Camera Shy - Not!

Mrs. O'Connor and Mrs. Magee always have a camera handy. These little Bunnies are well documented! They have a camera to play with, too, and they use it daily. Luckily three year olds are generally delighted to have their picture taken.

Growing

We're doing our best to grow milkweed and other butterfly loving plants from seed. The containers are 2 liter coke bottles repurposed as planters. Each day the children have the opportunity to observe the growth and water the plants. We use a squirt bottle for watering. It helps control the amount of water each plant gets (ahem!) and it's excellent for building hand strength. If you would like to have help watering your plants at home, give your little Bunny a squirt bottle and a smile!

Creation

We have been learning about God's story of creation. We've read several version of the creation story in some beautifully illustrated books. The Bunnies have been exploring the story through art as well. The children painted using toothbrushes in white paint on black paper and added silver glitter to make sparkly stars for the concept of light and dark. They also made a giant Earth by squeezing pipettes of green and blue watercolor onto huge coffee filters. The colors blend beautifully to look like the Earth. We also sang "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands". We will continue to explore the story of creation over several weeks.

First Fire Drill

We had our first fire drill this week. We walked out to the back parking lot and stood on one of the yellow lines (more or less). I think a few Bunnies were disappointed that firefighters were NOT coming to school.

Puff Paint

We are continuing to slowly introduce the children to a variety of art materials - one at a time. It's important that they gain experience with one type at a time so that later when we present them with multiple materials, they won't go nutso. This is puff paint. The recipe is simple: a squirt of shaving cream, a squirt of glue, and a squirt of liquid watercolor. Whisk, then paint.

Magnetism

Today the children were interested in a magnetism activity. Each colored disk is a magnet with poles - positive and negative. When the disks are threaded on the stands, they either attract or repel each other. There are pattern cards to go with this activity and tons of vocabulary to learn related to magnets, but we didn't do any of them. The best way to introduce new concepts is to let the children first fully explore the materials on their own. That way they get to make some of their own discoveries.

Parent Orientation

Next Monday, September 14 will be Parent Orientation. Please plan to meet in our classroom at 6:30. I'll share lots of information about our school year. You can browse around the room and ask questions and visit with other parents. A fun evening just for grown-ups.

Tricky Snake

Today a few of us worked to create this colorful snake. We started with the head and added sections to the snake by matching patterns. Easy for some kids, quite challenging for others. To add the next section, each child had to find another piece with a matching pattern AND orient it to keep the snake from curling onto itself. Tricky snake indeed! We got to a point where no other pieces would work, so we stopped, put on the tail, and counted. Our snake was 20 pieces long. Maybe next time we can make it even longer!

An Illustrator

We have a Bunny who loves to draw. In a short time Monday, he produced three or four drawings at the easel. He quickly learned how to hang up and take down paper, and how to put it out on the porch so it won't blow away. I have a feeling our markers are going to get a workout this year! Delightful!

Three Great Books

Over on the right side of this blog, there is a section of favorite books. Here you will find books that we have read in class that had a great message OR that the kids just particularly loved. Way, way, way down at the bottom of this blog is a bookshelf. On it, you will find the books mentioned and you can see what the covers look like. Right now there are three books. Two of them are about school and adjusting to school. One is about rabbits. Since we are the Bunny Rabbit class, we tend to read bunny books frequently. If you are looking for fresh books to read at home, try checking the favorites list for ideas. Happy Reading!

Playdough, Paint and Sushi

The Bunny Rabbits had a great first day! Everyone explored what there was to do in the room - and there was LOTS to do in the room. Playdough is always a big hit and we will have it every day. We painted big bunnies in art. Watercolor was a new experience for a few Bunnies. Our Chinese restaurant had lots of customers and chefs today. Yum!

We also began establishing our routines - washing hands upon arrival, playing with one thing at a time, asking another child for a turn, and cleaning up. It will take many weeks for the routines to become, well...routine. We're off to a strong start!

Welcome Bunnies!

We're so excited you are here! It will be a great first day.

One Week to Go!

Mrs. Magee and I have met ten of our new little bunnies, and we love them already! We will meet two this week and two more yet to be assigned to our class. I expect we will start the year with 14 Bunnies. This week, the teachers will gather for inservice, for worship and for planning. By this time next week, we'll be ready to roll!

Waking Up

It's been a delightful summer - hot, but delightful.
Now it's time to get excited about a new group of Bunny Rabbits! I have my class list in my hands, and I'm ready to start calling my new families. The first order of business is to schedule classroom visits. Yea!

