Presidents and Dr. Seuss

The past few days at preschool have been extremely busy!  We've been learning about what presidents are and where they live.  Last week we painted wooden craft sticks white and this week we've been using them to create a white house.  The craft sticks are the columns on the front.  We also had fun making a log cabin out of wooden sticks and building with Lincoln Logs!

This week we've had fun learning about Dr. Seuss.  When I asked the kids what they knew about him I got some interesting responses:  Here are some of them:

He wrote The Lorax and Green Eggs and Ham.

I like eggs.

Dr.'s look in your mouth and check your teeth.

Some Dr.s give you medicine to make you feel better.

He wrote the Grinch.

I like The Grinch!

He wrote The Foot Book.

I have that book at home!

Then we talked a little bit about what an author and an illustrator is.  I showed the kids a bunch of different Dr. Seuss books and nearly everyone had at least one of his books at home.  They got so excited!!!  I read Mr. Brown Can You Moo ? and they helped read along with me.  Next we watched a short video on Dr. Seuss.  Here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bXbscNc37I


The kids wanted to hear more of his books so we read There's a Wocket in my Pocket. we had fun making up silly rhymes after we read that one. Then I added all the rest of the Dr. Seuss books to our classroom library so the kids look at them after snack time.

We had fun creating "sound makers" since we heard so many different sounds in Mr. Brown Can You Moo?

We went outside for a breath of fresh air and played the game called "Captain, May I?"  Ask your child if they can explain the rules to you.  It was a lot of fun but we all got cold in a hurry and went back inside!

Mrs. Jenkins came in for music and then stayed for lunch and extended day.  Mrs. Gould had to take her son to the Dr. so Mrs. Chyko and Mrs. Jenkins stayed for the afternoon.  Mrs. Jenkins played coin bingo with the kids while Mrs. Chyko worked on art.

Today, we heard the Dr. Seuss book, Ten Apples Up on Top.  The kids had fun filling in the rhyming words when Mrs. Gould would stop reading.  Then we played Simon Says and had a great snack of graham crackers and apple juice!  Kate brought the mystery bag back to share with us.  She had put a striped swim suit, a stuffed dog, and a cool art project inside to share with us.  The kids all had fun trying to guess what was inside of the bag while Kate gave us hints!  This week Duncan is taking the bag home, I wonder what he'll put inside?

We watched a Dr. Seuss video called The Grinch Grinches the Cat in the Hat.  None of the kids had seen it before so they really enjoyed it.  Here is the link in case they'd like to watch it again at home.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVqvSXMwZMk

We had fun fingerpainting and trying to make apple trees with apples up on top!

Dr. Seuss's birthday is Sunday, March 2nd.  It might be fun to have a party for him at home. (green eggs and ham perhaps??)   Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss!!

Presidents

Today we introduced the kids to the idea of Presidents.  We heard part of the  picture book called "President's Day" during circle time and we compared the ideas of rules in a classroom or at home that kids have to follow with laws that grown ups have.  We showed the kids pictures of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln and talked about the powder puff wigs that George Washington used to wear.  I really thought the kids were getting it, they seemed really interested so  I asked the kids if they had any questions or thoughts about presidents.  One of the kids raised his hand and said, "sometimes toys are inside of presents!!"  (I wonder if all of the kids thought we were talking about presents instead of presidents...probably....too funny!!)  After that comment I quickly decided it was time to watch our video called DW goes to Washington DC.  This the kids seemed to enjoy.  Here's the link to it:

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0k32791oyAw

We had music with Mrs. Jenkins and we learned a song about George Washington's 3 cornered hat.  Carter brought in a yummy patriotic snack today that he made with his mom.  

Red, white and blue pretzels...yum!!!  Thanks so much!!  (Carter also sent in orange slices and rice cakes too).  

We learned about coins during activity time and tried our hands at coin rubbings.  This is a fun activity to do at home and another idea to help develop fine motor skills.  The trick is to rub the crayon on the side and very lightly while the coin is under that paper.  The kids have to use their fingers to figure out where the coin is under that paper.  We're working on identifying the names of the coins.  Starting a piggy bank might be a really fun follow up activity to this!!  

Tomorrow we'll hear about Abraham Lincoln!!

