How to make your own Sea Salt

"How does salt get into the sea?" - Josh McDonald

Thanks soooo much for your question Joshua McDonald!! Josh has since moved off to school but the children's curiosity to find out continues to buzz!!

Last week Judy managed to find clips about Salt Farms on You Tube and then managed to stumble across a step-by-step movie on how to extract the salt from the water....How cool is that!!

Kylie bought in some sea water on Tuesday and posed a question..."How do you think we will get the salt out of the water?"

Matthew Mansell thought it would be really easy because we could just pick it out with our fingers, but we tried that ... didn't work.

We then referred back to the clip... We had to boil it for 1 hour!! Whoa, that was a long time!!

But, an hour went by, and nothing. We had alot less water - (and we learnt a new word, EVAPORATION) but no salt.

Kylie put it on the range and continued to cook it for another whole hour!! What we found in the bottom of the pot was amazing...lots and lots of chystalysed salt!! Wow how amazing is that!!

After scraping it onto a tray, each child had a taste test...Hmmmm, pretty good actually!!

Another question was asked..."What are we going to do with the salt?"

Caitlin was VERY quick to suggest we put it on some hot chips, because that is what she likes to do with salt at home. Great suggestion Caitlin.

Friday came along and we had potato, parsnip AND kumara chips to prepare, cook and eat. Thanks to all my wonderful helpers today...peeling and chopping all those vegetables was pretty hard work we found out!! Ryan Fitchett deserves a special mention because he persevered and managed to cut ALL the potato chips up for us!! Thanks Ryan :)

I must say, the chips were so good...and the Sea Salt made them taste delicious, what a lovely treat for a Friday and a great way to wrap up the very salty experiment...BUT, we STILL aren't sure how the salt GETS INTO the sea...Does anyone have any ideas? Leave us a comment...We would love to hear from you.

Kylie, Judy and Christina

Green Thumbs...and fingers and toes!!

Have you seen our vegetable plots??? Make sure you check them out as the afternoon group have spent this week preparing, planting and watering the garden in anticipation that we will be able to harvest our very own kindergarten vegetables within the next term....

The children assisted as we worked the soil, made some holes and planted Carrot seeds, Radish seeds and Mesclun salad mix into the first planter.

Wednesday came along and it was time to plant the seedlings, Broccoli, Lettuce and Silverbeet. Yummo!! We will have to keep an eye on Sting as I'm sure he will try to grab a nibble on his travels!!

A group of children also chose to plant their own radish seeds to take home and watch the process of seed cultivation at home...There are still some at Kindergarten, did your child make one?? Check them out on the kitchen counter on Monday and take your one home, cheers!!

What a great opportunity to learn alongside our peers. Some children could also share with the group some of the vegetables that had been planted at their house recently...Awesome!! Joshua Munro shared that he had planted lots of vegetables but he was most excited about the Strawberries!! Guess what Josh, we have Strawberries growing at Kindergarten too. I wonder which ones will be ready first??

If you have a vegetable garden at home, we would love to see photos...another great way to promote discussion amongst the group. And for our families that have some kindergarten radish seed at home, we would LOVE if you could document the process through photos and stories and send them through to us....just a small challenge :)

Cheers guys,

Judy, Kylie and Christina

Check out these amazing 'Thinking Faces' ...

Now we can feel some serious thinking going on in the Project Room ... What could you do today girls ??? Questions & Questioning skills are our focus for Term 4. We already have had a thought provoking question shared: Josh McDonald wants to know 'How does salt get into the sea?' Can anyone help us .... leave us a comment. WE WANT TO FIND OUT MORE !!! Someone mentioned there is a salt farm in Marlborough? Let us know.

It's great to be back ... and it's great to have some warm weather at last. This week in morning meeting (aka Group Time) we have watched the progress of the Chilean Miners. The children have been VERY interested ... again lots of questions: How did they get there? How will they get out? We have shared some video footage before, after & during ... and we have had lengthy discussions about what the miners would need to 'survive'. And of course we have shared some snippets of the Commonwealth games ... GO THE SILVER FERNS (but not forgetting all the other sporting achievements). And of course we had to have a conversation about losing that ... LOG OF WOOD (aka Ranfurly Shield). So lots of discussions about current events ... fantastic.

Our Afternoon group has had LOTS of new faces. A warm welcome to Keira Moodie, Tara Zwies, Timata Ropata & Hannah Price ... great to have you amongst us. Because we have soooo many new children we are wondering in all our Parents could sit with us @ group time @ the end of the day. It provides a more settled & warmth to our end of the day.

