What can you see?

After joining the "Twitterverse" at the end of last year, I have been overwhelmed and completely inspired by the other educators who I have connected with. Not only does this type of social media represent a "digital staffroom" for those in education, but it is such a springboard to gain new insights, build connections, and share our learning around the world!

In particular, Angie Harrison, a Kindergarten teacher from Lake Simcoe Public School, had a brilliant idea on her blog that I thought our class could be a part of! She states, "Ever wonder what other teachers or children see when they look out their windows?" Her philosophy behind this question is to give our students an opportunity to gain an understanding of the world around them and broaden their perspectives that other children may see different things in their backyards. With this in mind, her Kindergarten class and teaching team created a digital book that illustrates and documents all that they see in their schoolyard.

So here's what we did! In order to get our students' "minds-on" to this notion of "what can we see out of our classroom window?," we decided to share Mrs. Harrison's Kindergarten Class' video and see if our students could make any connections to the similarities and differences between our schoolyard and theirs. Here is what they had to say:

"We don't have a pond or a farm in our schoolyard." - I.D.

"We have a soccer field but ours looks different." - J.S. (SK)

"We don't have bull rushes like Mrs. Harrison's class." - I.D.

"We have a basketball net!" - W.V.

"We see many trees in our park." - T.B.

"We have bushes too!" - V.D.

"We have trees." - A.M.

"We have a playground too." - R.L.

"We have a fence around our playground like they do." - W.F.

"We have lots of leaves on our trees too." - L.D.

"We can see a park." - R.F.

"We have a parking lot too with lots of cars." - L.D.

Our students' responses were amazing and their excitement and enthusiasm to create our own class book to show Mrs. Harrison's class was evident so we didn't waste any time getting them outside and calling out all that they saw! With cameras in hand, Ms. Theis and I took a ton of photographs to which we have compiled into our own digital class book! 

Our hope is to continue to connect with Mrs. Harrison's Kindergarten class and hopefully host some SKYPE sessions whereby our students can have the opportunity to talk about, listen, and learn from other students in another community. Who knows? Perhaps we can even make connections to another school from around the world? Stay tuned!