Gilberto goes out to play with the wind.  What he finds is Wind can be a moody friend.

Materials

• Several empty toilet paper tubes
• Plastic straws
• Several ping pong balls or large puffballs
• 26 Clothespins and a drying rack. If you do not have a drying rack, you could attach a piece of yarn to make a clothesline.

Vocabulary

• Invisible (You can not see it but it is still there)

Before Reading the Story

Ask the children to look out the window and tell you what they see.  If someone mentions that they see something that is moving ( a tree branch) ask them what they think is making it move.  Explain to the children that the wind is always moving things but that the wind is invisible. We can not see the wind but we can see what it is moving.  How else can we tell if the wind is around? (You can hear it, you can feel it)  Recite the following poem to the children.  The Wind, Christina Rossetti.

Who has seen the wind?

Neither I nor you;

But where the leaves hang trembling,

The wind is passing through.

Who has seen the wind?

Neither you nor I;

But when the trees bow down their heads,

The wind is passing by.

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; demonstrates increasing ability to attend to and understand conversations, stories, songs, and poems.

Reading the Story

As you read give the children opportunity to talk about similar experiences they might have had.

Science/Scientific Knowledge; expands knowledge of and abilities to observe, describe, and discuss the natural world, materials, living things, and natural processes.

After Reading the Story

This might be a good day to talk to the children about severe weather and your school policy in case of.  Do you and your children know what to do and where to go if there is a tornado?

Physical Health & Development/Health Status & Practices; builds awareness and ability to follow basic health and safety rules such as fire safety, traffic and pedestrian safety, and responding appropriately to potentially harmful objects, substances, and activities.

Discovery

Let the children use bubbles in the center today.  Give them small containers of solution.  You can make simple bubble blowers from pipe cleaners. As they blow the bubbles, talk about how their breath is like the wind and pushes the bubbles to move. (Blowing bubbles is difficult for children to learn to do. Show then how to gently blow by blowing on the back of their hand.

Science/Scientific Skills & Methods; begins to use senses and a variety of tools and simple measuring devices to gather information, investigate materials, and observe processes and relationships.

Music and Movement

Have the children stand up and spread out.  They should be standing far enough apart that with their arms outstretched they are touching nobody. As you recite the poem, Wind, the children can move their arms like a windmill round and round.

Blow and turn then blow again, Round and round the windmill spins.

Whooshing fast, then creaking slow

Come on wind and make us go!

(Play with moving your arms fast and slow).

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; demonstrates increasing ability to attend to and understand conversations, stories, songs, and poems.

Tell the children that you are going to pretend to be trees on a windy day.  Plant your roots into the ground because they are strong.  Use your arms to be the branches.  First the wind is just a breeze and you hardly move at all.  Then the wind gets gusty and you bend and over and come back up.  Then the wind gets blustery and you don’t know which way to move so your branches (arms) are swirling all around as you bend and come back up.

Creative Arts/Dramatic Play; participates in a variety of dramatic play activities that become more extended and complex. AND Language Development/Listening & Understanding; understands an increasingly complex and varied vocabulary.

Look back over the story and challenge the children and yourself to act out more wind scenarios.

Creative Arts/Dramatic Play; participates in a variety of dramatic play activities that become more extended and complex.

Blocks

Ask the children to build a fenced around a large area of your block center with the blocks. Inside the fenced area build small tunnels and halls. (Think mini golf course). After the children have finished building, give them each a ping pong ball and challenge them to blow it around the fenced area, trying to go under or through the blocks.

Approaches to Learning/Engagement & Persistence; demonstrates increasing ability to set goals and develop follow through on plans.

Art

Water down several colors of tempera paint.  Place a small spoonful onto a piece of paper.  The child uses a straw to blow the paint across the paper.  Make sure to have the children practice blowing out a few times before they begin.  Plastic straws work best.

Creative Arts/Art; gains ability in using different art media and materials in a variety of ways for creative expression and representation.

Library and writing

Make letters of the alphabet on pieces of paper (white like the white sheets in the story or fancy shirts).  Hang a clothesline and encourage the children to clothespin the letters to the line in the proper order.  Make sure to put out an alphabet line where the children can easily see it.

Literacy/Alphabet Knowledge; knows that letters of the alphabet are a special category of visual graphics that can be individually named. AND Identifies at least 10 letters of the alphabet, especially those in their own name.

Sand and Water

Put water into the table today with small boats. Encourage the children to pretend to be the wind and blow the boat across the water table.

Science/Scientific Skills & Methods; begins to use senses and a variety of tools and simple measuring devices to gather information, investigate materials, and observe processes and relationships.

Dramatic Play

Hang pictures of different kinds of weather events in the center for the children to use as a jumping board to their play. For a more permanent look, turn these pictures into window scenes.

Science/Scientific Skills & Methods; begins to use senses and a variety of tools and simple measuring devices to gather information, investigate materials, and observe processes and relationships.

Math and Manipulatives

Collect a variety of lightweight objects ( a feather, piece of yarn, paperclip, a leaf, a cotton ball, a piece of wadded up paper).  Show the children how to put the toilet tube over their mouth and blow hard!  Have the children take turns blowing the different objects.  For older children they can measure how far an object went by using a ruler or chain links.  Now add some heavier items.  How does the weight of an object affect the way it moves when it is blown?

Mathematics/Patterns & Measurement; shows progress in using standard and non-standard measures of length and area of objects. AND Science/Scientific Skills & Methods; develops increasing abilities to observe and discuss common properties, differences, and comparisons among objects and materials.

Outdoor Play

Look for evidence of the wind.  Do you see the wind moving anything?  Stand very still, is it moving anything on your body? Can you feel the wind upon your skin?

Science/Scientific Skills & Methods; develops increasing abilities to observe and discuss common properties, differences, and comparisons among objects and materials.

Bring your bubbles and wands outside. Can the children tell what direction the wind is blowing by looking at the bubbles floating? Can they pop the bubbles before they reach the ground? Can they catch a bubble on a bubble wand without popping it?

Physical Health & development/Fine Motor Skills; grows in hand-eye coordination in building with blocks, putting together puzzles, reproducing shapes and patterns, stringing beads, and using scissors.

Transitions

Tell the children that in the story the wind moved many objects.  Ask the children to recall something in the story that the wind moved or something from their own lives.

Literacy/Book Knowledge & Appreciation; demonstrates progress in a bilities to retell and dictate stories from books and experiences; to act out stories in dramatic play; and to predict what will happen next in a story.

Resources