Although we started week #15 with a snow day, we were still able to fit almost everything in.  We were excitedly getting ready for Christmas.  The 3s class finger painted snowmen on Tuesday.

 Thanks to a couple of willing volunteers, we were able to have our Snowman Factory this week.  I laid out a tray with white play dough, buttons, string, and sticks and the children had a blast creating snowmen and other creations as well.

 The 4s classes painted wreaths on Wednesday using green paint and brillo sponges.  On Friday they used red paint and fingers to add berries.  They turned out so well.

 The 3s class had some free writing time in their journals and also enjoyed the snowman factory.

 I would have to say the highlight of our week in the 4s classes was baking and decorating cookies.  Our letter this week was Cc and what better way to celebrate the letter Cc then by baking cookies? Everyone had at least one turn stirring the batter and while they were in the oven we read "The Gingerbread Man." 

 

 After they cooled off, we decorated the cookies and finally we got to eat and enjoy them.  There were even extras that I took to the Jr./Sr. High teachers wishing them a Happy Friday from our Preschool classes. I think we are all ready to celebrate with parties on Monday and Tuesday and then enjoy a couple of weeks off with family!

 Wow, week #14 was busy, busy, busy! The 4s classes practiced cutting Christmas trees apart and then gluing them back together in numerical order.

 We also practiced out scissor skills by cutting straws.

 All three classes played in the rice table for the first time this year and all of the students loved it.

 With our letter being Mm this week, we read "If You Give a Moose a Muffin" in the 4s classes and then each child created a muffin cup monster and they were adorable!

 Our 3s class, was introduced to Quiet Boxes this week.  After snack time, each child has a Quiet Box that they play in until story time. Each Quiet Box is different and they are switched once a week.

 On Wednesday and Thursday, we had this green duct tape Christmas tree on our classroom floor.  The children enjoyed driving cars and trains on it and also walking and jumping on it.  We took turns placing the star on the top by only walking on the tree lines.

 The 3s class also decorated Christmas trees using Bingo Stampers. The morning 4s class used M&M candies to cover a M and then after removing the candies, covered them with Bingo stampers but we ran out of candy so the afternoon class only covered their Ms with the Bingo stampers. Regardless, we had fun and both classes did a nice job.

 We had another busy week of learning during week #13.  We talked about friendship in the 4s classes and what it looks like to be a good friend: helping others, playing nicely, and sharing our toys.  We read several stories to support these traits.  We also drew pictures of our friends.

 The 4s classes had "snowball fights" in the big room.  Every child wadded up a piece of paper and we practiced throwing and catching and then we had some fun pretending to have a snowball fight. 

 In our 3s class, we had some more fun with sorting by color. On Tuesday, we sorted Froot Loops and on Thursday we sorted Goldfish. After we were all done sorting, we did some counting and then of course eating!

 Friday we used some different tools in our 4s classes to paint.  We had some pretty amazing designs. We used koosh balls, sponges, cookie cutters and forks and paint and these are a sampling of what was created.

 During week #11 we started to prepare for Thanksgiving with some fine motor skills practice-turkey style.  The students poked feathers into the turkey box and pinched clothespins onto the turkey by matching the colors. We also worked with the letter Tt and the number 6.

 We talked about forms of transportation and made trains in all three classes.  The 3s class glued rectangles onto the tracks to make their trains but the 4s classes had letters written on their rectangles that, if glued in order, would spell their names.  Some students even decided to add details such as smoke or passengers to their pictures.  I enjoy seeing the creativity of the children. In the big room we played a game called airport where the children pretend to be airplanes flying around the room until I say "land" and then they slow down and come in for a safe landing until we "take off" again.  We read several books about transportation and acted them out as well.  Finally we found toys in the classroom that were forms of transportation.  Even though it was a shortened week because of fog, we accomplished a lot.

 For week #10 we worked with the letter Bb.  Bb is for bears and buttons.  We read "Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons" and then the 4s classes glued buttons onto their cat and wrote how many buttons they had.

