Captured in a Woodland Forest
Once upon a time, on a spring night, a troop of fairies were visiting a woodland forest. Owls hooted and small animals were scurrying in the forest. The fireflies were dancing among the trees and the little fairies tried to catch them. When they got bored, they began to play tag. A hungry cat was stalking a mouse in the bushes when he got distracted by the darting fairies. He chased the fairies and when he caught one, he took it off to a cave to play. Meanwhile, the transformers were in their hideout testing their new supersecret spy equipment. They heard the fairies call for help. They grabbed their powers and flew to the aid of the fairies. They followed the trail of the cat and found him nibbling on the fairys leg. They used their powers to freeze the cat. Two of them returned the fairy to her troop. While the fairies were celebrating the return of their friend, the other transformers [used their powers again to] unfreeze the cat. Then they fed it some yummy cat food and took him back to his home.
Concurrently, the teachers were observing extended play in the block area and on the playground that focused on the building of ramps and catapults. They had also recorded childrens comments during the water-table activities described in Table 6.1 (sinking and floating). Among them were several comments about the amount of force it took to sink a boat and a loud argument about the power of water to move or control heavy objects.
Grayson: When I pressed on the boat, it went down.
Sami: When you push down, the boat always sinks.
Luke: Thats because your hand is heavy.
Zach: But boats can come back up.
Finn: Well, can water move things up?
Jon: No, that wont work because water wont go uphill.
Eli (shouting): Then how does it come out of the shower?
Finally, Mary and Jane realized that the children were very intrigued by a new feature of the physical environmenttwo large plastic barrels that had recently been installed on a platform on the playground for rainwater collection. The children intently observed what happened to the water after rain showers, asked many questions, and offered theories about how the barrels worked.