Valentines

Last week we had our Valentine's Day Party.  We had so much fun making our valentine bags and passing out our valentines to one another.  We also went upstairs to the church narthex and hunted for hearts.  (Mrs. Chyko hid them) Once we found our hearts we counted them up, we had 11, and then we went to surprise the church secretaries and gave them our hearts!  Mrs. Candy and Mrs. Diane were so surprised and of course Mrs. Diane gave each of us a tootsie roll.  (She always keeps them on her desk just for occassions  like these!)  We had heard the book Heartprints earlier in the week and we talked about how we left hearptirnts when we gave our hearts to the secretaries.  The kids said their hearts felt happy because they surprised Mrs. Diane and Mrs. Candy. It was cool to see that they understood that heartprints work both ways, in giving and receiving!!  When we came back downstairs we had our Valentine Treats. Thank you to everyone who sent something in, the kids had a great time frosting and decorating their cookies, eating tutti frutti popcorn and drinking red fruit punch.

  

During art time we used celery and red paint to stamp a valentine rose and make a valentine.  This was also a great writing activity for the kids. Since we have different ages in our class some tried to write Happy Valentine's Day or I Love You by themselves inside the card, some wanted to write just a few letters or their names, some wanted to trace dotted words and some learned about writing by watching as I wrote and spelled the words out in front of them  

We talked about shapes this past week, especially hearts!  We heard a great book that was illustrated with hearts making lots of different animals!

 We practiced sorting, counting and graphing with coins and candy hearts this week.  We made a class graph with coins and the next day we made our own graph using candy hearts.  

We passed a heart around and sang a song while we were passing. Whoever was holding the heart when the singing stopped had to sit in the middle. Then we passed the heart around faster and faster until eventually everyone was sitting inside the circle!!  There was lots of giggles during this.  The words to the song went like this "Pass the heart around, pass the heart around for Valentine's Day, when the music stops, when the music stops....who has the heart today?"  It might be fun to see if your child remembers how to sing and play the game.  S/he might even be able to teach you how to play it at home!!

Finally we wrote a story about hearts.  Here it is:  

Each child added something to the story.  See if your child remembers which line s/he wrote!!

Hearts

Today was such a nice day.  Last week I pulled out the "big kid" legos and the kids are having so much fun building with them.  We've had a lot of race cars, dinosaurs, and airplanes that are being made.  Such a great activity for visual spatial skills, fine motor, creativity, and geometry skills!!  We also have the larger size duplos and megablocks that have been used a lot too.  We may have a classful of engineers in the making!!  The kitchen area, vet center and babies also continue to be a hit during early morning activity time.  Last week we were working on identifying the numbers 1-12 and then finding them on a clock.  We had several movable clocks set out this morning for the kids to play with when they first arrived.  We reviewed the concepts that clocks have 2 hands and they move around as time passes.  We also practiced counting 1-12 on the clock faces.

During circle time we did some beginning sorting and graphing work.  Emma had brought in some coins from her piggy bank to share so we identified them and sorted them into piles of nickels, dimes, quarters and pennies.  Many of the kids were fascinated to find out the name of the coins!!  (Some of the kids already knew).  Then we laid them out side by side into a graph like format and counted how many of each one there was.  We'll continue to be talking about coins and money into next week.  We also discussed how the coins were all in the shape of a circle but some were bigger and some were smaller.  Great early math concepts!! 

We heard a book called The Valentine Express.  We learned that Valentines Day started hundreds of years ago.  The story is about bunnies at school having a Valentine's Day Party and then they decided to go home and make valentines to give to their neighbors.  They loaded up a wagon with valentines and named it the Valentine Express as they went around the neighborhood handing out valentines to their neighbors.  I showed the kids how to cut a heart from a folded piece of paper.  This would be a really fun activity to do as a carry over at home.  Cutting hearts, using glue sticks to put on pieces of paper and adding decorations with crayons, markers, or stickers is such fun for the kids and also a great way to develop fine motor skills!

We pretended we were a train (our own Valentine Express) on the way to snack time and we played a circle game where we sang a song about valentines and passed a heart around.  Ask your child to explain the game to you.  They might even be able to sing the song we learned!!

