Ioan and Finn suggested making a weather wheel to use. As always, I wanted this to be child led, so they had a conversation, planning all of the steps they would need to go through, to make their weather wheel independently. Then they went on a hunt to find the resources they required.
Resources
- Recycled cardboard boxes
- Pencil
- Felt tipped pens
- Little Brian paint sticks
- Ruler
- Scissors
- Paper fastener split pin
Method
Ioan drew a ‘pizza slice’ on our cardboard, then cut it out. Finn worked out that they wanted 8 different types of weather, so drew round the cut out slice eight times to make the different sections. Then they were ready to start drawing their weather imaged on.
Finn drew on his storm cloud for his thunder and lightening.
Ioan coloured in the rainbow.
They were concentrating so hard that Cian (18 months) came to investigate what was going on to keep them so quiet. He stood in the doorway and snored, to indicate that he thought the were asleep, then climbed up to see what they were up to.
Once Cian had given Ioan a kiss, he ran round to the other side of the table shouting, “Bubba!” (brother) to get a kiss from Finn too. Then Cian helped himself to some cardboard and pointed at his high chair, asking me to lift him up. As usual, he was much more interested in trying to get the lids on and off the felt tips than actually using them, but he was happy and felt included in their activity.
Whilst Finn was drawing his sunshine and cloud, he explained that he wasn’t going to colour this cloud in grey, “Because grey clouds are dark and full of rain, on a sunny day the clouds are white and fluffy.”
Ioan drew the wind, then a snowy scene. Finn was a bit upset because he’d hoped to do the snow. Even though it was Ioan’s turn to draw the picture, he kindly let Finn draw some snow, which left Finn grinning from ear to ear.
Finn drew the rain cloud and decided to draw a stripy umbrella underneath. He said, “I do like splashing in puddles, but I like playing in the paddling pool more. I hope we don’t need this picture too soon!”
Ioan drew the sun. Meanwhile, Finn spotted he’d not coloured his dark cloud in on his rainy picture. He fixed that, then drew his cloudy day.
Once they’d drawn all their weather images, they moved on to the second piece of card. This was the one they’d cut a pizza slice out of. Ioan wrote the word, “Weather” and they alternated painting the letters with their Little Brian paint sticks.
Ioan loves these paint sticks, he enjoys painting but doesn’t like getting dirty, making these perfect for him. Finn and Cian definitely prefer ordinary paint, they spend hours squelching it with their hands and feet during messy play.
They added some weather symbols, “Just so you still know what it is if you can’t read.”
Ioan used a pencil to poke a hole through both layers of cardboard, then Finn turned the cardboard over and pushed a paper fastener split pin through.
He separated the two tines of the legs and bent them over to secure the two pieces of cardboard. This holds the pin in place and the sheets of cardboard together. The top piece of cardboard now rotated round.
Note: If you find the cardboard gets stuck, or snags, on the split pin, then just remove the pin and make the hole slightly larger. When you reinsert the pin it should turn round more smoothly.
Finn demonstrated how their weather wheel works.
DfES Outcomes for EYFS and National Curriculum (2013)
Science Year 1 programme of study
Seasonal changes
- observe and describe weather associated with the seasons and how day length varies.
Design and Technology in Key Stage 1
Design
- design purposeful, functional, appealing products for themselves and other users based on design criteria
Make
- select from and use a range of tools and equipment to perform practical tasks [for example, cutting, shaping, joining and finishing]
- select from and use a wide range of materials and components, including construction materials, textiles and ingredients, according to their characteristics
Evaluate
- explore and evaluate a range of existing products
- evaluate their ideas and products against design criteria
Technical knowledge
- build structures, exploring how they can be made stronger, stiffer and more stable
- explore and use mechanisms [for example, levers, sliders, wheels and axles], in their products.