Naptime

It's naptime for the Bunny Rabbit blog.

Come back in August to see all the preparation and excitement for a new class of Bunnies.

Night, night!

With a Grateful Heart

I absolutely LOVE my scrapbook! Each page is darling and truly shows the personality of each precious Bunny. I appreciate the gift cards, too, and I know I'll have fun choosing something special. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Water Play Day

Our last big hoorah of the year was Water Play Day. We spent the entire morning outside getting wet. There were so many activities, the Bunnies hardly knew what to choose! We had shaving cream and watercolor on bubble wrap, fishing, bathing babies, a car wash, an ice pool (brrr!), watering the garden, and a water slide. By far, Callie and Parker had the most fun. Those two tried it all. They were wet, gooey and smiley for three solid hours! Mrs. Magee named them "Number 1 Water Boy" and "Number 1 Water Girl".
We wrapped up the fun with popsicles on the porch - the best part, we all agreed!
Most were disappointed to learn they couldn't wear their bathing suits again the next day.

Sorting

We had a chore to do, and it turned out Bradley was guy to get it done! We had a large stack of books to return to the library. Bradley sorted the them by the colored tape on the spines of the books and put the books into piles. He made shelving them much faster for Mrs. Magee and I. Thanks, Bradley!

Gingerbread Day

Gingerbread in May? Certainly! We spent some time reading the story of the Gingerbread Man - in various versions. We decided to make our own gingerbread man. Gabriel's mom prepared the dough. The children pressed the dough into the huge cookie cutter and then decorated our guy with raisins. Then Gabriel's mom took him to the oven for us. While he was baking, we read the Gingerbread Girl. Her story turns out quite differently than her brother's. After the story, we went to the oven to get our big cookie, but guess what?!!! He was gone!!!

Our gingerbread man left us a clue to find him. We chased him to the big blue barn on the playground, but we just missed him. We chased him to the library and to the Seahorse classroom, but he was just too fast for us. Our last clue suggested we go back to the Bunny room. There he was! Right on the table waiting for us!!

He made a delicious snack. We gobbled him up like hungry foxes!

Patience

At the end of the school year, it is amazing to see what the children can do. Most of them have turned four by the end of May and, in general, their level of patience and perseverence has grown significantly. Look how many buttons Sarah has strung on this necklace. She kept going long after I took this picture, too.

Catching Up

The last few weeks of school really got the best of me and I fell down on my blog posts. Summer's here, but I'm going to get caught up anyway. Adventures from May still to come. Stay tuned!

Measuring

There are lots of ways to measure. In preschool classes, we often use non-standard units of measure. That means the children can use any item as a reference and measure other items against it. Sofia and Sarah made a tall column of pipes. Then they made other pipe structures, and they continued to use the first one (the tall one) as their standard of measure. Is this math?? You bet!

Carrot Crazy

Remember a few weeks ago when we went carrot crazy? Well. The carrot tops we planted met with mixed success. The first batch that we've been sharing with the Zebra class have grown very tall (photo at the top). The ones from Bunny class suffered a bit from hungry snails while in Mrs. O'Connor's garden over the Easter holiday. However, they are showing signs of growth now and they look different from the Zebra ones - different carrot varieties perhaps? Our carrot seeds have sprouted and many of them are growing their second set of leaves. We have high hopes for these!! Stay tuned for another gardening report soon.

Listening

Have you ever wondered about the equipment that Isabella wears in her ears and around her neck? Isabella is hearing-impaired. She wears two hearing aids (with darling pink earmolds) every day. Hearing aids make sounds louder for Isabella. While she is at school she also wears an FM system. It consists of a little box (like a cell phone) and a loop which goes around her neck. I wear an identical box and a small lapel microphone. The purpose of an FM system is to eliminate distance between the speaker and the listener. It works the same way your radio works in your car. No matter how far you drive in your city from the actual radio station, you hear the broadcast at the same volume. An FM system really helps when the listener is far away from the speaker - like on the playground or across the room. With all this great equipment, precious Isabella is tuned in to the exciting things in our classroom and in her world.

Benjamin Bunny

Benjamin Bunny has completed his travels. His last visit was to Mrs. Magee's house. If you come to Open House you will get to see Benjamin and read about his adventures with each of the Bunny Rabbits this year. He had so much fun!!

Doctor, Doctor

We are exploring the role of doctors this week. The children had so much fun using doctors' equipment, driving patients to the hospital in an ambulance and of course, weraing doctors' gear. We had it all from coats to shoe covers. Notice in the photo above there are real x-rays in the window. It's way cool to see bones!!

