Term 3 2019, Liverpool Public School – Week 7

The students finalised their art works for the story they wrote with Harri at the beginning of the term. Every student has chosen his/her part of the story and made an artistic representation.

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A mum has chosen to draw the deep dark cave. Most of the students drew or created a candy that they imagined would be at the candy land.

Some students made the magical globe, others made the Marshmallow wand. Some students preferred to finalise their sweet creature masks.

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Term 3 2019, Liverpool Public School – Week 6

Today we were filming for the first time. It was wild but very fun! I had brought a huge amount of costumes. The really enjoyed dressing up in a variety of different costumes and filming outside.

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Some people stayed inside and made props like the villain’s staff, a big monster artwork and the magical globe. They looked great and were super creative! Some of the mums went all out making cool backdrops in texta marker that we will hang on the walk next week.

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Term 3 2019, Liverpool Public School – Week 5

This week our aim was to get the narration for our movie recorded. I brought along a microphone which connected to my laptop. The kids absolutely loved recording themselves and found it hilarious but also took it seriously. They learnt some mic technique and pacing.

They got excited about learning some lines in different languages and were trying to translate on the go. Some are going to go home and ask their parents for help. We have Arabic, Kurdish, Hindi, Yoruba and Serbian just from today! Looking forward to that being included in the film.

We split into groups today because we needed to record somewhere quiet. There were a few new kids and they enjoyed participating in the narration.

Term 3 2019, Liverpool Public School – Week 4

We started with colouring our sweet creatures - which most people did for the whole session, in such a relaxed way, with parents and our volunteers. The kids enjoyed slowly choosing the exact colour they wanted and they really made some masterpieces!!

We then read the story and lots of the girls joined in to dramatically read it out.

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We then did some glockenspiel playing.

I wrote the cave song and the candy land song on the board and we worked hard to get it right. The kids enjoyed focusing on getting it right and enjoyed doing the note sliding glissando.

I tried to get the group playing the music together! It was tricky for them to play different parts of the song at the same time to accompany each other but they did really well when we passed the melody one by one around the group. We even did it backwards! It was nice to see parents playing instruments.

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Term 3 2019, Liverpool Public School – Week 3

Today’s session was great! We had a new family, a mum and two girls who were very keen and loved their time at Wandering Books. They said they “adored it” and “really really loved being creative”. They enjoyed the music and art equally.

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We played glockenspiels today, the kids wanted to learn twinkle twinkle little star so I wrote it on the board and we worked on it together and separately. They enjoyed playing it for the group one by one. Some needed encouragement as they found it a little hard but seemed very chuffed and rewarded when they did get it.

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The kids coloured in these beautiful sheets. These are going to be the candy land creatures. It was very relaxing and we all sat, sometimes in complete silence, colouring. The kids were begging not to leave and saying it felt like ten minutes only had passed!

Term 3 2019, Liverpool Public School – Week 2

We had some new glockenspiels today which the kids were very excited about. We did some improvising - call and response.

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The kids all expressed how quickly an hour feels and didn’t want to leave! I think because they are used to mostly just doing the art plus a tiny bit of writing or other stuff at the end it feels a bit different. Today we started with story writing, then music then art. They made more props for candy land. Big chocolates, little chocolates, sparkling candy canes, lollipops etc.

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Term 3 2019, Liverpool Public School – Week 1

The first week had a great turn out! The kids were extremely excited that we were back and were saying how much they missed Wandering Books.

The kids were excited about the idea of making a story, acting, singing, dancing and making costumes and were still so enthusiastic about making art.

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They started a story they thought was very cool, with ugly monsters and candy land and cute creatures learning not to judge a book by its cover!

The kids loved opening up our creative arts box and finding all the art supplies. They made candy for their candy land such as a giant cupcake which they worked on together and sparkling candy canes.

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Time flew and they were trying to hang around as long as they could!

Term 3 2019

This Term in Wandering Books, we are creating our own video from scratch! Our story is called "Candy Land" and it's about not judging a book by its cover. We wrote the story together as a group, and we are narrating it in different languages, creating the set designs and costumes, acting in it and even making the music!

