Curious Classroom Book Study: Investigate Ourselves and Our Classmates

This chapter is about the relationships that need to be developed and sustained in order to create a collaborative environment for inquiry.  It’s about providing structures to “work explicitly on both identity (Who am I?) and acquaintance (Who are we?).”  The author reminds us that, “We can take affirmative steps from the start of the year to dramatically raise the odds of growing a collaborative group of students who can take responsibility for challenging and cooperative inquiries all year long.”

Included are activities for creating “me charts” such as identity maps, partner venns,  and pie charts.  You’ll also find ideas for exploring differences through a game called Step in, Step Out, and for those serving highly diverse populations, suggestions on ways to have children share their first languages. Lastly, there are several pages devoted to developing morning greeting rituals as a means of building community and getting your day off to a great start!

The mapping activities shared in the beginning of this chapter, might be a bit challenging for most beginning kindergartners. So here’s a Heart Map I’ve used, in case you also work with young children, and are looking for something a bit simpler.

Children can use this map to draw and/or write what is “inside their hearts” while finding out what is near and dear to each other.

For me, one of the most important thoughts included in this chapter, comes at the end when the author reminds us that, “building a community isn’t just a first-week-of-school-thing.”  While beginning-of-year, get-to-know-you type of activities definitely have their place (you can find mine here), it’s been my experience that providing time for a daily meeting to talk with the children about current classroom happenings such as project work, behavior, or home-school connections is essential to building the relationships necessary for inquiry work.  Through this structure, children share ideas, contribute to problem solving, and come to know that their contributions are valued.  You can read about my journey toward this type of meeting here!

I appreciated the section in this chapter on developing a morning greeting ritual as I think mine could use a little work! I like the idea of the dance party, but also might consider something a little more mellow such as Cosmic Yoga.

It also makes me think of an idea that has stayed with me for a long time, but I have yet to try, which is simply having the children engage with books upon arrival.  Check out this video by kindergarten teacher and author Sue Kempton, who writes a lot about this morning book time in her books, The Literate Kindergarten and her more recent work, Let’s Find Out!  I’ve also seen (and I can’t remember where) the idea of a “book blanket,” which was a circular blanket laid out each morning for the children upon arrival and filled with books for them to explore – such a lovely, welcoming idea!

Your Turn

Chapter 1: Demonstrate Your Own Curiosity
Chapter 2: Investigate Ourselves and Our Classmates
Chapter 3: Capture and Honor Kids’ Questions
Chapter 4: Begin the Day with Soft Starts
Chapter 5: Check Our News Feed
Chapter 6: Hang Out with an Expert
Chapter 7: Pursue Kids’ Own Questions with Mini-Inquiries
Chapter 8: Address Curricular Units with Mini-Inquiries
Chapter 9: Lean Into a Crisis