Group Learning Experience Planning Sheet:

Student Name: Jessica Edwards Course Code: ECS4070

Age Group: 4 to 5 years. Date: November 10th, 2017

Learning Experience: Social-Belonging Activity- Remembrance Day Peace Dove
Programming Purpose:

Due to Remembrance Day 2017 falling on a saturday, the school is having their
Remembrance day ceremonies on Friday November 10th. Due to the subject matter of the
event the kindergarteners have their own individual discussions about remembrance day in
their classrooms rather than attending the schools ceremony. This discussion may be the first
time that the children are introduced to the topic of death, war and other serious topics. Earlier
in the week the staff in the classroom and I discussed different positive and fun activities we
can include during the day that can stress the importance of remembrance Day but also
introduce positive concepts such as peace and unity, as some of the topics discussed can been
frightening.
Objective:
The children will:
1) Engage in sensory play when using bingo dabbers and ink stamps to make colourful
thumb prints.
2) Engage in an active and open discussion about peace and other concepts related to our
remembrance day activities.
3) Practice fine motor skills when using bingo dabbers, ink pads and when signing their
name on the dove art work.
Materials Used:

Large Bristol Board Sheet

Black Sharpie Marker
Bingo Dabbers in various colours
Non-toxic ink pads in various colours
Pencil
Set Up:

Chair
Bingo
Dabber
Table

Ink Pad

Dove
Artwork

Implemented Activity

1. I invited three students who I knew had an interest in writing to help me write the word
peace on the top of our bristol board sheet.
2. I drew a pencil sketch of peace dove image and outlined the drawing in black marker
so that the space children were putting their thumbprints inside was clear.
3. The three students who wrote the title on the bristol board placed down their
thumbprints first, using an ink pad, our dabbing ink onto their thumb with a bingo
dabber and placing three or more thumbprints inside the dove outline.
4. The three children then stamped a thumb print on the bottom half of the bristol board,
below the dove and signed their name beside it.
5. I then asked the three students to invite three more friends to the table. The next three
students arrived and made their thumbprints, and signed their names.
6. At this point I decided to invite children on my own in order to keep track of who had
already participated. This including inviting the children to explore the bingo dabbers
and ink pads, and how they could create thumbprints with multiple colours. I also
invited children who had questions about our remembrance day discussion to share
them with me while they helped us with our peace dove.
 7. This continued until all 23 of the children in the classroom had added their thumbprint
to the peace dove. Some children with sensory issues who did not want to put the ink
on their fingers used the bingo dabbers like a stamper to add to the dove.
8. At this time the staff and myself added our thumbprints and signatures to the piece.
9. Some interested children and myself added extra thumbprints to help fill in any blanks
areas in the dove illustration.
10. I hung the piece outside the classroom in our Remembrance Day ___ Remembers
display.

Learning Strategy #1
Questions

While the children were working on this project I wanted to allow them to have an open
discussion about our remembrance day presentation. This includes answering their questions
and directing them to sources of more information if I was unable to answer their question. I
also wanted to explore the concept of peace in contrast to some of the darker topic we covered
that may have been upsetting for some of the children. Examples for questions from this
activity include:

____, do you know what the word peace means? What does peace man to you?
Do you have any questions about anything we talked about or saw today when we
learned about remembrance day?
How did you feel when we watched the music video about Remembrance day?
Learning Strategy #2
Invitations

As the children participated I chose to invite them to the table myself in order to keep track of
who had and who hadnt participated yet. Examples of invitations for this activity included:

Invite children who had questions about other topics related to Remembrance Day to
participate in the activity while we discussed their topics.
Inviting children to participate by opening a discussion about peace, and what peace
meant to them.
Inviting children to explore the ink pads and bingo dabbers about art materials.

Overall Evaluation
What worked during this experience? Why?

All of the children in the classroom were able to participate in the activity in some way,
 and sign their name as a piece of work that united the class and staff.
We were able to have an open discussion on the childrens thoughts and feelings about
the themes we discussed during our remembrance day activities.
The children were able to participate in a relaxing sensory/art activity after the
remembrance day discussion which was upsetting or confusing for some of the
students who were uninformed about, or deeply attached to some of the issues.

What did not work during this experience? Why?

The initial amount of thumbprints the children created didnt fill the dove completely.
The activity took up a alge portion of the day and due to the nature of the ink and the
mess it can creste I had to spend most of my time in one area of the classroom and
couldnt travel around as actively as I would typically like to.
What might you have done differently?

Supervise the activity from afar in order to be able to explore the classroom more and
speak with children who were participating in other activities.
Allow the children to draw and outline our peace dove as an added opportunity to
practice fine motor and literacy skills.