 The 3s class each got a cup full of colored blocks and they had to match each block in their cup to the colored rectangles around the room. You can see the yellow rectangle in this picture. This got them up and moving while also working on color matching.

 Both 4s classes learned a new game in the big room this week.  It's called the hibernation game. A couple of students were "hibernating bears" and the rest of the class had to tiptoe past the bears without waking them up. When I yelled "springtime," the bears woke up and tried to catch the students.

 The 4s classes also worked on cutting and gluing skills by trying to place the numbers 1-5 in order.

 We started letter centers this week in the 4s classes.  There were several hands-on activities to practice our letter of the week.  We traced letter cards, we wrote the letter, we wrote the letter in sand, and we created the letter using these new magnetic pieces.

 The students were invited to bring a bear to school and then the 3s class colored bears while their stuffed bear friends watched on. We had a busy week with bears!

 For week #9, our letter was Ee. We did a lot of counting to five this week. We counted bears, bees, cars, jumping jacks and butterflies.  We even learned this song (sung to B-I-N-G-O): Can you count to five with me? I know that you can do it. 1,2,3,4,5  1,2,3,4,5  1,2,3,4,5  I knew that you could do it. 

 Probably the best part of the week was getting down the big blocks.  There are several students who had asked me several times "when are we going to play with the big blocks?"  This week was the week.  We played with them all three days and we left them down so we can play with them again next week.  I saw a lot of animal cages being built, but also a train, a boat, and some houses.

 During week #8 we worked with the letter Ff and we talked about the fall season.  On Monday the 4s classes used q-tips to paint fall trees.  Then on Wednesday, we brought in lots of leaves and we investigated them.  We looked at the different colors, sizes, shapes, and textures. 

 Lastly, we drew pictures in our journals of the leaves that we liked the most.

 One of the high school teachers brought in two more big boxes and all of these awesome Styrofoam pieces and wow, we had fun building!  I laid out the pieces and gave some basic instructions on how to handle the Styrofoam and then I sat back and watched them use their engineering skills. They were building sky scrapers, houses, bridges, teeter-totters and more.

 In the afternoon 4s class, we laid the box out flat and colored roads and a city on it and then the students were driving cars on it. 
Don't be mistaken, our 3s class had fun and learned this week also, but since we only had one day of class, I missed an opportunity to get any pictures.

 Week #7 was all about the letter Ff, the number four, frogs and fire safety.  We spent the first part of the week discussing frogs.  The 3s class mixed blue paint into yellow paint and then painted our frogs.  They were excited to see the blue and yellow make green. 

 The 4s class focused on the life cycle of frogs and we made a sequence chart showing the life cycle, starting with eggs and finishing with a frog.  They practiced cutting and gluing to make the sequence charts.  We also practiced some fine motor skills by using our bingo markers to stamp inside some circles. The end of the week was spent talking about fire safety. We talked about getting out if a building is on fire and also about having a meeting place outside where you gather after everyone gets out.  We talked about and practiced "Stop, Drop, and Roll." During free play, I heard several students practice calling 9-1-1 in our kitchen center.

 Week #6 was all about pumpkins.  We mixed red and yellow paint in the 4s class and then used our mixed paint to paint pumpkins on Monday. On Friday, we turned our pumpkins into jack-o-lanterns by gluing eyes, a nose, and a mouth onto them. They turned out really well.

 We got out the balls in the big room this week.  These are a new addition to our classroom and they were a big hit!

 The 3s class also talked about pumpkins. We kept our jack-o-lanterns simpler by coloring them and then gluing on the faces.  We also looked at and felt some pumpkin seeds and "pumpkin guts."

 The 4s class wrapped up our unit on pumpkins by visiting the Pumpkin Peddler.  We had beautiful weather and so many wonderful pumpkins it was hard to choose which ones we wanted to take home.

 We enjoyed a wagon ride out to pick our pumpkins and a wagon ride back to enjoy our snack of powered donuts and apple cider.  Then we played in the pumpkin maze and the new straw maze.  We had a great time!