Apples and Leaves

We talked about apples and pears today.  We read a book called Apples and Pumpkins and also heard a story called The Little Red House with No Windows and No Doors and a Star Inside  After we read the story we cut open an apple and found a star inside!  Then we used the apples to make apple prints. We tried to capture the star while we were printing.  We also cut a pear in half and didn't find a star....it looked more like a football inside!  We tried to capture that shape too!

We had our first extended day on Tuesday!  Six kids stayed for lunch and then we walked to Wildwood Park. On the way we stopped and looked at "fall things".  We saw apples on a tree, leaves on the ground and some cats watching us out their front door.  We got back to school just in time to get a drink of water and go home.  Here's a picture of our "lunch bunch"!  We had fun on our extended day and had some very tired Maple Leafers and teachers!!

We started Maple Leaf of the Week.  Brooke was our first "leaf".   She brought in a poster about herself and shared it with the class on Tuesday.  On Wednesday her mom and dad came to visit. They brought in a special train set for us to see.  We also heard two great stories about trains, The Little Engine that Could and Curious George and the Train. Then we were treated to a special cookie in the shape of a train crossing!  After snack it was time to go outside and pretend to be a train!  Everyone had to hold onto a rope with loops to create a train and Brooke's parents set up train crossings for us so we had to stop and go.  When we finished the loop everyone wanted to do it again!  So of course we did!  We even had train whistles that Brooke gave us to blow while we were being the train!  We got a special train treat bag to take home with us too...wow!  Thanks Brooke, John and Jen for creating such a special day for all of us!!

When a child is "Maple Leaf of the Week" they are also the helper for the week.  That means they get to feed the frogs and be the line leader.  They also lead us in the calendar each morning. and get a Maple Leaf crown to wear for the week!

We had an apple tasting party with Golden Delicious, Macintosh and Granny Smith apples first thing in the morning on Wednesday. We discussed what our favorite apple was...Golden Delicious was the class favorite.  We cut up apples to make "Friendship Applesauce".  The apples smelled so good cooking in the background while Brooke's family visited!

We also learned a new art technique during activity time....weaving! 

Thursday was the day of our leaf hunt.  We heard a great story called Going on a Leaf Hunt.  Then we went outside and took a fall walk around the church looking for beautiful fall leaves.  We discovered red leaves, yellow leaves, orange, brown and green leaves!  It was so nice we had extra time to play outside before we went on our walk.  We also discovered that leaves have different shapes, sizes and colors depending on what kind of a tree it is!  Mrs. Gould showed us how to make leaf rubbings with leaf plates that she had.  During activity time we each started making our own fall tree with colorful leaves.  We had a very busy week!!

Pumpkins

We started the week with orange day.  All of the kids looked great dressed in their orange clothings.  They all brought in something orange for show and tell as well.  We had orange trucks, orange bears, an orange leaf, and lots more.  Mrs. Gould brought in orange gourds for all of us and we each got to take one home.  Then it was time to hear our story about an orange pumpkin named Spookley.  We had a CD to go with it so we listened to that as well.

Click on the link below to see the video of Spookley.  My guess is that your kids would love to watch it!!

During art we mixed red and yellow paint on a square piece of white paper to create orange.  We needed to let these dry before we could turn them into our very own Spookleys!

Wednesday was pumpkin science day.  We heard a story called Pumpkin, Pumpkins which tells the story of how pumpkins grow.  It had real pictures as illustrations and took us through all the stages from seed to pumpkin and even to jack o lanterns! (Life science and biology for preschool!) Then it was time for us to cut open our pumpkins and see what was inside.  We all knocked on the pumpkin first and realized it was hollow.  Then we saw all the seeds and pulp when we opened it up.  We broke into partners and we each got a pumpkin to clean out.  

Some of us liked how it felt inside and some of us didn't!  After we cleaned out the insides we put the pumpkins in the oven to bake. Naomi brought in some pumpkin seeds that she helped bake at home so we had them with our snack.  Thanks Naomi....they were delicious!! When we pulled out the pumpkins they were dark orange and the insides were very soft. (States of matter and how matter changes...physical science and chemistry preschool style).  We also baked the seeds!

Here are the seeds after they came out of the pumpkin.  All of the kids had a turn to put a little salt on the seeds before we baked them.

Thursday was pumpkin bread baking day!  The insides of the pumpkin were scooped out and pureed so we could use it in our recipe to bake.  Then we made "Friendship Pumpkin Bread".  We called it friendship bread because all of us had a chance to mix and add ingredients.  

 While the bread was baking we went outside, finished our art project, had activity time and heard another story about a pumpkin who became a jack 'o lantern.  Our classroom smelled so good!

