Chasing Rainbows

In the Gold Room, the students have been noticing rainbows. One day as we were writing at the table, the sun came through the crystals hanging in the windows made rainbows around the room. The Gold Room kids noticed that the rainbows moved as the sun moved. Then, when a student moved the crystals, the rainbows began to dance. We decided to try to find all things rainbow around our room.

Student: There is a rainbow right by my arm while we are making playdough.  It’s red like the playdough. It changes when you move your arm and more of the light shines in.

The Gold Room explorers were able to find rainbows in our room, in the music studio, while drawing with chalk outside, and many other places. They continued to use the crystals in the classroom to refract the sun light to make rainbows around the room. 

Student: You need the sunlight to scatter through the rain drops to make real rainbows.

Student: Let’s use these small candles in the rainbow color magna tiles and see if they make rainbows.  

As we searched for rainbows, we invited the children start to contribute to our classroom documentation. We invited the children start taking our photos for our documentation. Then, we looked at all the photos together, asking:

• Can you tell what we are researching in the Gold Room with these pictures?
• What would you take pictures of so others would know that you are noticing rainbows around our room?
• How should we display our photos?
• What other ways can we document our research?

We took a walk up and down the halls of the school to see what other classrooms showed for their documentation. 

Teacher: What do you think the Purple Room is talking about?
Student: Fish!
Student: The ocean.

As the children began to document our rainbow exploration, the explained their choices of what to photograph.

The children decided that another tool for documentation is observational drawing.  We created a Walking Rainbow to draw. First, we arranged cups in a circle, then we added water and coloring. Last, we used a paper towel to connect the cups.

Teacher: What do you think will happen?
Student: More colors. It’s red!
Student: It’s getting redder! They will be green.
Student: Why is it moving? It’s making purple.
Student: Are they pouring in?

After letting the experiment absorb for a day, the children were invited to draw what they saw.

Student: It’s a cup. I saw some cups. The paper takes the water. I am going to use purple and see if it changes.
Student: I am making the cups in a circle with flat in the middle. It’s sucking up the water.

Reflection by Vickie Crooks and Laura Cantrell, Gold Room Co-Teachers