Open House

Please join us in the classroom on Tuesday evening, April 21, to celebrate a wonderful year. The children will have some neat things to share with you.

Ack!

Our camera and camera card are missing in action, so no photos this week. I have confidence it will turn up. In our family we say, "Leave them alone and they'll come home."

Easter Wishes

Today at school we continued the Easter story by sharing experiences from egg hunts and chocolate treasures to church and meals with families. We hope the Easter story continues in your homes as well.

Seeds

We've planted something! Ask your child what it is.

I Spy

This week we finished a project begun long ago. We made our own I Spy. To complete the project, each child brought some trinket or object from home to glue onto our structure.

Now that it is finished, I have taken lots of photos of it. The Bunnies will have a little photo book to try to find the items in the pictures. If you don't yet have I Spy books at home, consider purchasing one (or lots!).

Block Structures

I'm told that in the block structure above, the baby animals are lined up along the edge so they could jump off. The mommies and daddies are on the side to watch. Every year in our class we have what I call a "liner-upper" - someone who lines up toys. This year it's Jessica.

In this structure, there is a bear in his cave. It had cubs at one point, but apparently they've wandered away.

Audrey was the architect of the structure above. The mommy giraffe is keeping her babies safe from the rain. What you can't see are three baby giraffes completely enclosed inside.

Colors Continued

Check out this cool light table! We had see-through pattern blocks to play with in the light. The children got to see the colors mix when they stacked them on top of each other.

We did some primary color mixing as our version of decorating Easter eggs. The kids put a little scoop of red, yellow and blue paint on the big paper egg. Then they folded the egg in half and smooshed the paint around.

When they opened the egg, they got a surprise - new colors!

What's Your Favorite Color?

On Tuesday we all had to tell our favorite color and then find something small in the room that was that color. For some Bunnies it was easy to find an object and for others it took some serious searching. Eventually, all were successful. Look in our window to see our favorite colors.

Chromatography

Last week we explored colors. We did several science experiments to discover that some colors are combinations of other colors. These pictures show one of William's experiments. First he colored on a coffee filter. Then he folded the coffee filter and dipped the center point in water. He watched the water travel up the filter. Last he opened the coffee filter to see what happened. He said his monster face looked "very scary".
By doing this activity some children noticed that the black ink appeared to have some other colors bleed from it. We heard Aaron say, "I see blue, but I didn't color with blue!"

After several weeks of playing with cars and animals, suddenly the blocks were out again. (The Bunnies make these choices themselves!) Jessica and Lexi worked very hard to build special places for the lions and tigers. You probably can't tell in the photo, but this structure is multi-leveled with larger animals up high and the cubs down low.
Just so you know, horizontal block building (like zoos and other enclosures) precedes vertical block building (like towers and castles).

Yee Haw!

We had so much fun learning about the rodeo and all things western. We worked farm and animal puzzles, played with toy farms, sat in a saddle, made pigs in the mud, painted with stencils, read farm and rodeo books, and tried "udder" painting. Most of all, we liked wearing our cool cowboy and cowgirl clothes!

Names

I think I have mentioned that our little group is very interested in letters and in spelling their names. Our little group is also interested in playdough. Mrs. Magee cleverly combined the two interests. She patiently spelled each name as requested, but only if the child was willing to roll all the "snakes" for construction. Fine motor skills and literacy - win win!

Quick Like a Bunny!

Recently we had another fire drill. Guess which class was first to arrive at their designated spot?!

Spring Is Almost Here

This week Sofia arrived with darling sandals and a fancy pedicure. When I asked her about her pink polish, in a teeny tiny voice she said, "I got them painted at the toe store."

Playground Playtime

We are so enjoying the beautiful spring weather. I know I didn't manage to photograph each Bunny, but here is a glimpse into the kinds of things they do on the playground. We have only one Bunny that can cross the monkey bars hand over hand. Can you guess who?? (Hint: It's a girl!)

Our Room

I just have to show you what our room looks like at the end of playtime. It's not pretty - you've been warned.

And this represents only three of our play centers. Oh yes, there are more. Is it evidence of a busy, fruitful morning or the byproduct of pandemonium? You decide.

Are you wondering who cleans all that up? It's the children! Are you wondering how in the world we get ordinary three year olds to return the room to order? We have well established routines, labels on everything, plenty of bins, and a good dose of patience. (I'll admit some days require more than others.)