Our Project on Cups
 10th October till 14th November 2003
By the Class of Bright Starts III

Our project on CUPS started with a hunt throughout the building for items that looked like, or seemed to function as, cups. We found "cups" in cupboards and on shelves. They were hidden amongst toys in the cooking section of Wee Care's toy library. There were also a few on teachers' tables. Aunty Denise showed us a cup she received as a birthday present when she was 16 years old! It was on her desk as a container for pencils and pens, dirty with ink stains. She asked us if we would drink from it and someone said, "wash it!"

We ended up with an amazing collections of cups, ranging from huge ones for soup to a tiny one from a key chain. Some of the children enjoyed doing "show & tell" with the special cups they had brought from home.

We lined our collection out in a long row, and then proceeded to try and define a cup. All of us seemed to know that a cup is something that can hold water (new word: liquid) and that we can drink from, but then we could not rule out things like bottles and bowls. In the end, we decided that a cup is something that holds liquid that we usually drink from with our lips, and that allowed us to remove item like jugs, bottles for mineral water and carbonated drinks, yoghurt pots and a watering can, from our initial collection.

Then came a tricky bit. Aunty Jeannie asked us to look at the different kinds of "cups" we had. She threw words at us like "mug", "glass" and "tumbler" and asked us whether they were still "cups". We decided that they were a kind of cup. Then, over the next few days, we sorted our collection of cups by height, colour, material and shape. Aunty Jeannie showed us how to use a ruler to measure the tallest, medium-sized and shortest cup, as well as how to draw the lengths on paper. Another day, we made a graph of what the children in our class like to drink.

Before moving on to more Math and Measuring work, Aunty Jeannie showed us a book that converted disposable plastic & paper cups into toys and other kinds of fun stuff. We made "maracas", "telephones", a long "snake", and "catch the bead" toys. It was fun and we had the chance to practice cutting (with a scissors), gluing, painting, and threading all over again. Another day, we made play-doh cups and experimented with making patterns along the external sides of our creations.

We even played a game of stacking wine glasses, pyramid-style. It took a lot of fine-motor control, attention, patience and perseverance. Fortunately, the glasses were made of plastic because the whole structure kept falling down!

Making Toys from Plastic Cups A Lesson in Physics: Stacking Wine Glasses

Eventually, we moved on to learn about Volume. We estimated (predicted) which cup would hold more water, and then verified this by pouring the water into two equal jugs and then comparing them.

As a nice breather in between our project sessions, we visited a number of shops in the Orchard Road area that use cups regularly. On the 21st of October 2003, we went to a drinks stall at the Cineleisure food-court, Burger King and Starbucks.

At the drinks stall, the lady there told us that paper cups are used for carbonated drinks, the glass mug for beer, and melamine cups for hot coffee and tea. If anyone wanted to take hot coffee or tea along with them, it would be poured into a styrofoam cup.

At Burger King, we were shown how the cups and drinks were placed in dispensers. Whenever anyone ordered a drink, all you had to do was to take a cup out of the cup dispenser, then fill it up with a drink from the drinks dispenser. The smells at Burger King were wonderful. Tamara kept asking for onion rings, and the floor manager loaned us Burger King caps to wear for our group photograph.

Starbucks was amazing! The manager showed us all kinds of cups. They were transparent plastic ones for cold drinks, and styrofoam ones for hot coffee. The cups came in different sizes such as Grande or Venti, and there were different sorts of lids corresponding to the size of the cup. At the end of his presentation, we were given baby raspberry frappuccinos with whipped cream on top! Yummy!

Learning About Volume Outing to a Food Court

Another activity that we realised related to our theme on Cups was Drinks. We spent some time making different kinds of drinks, and focusing, in particular, on the steps involved in the various sequences, as well as the different things that we need to do or to have before making the drink. Milo for example, is a dark powder before it is mixed with water.

Later, to hone our skills in learning through our senses, we identified different drinks by just smelling and tasting them without looking.

We had tea parties. We iced our own cupcakes. We smelt different kinds of tea and then looked at different kinds of tea-sets - the Chinese kind and the European kind. We sat at the table and pretended to be very grand (and careful!). We learnt to wait for our turn, and it was interesting to see how the Ribena (mock tea!) flowed out of the tea-pot spout.

And then finally, to round off a very exciting 4 weeks, we went back to looking at objects that are called cups, but that are not used for drinking. These included trophy cups, egg-cups, jelly cups, cup cakes and measuring cups. Of all of them, the cup-cakes were the best kind!


Having A Tea Party!

 

Some Reflections on our Field Trip to a Drink stall, Burger King and Starbucks on the 21st October.

Emma said, "We went to the Burger King. We got cups."

Benjamin "We take a picture. We got Old McDonald's hat at Burger King."

Julian "I think we went to the Burger King, because the Uncle take a picture of the cups, so its Kate's favourite cup."

Benjamin "I get a milo. The milo dropped on my shorts."

Kate "I drink milo from Burger King."

Tamara "I got Ribena. My jie jie wouldn't let me drink so much of the Frappuccino."

 

Recollections also differ:

Julian "I spilled the cold milo. Tamara's cup fell down."

Tamara "No, I drink it."

Julian "Tamara put the cup and the straw on the floor."

Tamara "I didn't."

 

Remembering Our Trip

Helena said, "We had our picture taken. We went to the ice-cream shop in Emma's car. The Uncle showed us a few cups. I had to kneel to eat my ice-cream because it was very tall."
Benjamin said, "I wait, for ice-cream. Vanilla ice-cream. Chocolate balls. I didn't like them. What's the Uncle's name? I walked, I bring an umbrella. Aunty Jeannie went in the car."
Kate said, "I ate chocolate ice-cream with Tamara. I dripped over my shirt. We used flash cups. I eat it and eat it but it was too tall. I saw a lot of people eating. We looked at cups again."
Tamara said, "We ate ice-cream, chocolate ice-cream. We took a picture of the Uncle holding the cup up. Benjamin dripped all over him the ice-cream. It was raining. We went in Emma's car. I dipped and eat my biscuit. I ate my ice-cream with Kate. And I shared the ice-cream with Grandma too."
Julian said, "We looked for cups in the ice-cream shop. The uncle bringed some dishes to us. It breaks when somebody drop it. It's going to break because it's made of glass. I like to eat too much. It was very sweet. Must buckle the seatbelt in the car. I sit beside Helena. I eat the ice-cream."
Emma said, "We had our picture taken. It was raining. Kate walked with the umbrella. My ice-cream was big. I shared it with Helena. We had to wait for Aunty Denise. We had chocolate biscuit in our ice-cream."

 

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For more information on the Bright Starts III Programme for age 4 years, please visit our website at www.weecare.com.sg.