Tips and
tricks for making mindfulness jars in a collaborative classroom.
Buy packs of bottled water.
I am not an advocate for buying bottled water and most definitely support
the reuse of jars. However, I have had a few troubles with getting children to bring
in their own jars from home. One is the lack of lids and another jars which
often happen to be too small. Many children regularly don’t bring in any jars
which in a collaborative classroom is usually around twenty percent. That’s quite
a few jars to source. So far using bottled water packs in a collaborative
setting for making mindfulness ‘jars’ has worked brilliantly because preparation
is minimised and the bottles are already full with water!
I have found that the most effective way of adding to the ‘jars’ is in
stations. (Eg. The food colour or dye table, the glue table and the glitter
table.)
Have the children name their own bottles with vivid before opening the
sealed lids.
When bottles are damp they do not take to being written on very well.
When the children name their own bottle beforehand this is a great opportunity for
them to chat and share the Vivids on the mat. It also means that their arrival
at the stations is naturally staggered. They don’t all go rushing up to the
stations at once.
Metallic paint can easily be sourced from dollar stores. Adding two teaspoons
to a jar helps to thicken the water. The most beneficial aspect is that the
glitter particles in the metallic paint take over two to three minutes to
settle allowing the children to watch the different weights of glitter settle
at different times.
What I usually add to our jars: stars, sequins, heavy glitter (larger
uneven flakes) fine glitter, metallic poster paint.
Adding glue is a great way to slow down the settling of glitter and papier-mache
paste is an easy option. Have an ice-cream container made up and ready at the ‘glue
station’ two teaspoons of thick paste works well. (Papier-mache paste is not
the best option and after a month or less it will lose its viscosity. It is
however the cheapest and most available option.)
A lovely adaption to a mindfulness jar is a jellyfish jar.
In the classroom I have jars along the window sill which look lovely
when the light shines through however they also offer a mindful reminder to
both myself and the children and are accessible for the children to use when
they need to. I have made a few jellyfish jars which work in a similar way.
The link to making a jellyfish jar can be found here:
http://themetapicture.com/homemade-plastic-jellyfish/
http://themetapicture.com/homemade-plastic-jellyfish/