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Term 4 2018, Liverpool Public School - Week 7

The kids made their invitation cards using the stickers Afaf kindly printed in English and Arabic. I had leftover scraps of glitter foam that the kids used to make frames and hearts and other decorations. We also had some leftover stickers.

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I brought a big roll of brown paper and some of the kids laid down and we traced the shape of their bodies. They loved this a lot and all wanted a turn but we ran out of paper! I think we did about 4 or 5 kids. All the kids who were still left gathered around the body and I asked them questions and they wrote their answers. They really seemed to enjoy it and were asking for more questions!

I asked:

• How do you feel when you are at Wandering Books?

• What do you enjoy doing at Wandering Books?

• What other things would you like to do next year or what could we do better?

• What was something you learnt?

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We had lovely positive feedback about the art and how much they enjoyed it.

Term 4 2018, Marsden Road Public School – Week 7

Today was one of the most lovely afternoons I’ve ever had with this group. It was a smaller group than usual which meant the kids all got way more attention and they thrived on that.

We made beautiful name artworks with glitter foam and stickers and textas and some random junk stickers I found at reverse garbage which the kids loved!

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Some of the kids started playing a game where they would write on the big orange junk stickers what I had done that was naughty. Then they stuck it on me and made me “go to jail” (ie. the storeroom) while laughing their heads off! I would pretend to cry and say I didn’t do anything wrong.

They would sometimes come into the room, hitting me with a soft noodle toy and laughing. I would put my arm theatrically out of the door and say “no no I’ll be good I promise!”. Then I would come out and bow and they would say “good show!” and clap. It was very hilarious. It was really cool to see them work together to spell the things to write on the naughty sticker and they were so engaged with doing it.

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We then sang a lot to Herman the Worm on YouTube which I didn’t think the kids would know but they did and luckily they loved it. Then the kids got to choose songs to sing or dance to. It was so cute. They were really into those dancing ones where it shows you the dance (from a game I think) and were enthusiastically dancing along!

All the parents seemed very happy and relaxed. All round today felt extremely relaxed and like a happy family. Everything felt calm but also fun and connected.

Term 4 2018, Marsden Road Public School – Week 6

This week was a fairly crazy week! We set up the room for painting and luckily managed to make no mess- phew! I was a little worried about getting paint on the carpet.

The kids enjoyed painting. Some used their hands, some did landscapes and intricately mixed colours to make new colours.

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We did some stuff with the boomwhackers but it was just so crazy. I got them to copy me in a rhythm exercise. Then we went around the circle and one by one played a little something. The kids were ok at not interrupting but struggled to be chill when it wasn’t their turn!

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I let them go in groups and come up with something to show the rest of us. This was fun. The coolest part of this bit was when all the kids spontaneously lined up all their boomwhackers into one long instrument and got me to sing into it. They were hysterically laughing and taking turns listening into the end. We then took turns showing the group what we had come up with. They ended up being mostly individuals obviously making something up on the spot but it was cool and super cute.

Term 4 2018, Liverpool Public School - Week 5

Today we painted echidnas with cotton buds and recited and wrote new stories.

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Everyone participated in the painting. Most kids made echidnas, some made bushes and leaves or landscapes. Some kids painted then folded the paper which looked so cool. Thanks to WSMRC who brought the paint, drop sheets and cups. Tomorrow we will use paper plates instead of cups as they were hard to clean.

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The new team were great and so proactive! The kids were demanding my attention from every angle today “Harri Harri”, “miss!”, “Mr!”, “Mr Henry!” so I couldn’t be there for everyone at all times. The team were great at being involved. It was a bit of a bigger clean up than usual due to the paints but we did it quickly and with excellent team work!

Term 4 2018, Marsden Road Public School – Week 5

We had a wonderful session today. We were going to make characters to tell stories with. I had made an example SpongeBob that I copied from the kids at Liverpool the previous week!

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I liked today that the kids kind of did want they wanted and were very free. Most did make characters but in all different ways. Some just drew characters, others used lots of those recycled seafood stickers again, others did lots of cutting and pasting, and some even religiously coloured a single colour for long stints at a time to achieve what they wanted to make!

