Big Bro's Coral Reef

At about the time Little Bro was wrapping up his first work of the morning, Big Bro decided to get going with his work...finally, after about twenty-five minutes later than Little Bro.

Had been sooooooo tempted to insist that he should get to it (find that it is more of a challenge sometimes to trust the process when it is my own child than when it is a student) but I held back and just hoped and prayed that what should happen would happen and that he would have the want to do it and then, he did...and boy, did he work!

Big Bro had selected to do some morning work from a seek and find sea life book.
He was fascinated by the Diving for Treasure page and the Coral Reef page, so he focused mostly on those his entire time.
He wanted cards to go along with the pages, so that he could better keep track of what he had found and could chart how many animals he had found.
Big Bro asked me if I would help him make some of the cards, so I did.
Since he is quickly becoming a voracious reader, Big Bro wanted to see all of the names of the sea creatures to learn them and to see if he could read all of them.

When Big Bro wrapped up his sea life seek and find work, he really wanted to make a coral reef
with either some paint or dough, as he wanted it to "be 3D and to look like a real coral reef."

Told Big Bro about some work that could look like coral, so he asked to see it.
We looked at Ms. Dyer's salt paintings on her lovely blog and then, Big Bro got busy...he mixed up some salt, some red and yellow paint, and then, he dipped some pipe cleaners into the paint.
( A big thanks to Ms. Dyer, as seeing your blog really made him want to use salt paint...he and I both love the work on your blog).

Big Bro wasn't sure as to how to affix the salt painted pipe cleaners to the paper.
First, he smeared the paper with the salt paint and laid the pipe cleaners on top...then, he decided to top it off with some Tacky Clear Gel.
Big Bro added some tissue paper scraps from yesterday and voila!
A coral reef!

While his reef work was drying, Big Bro decided to take his sea turtle he had created last night and wanted to add it to the reef.
He decided that it didn't look right, that the colors were too light on the turtle, so he got out some pastel chalks and did a wet brush painting of the chalk onto his turtle.
Turned out to be a very cool project.

We wrapped up our morning with some very informal, authentic assessments for math.

Have decided to keep several subject area journals to document Big Bro's progress, along with a portfolio, so that we will better be able to see his growth in all areas.