The kindy newsletter has been e-mailed out to all our families along with our Term Evaluations ... let us know if you have received them. Would you like a Term Slide Show iDVD? Ask Kylie or Judy. Also we are wanting some ideas for our Term Planning & Programme ie local places to visit, community events or activities, visitors to the town (we were really disappointed about not being aware of Craig Smith (Wonky Donky author) was visiting Winton Library so PLEASE let us know ... we NEED you to share things with us.

Oh .... just about forget. Can you help with sweeping (a weekly roster is displayed on the noticeboard in the foyer) the children DO notice and it is also a great way to show the children how well we look after our Kindergarten & Morning/Afternoon Tea (rosters are currently on the sign-in desk) and also @ the end of the day could you ... grab a broom, clean some brushes, wipe a table, finish a puzzle or rake the sandpit ... anything to help would be GREAT.

Have a great weekend ...

Judy & Kylie

Haere Mai to all our new families!!

We have welcomed many new families into our Kindergarten family over the past few weeks so I just wanted to take this opportunity to welcome you all, it is so great to have you and both Judy and I look forward to getting to know your children and their family during their time at Kindergarten. To all our existing families, if you see a new face, please introduce yourself and make them feel welcome :)

We continue to have LOTS of changes in our rolls over the next few weeks, so please bare with us...it IS a big job, I'm sure you have noticed how many Kindy Birthdays we have had recently. They are such a neat way to share this very special time with the big 5 year old to be, and their families.

This week sees the end of our 'All About Me' programme for our morning session. I hope everyone has found this beneficial for your children. We had Jo Lilley and Amby the Ambulance from St John come to the Kindergarten yesterday and Jo was blown away with how many of the children knew their own addresses and phone numbers...Awesome ay!! Remember to keep working on remembering these with your children. You never know when they may need to use them to get help for themselves or someone else.

Also don't forget to return the 'All about Me' evaluation form please.

Have a great holiday everyone!!!

We will see you all back ready for yet another busy term on Monday the 11th of October!! Term 4 already...where has the year gone!!!

Kylie and Judy

We have been busy!!! Take a look....

What a busy past couple of weeks we have had here at Winton Kindergarten!!

We began with Maroon Friday for the morning group and a dress up day in the afternoon group with both days raising funds for the Red Cross Canterbury Earthquake appeal. Maroon Friday also worked in conjunction with the Rugby Southland initiative as they are asking all Southlanders to dig out their Maroon every Friday while the Stags hold the Ranfurly shield. Well done to Emma McCallum and Cameron Scully who remembered again today :) .

A big thanks to ALL who contributed to the Earthquake appeal, Winton Kindergarten collectively raised $76.60 - Fantastic!! Mother nature can be so unpredictable at times and I'm sure it has made everyone more aware of what they need to do to get their homes and families more prepared in case mother nature decides we need a bit of a shake up. We have talked lots about 'Turtle Safe' and finding a doorway or table to take cover under. We also have regular earthquake drills too. Talking about this at home will further ensure your children know exactly what to do in case of an emergency.

A big thank-you to the 6 parents who came along to help at the working bee last weekend. Our parent group organises these for us and they will occur once a term to ensure our grounds are presented to a high standard. Many hands make light work as they say so the more people we could get coming along to these would be fantastic. Keep an eye out on the notice board for the next one.

Yesterday the Morning children were invited to see the production of 'Snow White' at Limehills school. The senior school students were the stars of the show and to say our kindergarten children were mesmerised would be an understatement!! What a lot of time and effort put into such an event and were felt very privileged to be able to get a private viewing!! The children were also lucky enough to get to chat with the stars of the show afterwards and check out the set while they got their photo taken up on the stage. I'm sure there were LOTS of stories being told about Snow White over the dinner table last night. I wonder if anyone had Subway for tea.....???

Our Celebration of Learning evening was held last night too. What a great success this was once again. It's great to see so many Mums and Dads interested in what's happening at Winton Kindergarten. Both Judy and I are excited as our work in the 'Special Focus Kindergartens' continues to progress and we really appreciate your input into your children's education. I have posted a couple of the clips that we talked about last night on the BLOG too for anyone who missed them. Also if you haven't already received one, for the people that came along there is a chocolate frog waiting for you in the office :) See Kylie!!

Something Daryl, our Parent Group president thought after listening to Johan and Joyce speak was getting our parents to sponsor our very own stoat trap. How cool would that be, getting regular updates as we found out how many stoats and rats our trap had eradicated. Food for thought!!

We also discussed the differences between 20th century education and 21st century education and my goodness what a difference. Technology use on both schools and kindergartens has increased remarkably in the last 10yrs which is proving to be very beneficial for our children. If you have any questions from the evening, feel free to ask

Again, thanks all for coming, and we can't wait for the next one!!

Like I said we have been busy!!

Till next week,

Ka kite ano

Kylie and Judy

21st Century Education vs. 20th Century Education