Happy International Dot Day! We had a blast celebrating today in our classroom. Read on to find out about all the different things we did to celebrate.
I had sent home a note asking the children to come dressed in dots and they did not disappoint. This group of girls were covered in dots. How cute is this little sweeties hair? Her mom used M&M barrettes and used cupcake liners to make dots around her buns. It was just too cute. One of my little boys came with orange dots all over his face. It was great to see them get into the spirit of the day.
We started our day listening to Peter Reynolds The Dot on the Smartboard. I have shared the link on my Facebook page but you can also find it here for future reference. This is a great animated version.
We spent a bit of time afterwards talking about the message in the story which I think is to persevere and don't give up. This is a great lesson for first graders who are prone to the "I can'ts". We discussed how Vashti kept trying and discovered that she really was a good artist. We talked about how that works for learning to do anything in the classroom too. I will continue to revisit this valuable lesson over and over again.
Next, we listened to the Dot Song. You can find it {HERE} or {HERE} with actions. It is a catchy little song that the kids enjoyed singing.
Next up it was time for dot fun. Our first activity was a dot scavenger hunt. Everyone looked for dots and then I took pictures of the dots they spotted. They had not problems finding them in our classroom. Here is a collage of a few of the dots we found. In the past I have had the students draw the objects but I decided on the pictures this year.
After a short break for recess we were ready for some dot art! I set up 5 stations with items the students could use to make a dot art piece. I did provide some direction but left it somewhat open ended as well. These were the stations:
1. Trace a circle - Students traced and coloured circles to create a dot picture.
2. Dot pictures - using circle counters (bingo chips and two sided counters) make a picture on a piece of paper. They were able to draw a background or add detail and then I would take a picture of their creation. This one was the most difficult. None of my students were able to really make anything here.
3. Kadinsky circles - I precut with my circle punches 3 different sizes of circles and showed them some Kadinsky circles. Many replicated his work while others made totally different and beautiful dot art with these circles.
4. Paint a dot - We used little plastic shot glasses from the dollar store and water bottle lids glued on to corks to make circles on our paper. The children could create any design they could imagine.
5. Marker dots - Draw a dot with markers
At the same time I worked with a few at a time to make a page for our 10 Black Dots book. I never took any pictures of the pages but will do so tomorrow and update the blog.
Here are a few of the masterpieces they created.
We also celebrated Dot Day in Math. Part of that time was the 10 Black Dots book page and the other was graphing with Smarties.
At the end of the day we went outside and played with bubbles since they are round and look like a dot too. The kids enjoyed blowing bubbles to end the day. Dot Day was a huge success. Here is a look at our Bulletin Board to celebrate and showcase our Art.
Did you celebrate Dot Day? I would love to hear about your day. Link up your blog below and include the image at the start of my blog in your post and link back to this post so that others can read all about your Dot Day.
Thanks for stopping by!
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