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At the end of the session we played dress ups out on the outdoor stage with a huge amount of dress ups I had brought. The kids loved it. They even dressed me up! They took turns wearing different costumes and some of the parents and Afaf got involved too. They were running around and laughing. Some of the kids tried to look scary, others were being royalty with crowns. They kept asking me to take pictures of them!

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Term 4 2018, Liverpool Public School - Week 4

Had a lovely afternoon. The kids made characters/puppet-esque things. It was nice being so free and they got really creative! All the kids did things so different to one another and it was really cool to see. They got really into it and were more focused on that than on story stuff for a good chunk of time.

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We then re read our chapters and then I gave the kids a sheet on “make your own story” which had words they could fill out. I tried to make a mix of easy descriptors like I sat down on my ___ bed (comfy, cosy, soft, hard, warm, etc.) and then more free things like In Big Brother’s dream he saw ___________ (and left lots of space). The kids were so sweet doing it. The hall went silent and kids were spread around the room, lying on the floor, up on the stage just writing and writing.

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Term 4 2018, Marsden Road Public School – Week 4

We had a lovely day today. The kids coloured in these cute boxy designed Australian animals. While most of them coloured, I invited any interested kids to come and extend the story with me - writing the new chapter.

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We then went outside to play word games with chalk, however the kids got so excited about the chalk that they just wanted to do their own things which was fine with me. I played one word game with some of the kids. They drew a big circle around them and when I would call out a letter they would have to write down as many words that started with that letter as they could. They seemed to enjoy it, and it was good team effort with them calling out words.

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Term 4 2018, Liverpool Public School - Week 3

We put brown paper out over all the tables and the kids loved this. Some drew mountains and trees and bush, etc to fit the story. Others drew whatever they felt like. It mostly fit with the stories. The kids and parents seemed to really enjoy the freedom. Lots of the parents drew beautiful things.

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The kids got really into the story writing and reading on the stage. At first, we read the stories we wrote last week together. Then we started writing a story together. The kids were so eager to write and didn't want to take turns, so they wrote their own chapters and read them out. This was a huge hit! Interestingly the kids mostly wrote quite everyday stories about how big brother would be feeling and acting, and then the consequences. They loved reading them out and all wanted to read each other's too!

Term 4 2018, Marsden Road Public School – Week 3

We set up two long tables and covered them in brown paper for the kids to draw a backdrop on for them to read the book in front of and to use in the book as backgrounds. The kids weren't super into it. I think they like having their separate things, which is interesting to note.

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I tried to do some music stuff with the kids but only some were interested. I wrote three different kinds of notes on the board (clap, tap and rest in musical notation) and they did it with me.

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Term 4 2018, Liverpool Public School - Week 2

We made koalas with newspaper and book rippings. We then read the story together with one of the parents which the kids loved. They seemed to love it when he would read in his thick Indian accent and would look up at him the whole time!

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We then made up a new chapter of the story which the kids absolutely loved and had a lot of fun doing! The kids took turns reading the new story while being filmed and then Afaf filmed us all reading it together. It was amazing how well some of the year 1s could read!

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Term 4 2018, Marsden Road Public School – Week 2

Today was a hot afternoon and the kids were very quiet and relaxed for the most part. We made koalas from paper, pens and Arabic newspaper rippings. It was very sweet and the kids got so creative. I liked seeing them really take their time and care with their artworks. Some kids only worked on their artwork the whole session.

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The Arabic newspapers were a hit and the kids were getting scraps for me to read. They loved seeing me try! Wondering if we should always have some there?

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Term 4 2018, Liverpool Public School - Week 1

Today went great! The kids came and just started colouring Australian animals to put on headbands straight away. Some of them didn't even take their bags off - just sat there with bags and hats on, happily colouring!

After some colouring we sat together and read the story. The kids and parents enjoyed it. Almost all the kids and parents came to sit then went back to their art afterwards.

The kids are very excited about the book idea and particularly about taking books home! I think it's going to be a very cute outcome!

Some parents just sat on the side, other parents coloured with kids and others stood around engaging at times and taking photos.