Memories of a kindergarten Gem inquiry: "What are the best gems?"
One day during outdoor learning time, a student approached Amber and announced, “I’ve got my flashlight, and I’m ready to look for gems!” That day, Amber and the student (and a whole group of others who joined in the hunt) crawled all over the yard searching for ‘gems’ of different colours. They found berries, seeds, and other small items, and the students imagined that the different-coloured ‘gems’ had different special abilities (e.g. gems for building, gems for starting fires, gems for healing injuries). This outdoor learning experience was the spark for a fantastic gem inquiry, with lots of learning about rocks and minerals, and volcanoes too! We quickly stocked our class library full of books about real gems (rocks and minerals) in order to extend students’ thinking and playing. We learned that “gemologists” examine gems and determine which ones are particularly special. So, over the course of several weeks, we became gemologists and the rocks we found were our own very special ge...