We had fun using heart stickers and punchers to decorate our valentine bags for our party on Thursday.  Thanks to all the parents who have volunteered to send in food for the party.  We are all set at this point.  If you wanted to send in something but didn't sign up yet, there will be more opportunities in the future to send in things.  Joan and I feel so blessed to have such supportive parents, THANK YOU PARENTS!!!!  The program couldn't be a success without all your help.

Mrs. Jenkins came in for music today and did hand bells with the kids and began to teach them to count in Spanish.  Mrs. Chyko helped the kids paint hearts at the easle during activity time.  What a busy day, but loaded with friendship, learning, singing and play....

Friends

We had so much fun learning about friends as well as practicing how to be a good friend.  We heard several really good books about friends including The Rainbow Fish and The Mitten.  In both of those books the characters learned to share with one another which we all decided was very important in being a good friend. 

Heres a link to a sweet video about Rainbow Fish.  We didn't have time to watch it in class, I bet the kids would enjoy watching it at home!!

► 5:53► 5:53

www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbKr-k1PTvA

Jul 29, 2013 - Uploaded by Hazel Panao

The Rainbow Fish Story by: Marcus Pfister Read by: Ernest Borgnine Animation from ...

We came up with a chart on the Do's and Don'ts of friendship.  Here is what the kids told me they knew about friends.

Friends Do: Share, help, play nicely, give gifts, use nice voices, wait and take turns, say "I'm sorry" and care about each other.

Friends Don't: make one another cry, act selfish, hurt each other, take things away from one another, use mean voices, push, or knock over other friends things.

We also wrote a chart story all about friends and each child contributed to the story.  Here is what everyone had to say..

                                                  

                        Friends

Jacob said, "My friend is Jack.  I like to play with his toys."

Duncan said, "Brothers need to act like friends."

"Natalie lives next door and I play with her," said Emma.

"Duncan is my friend," said Jonas.

Kate said, "I play with Emma."

Charlie said, "I like to play trains with friends!"

Mika said, "Friends play nicely."

"I like Ben, we play boom boom thunder!" said Liam.

Friends say, "I'm sorry," said Carter

"Watch out for little brothers so they don't get hurt!!" said Gavin.

We all said, "We missed our friend Knox today!"  (He's out with a cold)

I'd say we have some pretty wise kids!!  We also took time at the end of the day on Tuesday to share how we were a good friend at school today.  We'll be working on this more next week as we get ready for Valentine's Day!

We did a lot of indoor movement this week using the parachute, bean bags, and balls.  We also learned a new circle game where we moved around until the music stopped and then had to hold hands with a friend.  

In art we made rainbow fish, friendship hands, and a chain of friends.

We practiced using clocks with Mrs. Chyko and got introduced into how to tell time.  We have some great wooden puzzle clocks where the hands move and shapes have the numbers 1-12 that can get put in and out of the clock.

We made the letter "r" with mosaic squares.  We practiced the letter name and it's sound and worked our fine motor skills while we glued the mosaics down!

Have a great week-end!!

Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year began on Friday, Jan. 31st.  We had fun learning about it in class.  These are some of the things we learned:

Gong Hei Fat Choy is how you say Happy New Year in Chinese.

China is a long way away.

Chinese New Year is a big holiday in China, often kids get a holiday break from school during this time.

Chinese New Year is celebrated with parades, fire crackers, and lots of red for good luck!

Chinese dragons or lions march in parades as part of the fun.

Many Chinese people have moved to America and created Chinatowns all over the country.

The night before Chinese New Year, families clean to get ready to bring in the New Year.

Oranges are considered a sign of good luck.

Families celebrate with big meals.

To help us celebrate Chinese New Year we tried to be dragon marching in a parade.  

We discovered it wasn't easy to stay together and march under something, but it was lots of fun and brought lots of giggles!!

We ate mandarin oranges, (for good luck) ramen noodles (long noodles for a long life) and fortune cookies.  We also tried using chop sticks!!

Jonas's Uncle Phil spent two years in China and so Jonas brought in some cool Chinese stuff to share.  We saw outfits that boys and girls would wear, a stuffed panda bear, and we all got to take home some real Chinese money.  Thanks Jonas and Uncle Phil!!

We had a lot of fun making Chinese dragons during activity time.

We also learned how to count to 6 in Chinese and we tried writing the numbers 1-6 in Chinese!