Finally the bread was done and we were able to have our snack.  Chocolate chip pumpkin bread, pumpkin seeds, and chocolate milke!  Yum!!

Last week we made squish art with Mrs. Chyko using red and yellow paint.  The artwork was so beautiful that we decided to display it on our art wall.  Ask your child to show you their project next time you're at school!  The kids are so proud of their work!!

Beautiful!!!

The Farm

We spent the week getting ready for our trip to the pumpkin farm.  On Tuesday we learned the song and game "Old MacDonald Had a Farm".  We read a few books about farms and during activity time we had several different farms, barns and play animals for the kids to use.  We also had pumpkin cookies from Trader Joe's as a snack. We had several new books about farms set out for the kids to "read" when they finished their snack.

During art, the kids mixed red and yellow paint with Mrs. Chyko and made squish paintings.  We also got outside for quite awhile to take advantage of the beautiful weather!  

On Wednesday we heard the book The Little Red Hen. We retold the story using flannel pieces on a flannel board which is a great way to build reading comprehension.  The kids had fun using the voices of the pig, goose and cat as they said "Not, I".  We also had a good discussion about fairness after we finished reading the story.  Should the little red hen have shared her bread even though none of her friends helped her with all of the work?  The kids had some very strong opinions on this!!  During art we used a variety of shapes to create a little red hen. 

Thursday was our trip to the farm.  We were so fortunate with the weather!

We learned how pumpkins grow and saw a white pumpkin! (I think they actually said it was blue but it looks white to me!)

We went through a corn maze and a smaller maze made of hay bales.

We saw ducklings, a rooster, pigs, cows, and goats.

Time for the hay ride to the pumpkin patch...

Playing in the corn...it was a great day at the farm.  Thanks parents for helping to make this happen...it was great seeing everybody!!

Stone Soup

Tuesday we finished our sunprint art.  We traced traced around the areas where the sun didn't fade the paper due to the rocks and then we glued it on red paper.  We wrote R is for rocks and red to remind us of the sound R makes.  We also finished using do a dots to trace over a letter R.  The kids love doing these activities and while they're working on them they are developing their fine motor skills. We've been working on how to hold a glue stick, a paintbrush, a crayon, and dot markers.  We've also been working on how much pressure to use while working with these materials.

On Wednesday we read the book Stone Soup.  It's a folk tale about a village not having much food so they use stones to make soup.   Little by little each villager adds one item to the soup until they have a delicious soup at the end of the story.  We tried our hand at making stone soup!

We added stones to the bottom of the pot.  (Washed of course!!) Then we put in chicken broth, carrots, barley, salt and pepper.  Mrs. Chyko cooked the soup while we went out to play.  It was too hot to eat so we saved it until Thursday so all the kids could try the soup!!

On Thursday we listened to the story again, but this time with a CD version so all the characters had different voices.  Then we tried our soup for snack!  Some of the kids liked it and some didn't want to try it.  Everyone enjoyed the crackers and chocolate milk that we served with the soup!  Yum!!

Rocks

We had fun learning about rocks this week.  On Tuesday we heard the story Everybody Needs a Rock.  We looked at the rock collection I brought in and passed the rocks around.  We observed how the rocks looked, felt, and smelled.  Then it was time to go outside and go on a rock hunt!  We looked all around the church grounds and each of us had to choose just one, very special rock, that we wanted to take home with us.  We had lots of fun doing this!  When we went back inside it was time to celebrate Brooke's birthday!  She brought in ice cream cups with sprinkles that we could mix in if we wanted to.  (Of course everybody wanted to!!) Yum!! We sang "Happy Birthday" to her in English and Spanish! Happy 5th Birthday, Brooke!!

Mrs. Jenkins had us doing the hokey pokey among other things during music time. After music we had activity time.  We finished our houses today...they turned out so cute and the kids enjoyed writing on the inside using the prompt "Home is....."

Wednesday We read another good book about rocks.  This one was called A Rock Can Be...It helped us use our imaginations and get ready to paint some rocks and turn them into various creatures!

Look closely, we've got frogs, bees, lizards, ladybugs and butterflies!

Mrs. Chyko helped us use tooth brushes and water to clean rocks and see what they look like when they are wet.  Some of them got darker and shinier, some didn't change much.  The  kids enjoyed using the tooth brushes to get the rocks clean!!

On Thursday we heard the story If Rocks Could Sing.  We talked about the letter R and it's shape as well as the sound it makes. We each took a piece of black paper and went outside to put rocks around the letter R.  This  helped us become familiar with it's shape even more.  We were making sunprint art, so we left the papers outside to sit in the sun to see what happens!

