This week our eager, creative kindergarteners happily re-examined some beautiful autumn leaves while we read Lois Ehlert’s Red Leaf Yellow Leaf. Then I handed back the colorful tissue collages they had made two weeks ago. They were skeptical when I asked them to turn over their papers, trace two leaves on the back, then cut them out. I was most impressed with the tenacity and determination with which each and every child tackled both the tracing and the cutring, as neither was an easy task. The best thing of all was the way friends stepped up and offered to help one another, by holding the leaves steady for each other as they traced. There was a true spirit of cooperation and focused effort in the room all morning. When the children flipped over their cut leaf shapes, they were delighted by the colorful suprise on the other side. The final step was to glue them onto one of their wet on wet watercolor backgrounds that they painted a few weeks ago. These will surely catch your eye at our Spring Art Exhibit.
