Airport 126 has been quite a busy space in our classroom over the past few weeks! With flights going to Florida, China, Germany, Australia and beyond, our students have not only adopted particular roles which they felt were important (e.g. ticket agent, flight announcer, pilot, co-pilot, passenger, security guard, flight attendant), but they have truly shown eagerness and enthusiasm towards participating in this new transformed learning space.

Thank you to my wonderful Aunt who is a Travel Agent, for visiting our classroom and teaching us about what travel agents do, what belongs and doesn't belong in a suitcase, and surprising us with luggage tags, ticket holders and our very own airplane model! Your visit sparked lots of conversation around vacations and the steps to take once you arrive at an airport. Many of our students enjoyed sharing their own personal experiences from visiting places around the world and drawing and writing about them.  

This post highlights the student-led advancements within our dramatic play area as we continue to learn more 

about airplanes and airports! 

Here are some of the exciting additions to our learning space:

1. "Role Tags": Students decided that in order for everyone to know what role they are playing, they need a tag (e.g. ticket agent, pilot, co-pilot, etc). These are just simple clip-on plastic tag sleeves whereby students have written down each role.

2. Personal Passports: L.D. mentioned during a mini lesson that he needed a passport in order to go on his trip with his family. That comment led to much excitement as other students were able to make connections to having passports also. To support their idea, my DECE and I created a simple template for them to use. Each student filled out their passport and whenever they visit a new place, they get a sticker inside their passport to symbolize where they've been! It's been a hit!

3. Seat numbers: After reading many books about airplanes during our shared reading and read-aloud time, A.C., I.D., and C.M. decided that it was important for passengers to know what seat to sit in so they created seat numbers for the backs of our chairs. This also made it easier to fill in our Airline tickets!

T.B. (JK) decided to sort the airport word cards
around the carpet based on the first letter of
every word! Students saw and began reading all the
different vocabulary cards and making connections
to our airport! 

4. Luggage Scanner: After sharing A.C.'s creative representation of an "x-ray machine" at the Building and Constructing area to the class, she inspired a few students to make a plan for our giant cardboard box. R.L., T.B., I.D., J.S., and A.C. worked together to draw what they wanted our scanner to look like and what materials we would need to make it work. As a result, black streamers, tape and scissors were used to give it that realistic look! 

5. Security Computer and Checklists: I.D. brought in a book from home to share with the class that was all about airports. She noticed in the middle of the book that there was a picture of a luggage scanner! She also noticed that it needed a computer to see inside the luggage so she decided to create one to add to our airport. Similarly, a small group of SK's came up with the idea to make a checklist of "safe" and "not safe" items so that when luggage goes through the scanner, they can use the computer to check off what they see. Amazing!

This transformation of our dramatic play area has allowed us as educators to integrate, document and assess many curriculum expectations! Below are two short videos of three of our SK students (I.D., A.C., and S.M.) engaged at our ticket counter: 

(I apologize for the video being so small...it was much better quality on iMovie)

Oral Communication

BIG IDEA: Children are effective communicators.

1. Communicate by talking and by listening and speaking to others for a variety of purposes and in a variety of contexts. (1.2, 1.5, 1.7)

4. Communicate in writing, using strategies that are appropriate for beginners (4.1, 4.2, 4.3, 4.5)

Number Sense

NS1.3 Begin to make use of one-to-one correspondence in counting objects

NS1.4 Demonstrate an understanding of the counting concepts of stable order

Stay tuned for another update since we have another surprise visitor coming!

Blocks, Books and X-Ray Machines

Since the start of our airport a few weeks ago, our students have truly taken ownership over the learning space. In particular, the personal experiences and stories being shared by our students daily has really helped shape our learning and make the space meaningful to them. That being said, our students have found connections to each other which has allowed for an incredible sense of teamwork and creativity to flourish within our classroom! Moreover, with their interests and preferences at the forefront of our learning, collaborative projects are now underway to make our airport "more like a real one" (S.M.).

This post highlights the work of one of our SK students who used her schema, personal experiences and newly acquired knowledge to construct something spectacular in our Building and Construction area!

During our exploration time, A.C. decided to make an "x-ray machine" as part of our airport (now formally known as Airport 126). My amazing DECE and I noticed quite an interesting construction underway and wasted no time to jump in, dialogue and document her thinking. 

How it started... 

Here is how A.C.'s x-ray machine works:

Once A.C. was seen demonstrating how her x-ray machine works when scanning luggages at an airport, W.V. wanted to share his theory on how he thinks an x-ray machine works based on his personal experience at an airport:

Thank you to A.C.'s parents for letting us post these pictures since it truly helped make her thinking visible to all! 

How can an airplane fly?

Our Morning Meetings are always a wonderful opportunity for us as a class to reflect on the previous days learning, set goals for the day and share artefacts, sentimental items, and/or ideas and wonderments. With our classroom airport now up and running, our meetings have been filled with new and exciting learning moments and in particular, today's meeting was an extra special one! J.S. (one of our SK students) shared a "wonderment" that was brought up at home, specifically by his Dad:

How do the airplanes get up in the sky if they are so heavy and big?

What an excellent wonderment and it definitely got our students' minds-on to thinking about just how this could be! After some much needed "think time," our students were eager to share their theories behind such a puzzling concept. Here is what they had to say:

1. I know how they go up in the air. It's because they have a giant engine. - I.D.

2. I think an airplane can fly because of the wings because they are real wings. - R.L.

3. Well, you know the wings sore and then the pilot presses a special button and then it sores up in the air with the wings like a bird. - S.M.

4. I think it's the steering wheel that makes it fly because when you pull it into your belly button the plane goes up. We learned that from Daniel Cook. - J.S. (SK)

5. I think the airplanes go slow first, then they go faster, then faster, then even faster and faster and then it'll fly. - T.B.

6. The airplane are to go to the floor and then the wheels will turn and it go up the sky. - H.D.

7. Airplanes fly because it gets up in the air when the wheels go up into the plane because it is just in the sky now. - J.S. (JK)

8. Maybe when the airplane runs on the runway, it needs to go fast so that it can take off. - L.D.

9. I want to add to T.B.'s comment. Once it goes faster and faster before it's in the air you have to use the steering wheel because you have to pull it so that it will take off. - S.M.

10. It needs a ramp so it can fly. It has to be on the runway and then it goes straight and then it goes up and up and then it flies. - W.V.

11. When the bags go in the airplane's tummy, then it'll fly and now the machine will move and then the bags will move and in will go the airplane which makes it heavy but that's ok. - T.B.

How do you think airplanes fly?

Please leave a comment, idea, or question below because we would love to read your theories as we continue to investigate and learn more about airplanes!