We  practiced making R's with side chalk too.  Some of us wanted to write our names and make other things with the chalk as well!

We had snack when we came back inside.  We had enough ice cream left over from Brooke's treat on Tuesday to have it again today....yum!  Thanks so much Brooke for sending in such a delicious treat!

After snack we had Mr. Fleming (a Maple Leaf parent from the previous two years) come in and teach us some Spanish.  He'll be coming in on Thursdays about twice a month to work with us on Spanish.  Today he had us practicing how to say "hello" (hola) "good bye" (adios) and "my name is _____",  as well as counting to 10 in Spanish.  The kids really enjoyed this...thanks Mr. Fleming for volunteering your time to come and work with us!!

Many of the ideas for the rock unit came from kidssoup.com a wonderful resource for early childhood educators and parents!

All About Me

This week we talked about ourselves and our families.  On Tuesday we heard the book Clifford's Family.  Then we sat in a circle and all shared pictures of our families.  Each child told the names of the people in their family.  We had music with Mrs. Jenkins today.  She played the guitar and we sang songs that helped us get to know one another's names a little better.  After music it was time to go outside.  We had a bucket full of water and a bunch of paper towels and we all worked together to clean our outside play equipment....then it was time to play!  We had so much fun running around, climbing on the equipment, playing make believe games, and getting to know each other better.  When we went inside we had activity time.  We were busy playing with sand, trains, play dough, blocks, cars, and finishing our fingerpainting! 

Here are just a few of the fingerpaintings.  First the kids painted on paper and then we put another piece on top of their work to make a print.

We used cheerios and glue last week to write our names.  Matthew was so excited that he took his home and so it didn't make it in the picture!

On Wednesday we were talking about our homes.  We read the book Who's Behind the Door at My House?  Then we went around the circle and took turns sharing pictures of our houses.  We talked about the color of our houses and who lived inside.  During activity time we started making a house out of construction paper that looks like the house we live in.  We can open it up and see who lives inside!  The kids had a lot of fun with this project and wanted to take their time working on it.  I thought we'd finish it in a day but we're going to need another day or two before everyone is done!

Here's a sample of what the houses look like that the kids are creating.  

Today was another beautiful September day so we made sure to have plenty of time outside to run around and play!

We had our first birthday celebration on Thursday!  Caden had an August birthday and he wanted to celebrate it with his friends at school.  He brought in a delicious birthday treat of rice krispie treats dipped in chocolate and sprinkles!  Yum!!  He even helped make the treat with his mom.  

We sang Happy Birthday to Caden in English and then Mrs. Chyko taught us how to sing Happy Birthday in Spanish!  Here are the lyrics.  It might be fun to practice singing this version at home with your kids.  We're planning to sing it (along with the english version) each time we celebrate a birthday at school.

Feliz cumpleaños a ti

feliz cumpleaños a ti
feliz cumpleaños querido/a(name)
feliz cumpleaños a ti.

It's sung to the same melody as Happy Birthday.

Happy Birthday, Caden!  Thanks for the yummy treats!!

We try to incorporate music as much as we can at school.  In addition to  Happy Birthday, we have learned a Clean up Song, Good Morning Song, Time for our Snack Song, Days of the Week Song and Good Bye Song!  I hope the kids have been singing some of them at home for you!!

 It was such a beautiful day we had to take advantage of the weather so we went for a walk to Wildwood Park.  

We had a great week at school!!

Welcome Back

It was great to see everyone this week!  "Meet the Class Day" is always a fun event and a great way to transition into the school year.  Thanks parents for your support with this and for turning in all the needed paperwork.

Wednesday we read the book Quick as a Cricket by Audrey Wood.  During activity time we filled in a story based on this book.  The  pattern was I'm as ______ as a ________.  The kids had great ideas as we filled in the blanks! 

 We played several games to help us get to know one another.   The unanimous favorite was "hot potato".  We passed around a potato and whenever the music stopped, whoever was holding the potato had to shout out their name. Then the kids had a chance to go around the circle and try to say everyone's names.  Hopefully by the end of September we'll all know one another's name!

Thursday we heard several stories about preschool.  We heard Maisy Goes to Preschool and Spot Goes to School.  It was rainy outside so we did movement inside.  We listened to the song "Animal Action" by Greg and Steve and acted out all the different animals.  Your kids may show you how they pretended to be frogs, elephants, monkeys and snakes among other things!! During activity time the kids finger-painted with Mrs. Chyko and wrote their names using glue and cheerios with Mrs. Gould.

 We met our pet frogs today.  We've come up with some ideas but haven’t voted on them yet.  Next week we'll name our frogs!