How do our senses work together to help us live?-Sense of sight and touch

This week, we have been learning all about our 5 senses and how they work together. Yesterday, we experienced what life may be like if we were blind. The students realized very quickly how dependent they were becoming on the other 4 senses. We continued that exploration today:

This was our morning message this morning.

Their responses are in green (1. No, they need glasses; 2. No, we would have to read the book to them, and 3. Yes, if they could get new eyes.)

We moved into our wonder of the day:

I realized very quickly, that most of my students had no background knowledge of Braille.

Next, we completed a mystery box activity where students had to guess what was inside the bag without looking. Students recorded their predictions on the posters. Once again, they realized how closely each of our senses work together.

After exploring and sharing the predictions on the posters, we pulled the mystery items out of the bags!

Next, we learned about an incredible man named Erik who hiked to the top of Mt. Everest.  This alone is incredible, but the coolest part about it, is that Erik is completely blind. His story is completely incredible! If you would like to read more about his story, please click the link below.

http://inspiremykids.com/2011/erik-weihenmayer-achieving-the-peak-of-success-literally/

One of the pictures on his website was a picture of Erik reading. At this point, we went back to our morning message and wonder of the day. I asked the students, "what did you use to figure out the items in the mystery bags?" They of course replied that they used their sense of touch. I then asked the students again, "knowing that, how do you think people who are blind can read?" This was when the light bulbs starting going off! One student responded, "by touching!" Another student added, "by touching those dots maybe..." This is when I introduced the term Braille and showed them examples. The students felt the letters that would make their names using the Braille alphabet card. 

At this point, we went back to our wonder of the day and wonder journals to write the answers to our questions we had asked this morning.

Right before we went to lunch I asked the students, "What would happen if we had a student at Oakland who was blind? Do you think we have Braille around our school?"  All of the kids said, "No!!" We decided to search for Braille in Oakland on our way to the cafeteria.  To our amazement, every classroom has Braille outside of it!

My kindergartener's continue to amaze me each and every day! I hope you enjoyed reading about and seeing pictures from all of our learning today!