Noah's Ark

No chat about the creation of land and water would be complete without exposure to Noah and his big boat.  Look closely - do you see the best part?  I absolutely adore the pair of ostriches hanging off the side of the ark by their toes!

God Made Land and Water

In our continuing efforts to learn about the world God made for us, we've spent time talking about land and water.

The children represented land and water by watercoloring coffee filters with pipettes instead of paintbrushes.

They also tried a neat activity called "pour painting".  They each had a large rock and poured paint over it to resemble a globe - land and water.

They really loved it and we had high participation in this activity.  We'll look for more opportunities to provide pour painting!  It was fun to watch the paint move and slide over the rocks.  These were entirely too gloopy, gloppy wet to send home (you're welcome, parents!) so they will spend the week drying at school. 

We also took the opportunity to learn about the properties of water by experimenting with items that sink and float.

On Monday, the Bunnies had a bucket of items and a bucket of water for simple experimentation.  We spent time with the children exposing them to the concepts and vocabulary in a very casual conversational manner.

On Tuesday, we increased the complexity by changing the items slightly and by providing sorting mats and more independence.  See how these guys tested the objects and placed them onto the mat representing each property?  By allowing the children to begin with simple exposure to the concept and then progressing to a higher level of complexity we give them the opportunity to take charge of their own learning.  Sink/float is a fun activity to do at home with things beyond the typical bathtub toys.  Try it!

Little Fingers

One of the most important things we do is help the children develop motor skills.  Each week they have opportunities to work their little finger muscles in a variety of ways.

Stringing beads is not easy.  We find that Bunnies are typically successful at stringing large beads, but struggle with small ones.  By using pipe cleaners for stringing, they are better able to control the beads.  The stiffness of the pipe cleaner adds support in a way that floppy string can't.  Success!

Everybody loves hammering!  Giant styrofoam block + plastic hammer + golf tees = fine motor development disguised as endless fun!

Creation

This fall we will be learning about the world God created for us.  Obviously that is a topic of life-long study, so we begin in small ways.  Reading and talking to children about creation is important and we do that.  However, we find that the most profound way for children to learn about the wonder of creation is to let them be creators!

This little Bunny is learning about the creation of light from darkness by marble painting with white and silver paint on black paper.

Mrs. O'Connor and Mrs. Quinn have many more activities planned to help children learn about creation by being able to create with open-ended, interesting materials.

Learning Together

The beginning of the year is exciting and surprising, and also not-so surprising.  It is very typical this time of year to see the children play along strict gender boundaries.  Notice in the photos below that girls are playing in the housekeeping area without any boys nearby, and boys are playing with cars on the rug without any girls in sight.

I can't say with certainty why this happens, but it happens every year.  I can only theorize that it relates to the children's level of comfort with each other.  Here at the beginning while everyone is getting to know each other, they make connections by searching for commonalities and build from there.  Right now their main commonality is their gender.  As their repertoire of commonalities increases (such as by discovering similar interests), their play branches out, too.  I love that at SLC we provide an enormous variety of play materials to appeal to children for a variety of reasons.  It won't be long before the children are interacting together in more balanced play.

Duos

Normally we don't see the children playing together this early in the year.

Considering that they really don't know each other yet, this is unusual and exciting.

This is a sure sign we are off to a great start!

First Day Fun

The first day of Bunny Rabbits is always a mix of excitement and trepidation for the children.  They don't know us, they don't know each other, and they have no idea what to expect, BUT it always works just fine!

Please check here from time to time to see how these fabulous children learn through play!

These two guys found some games to play.

Remember Viewmaster?!  It's a timeless toy and children absolutely love it!

You'll see lots of playdough in our room.  It's fantastic for strengthening little hands, for encouraging conversations and most importantly, it's just fun!  See how this little Bunny snipped the playdough into little bits?  Excellent fine motor practice.  Feel free to try it at home, too!

Welcome to a Wonderful New Year

Mrs. O'Connor and Mrs. Quinn are excited to begin a great year with the Bunny Rabbits.   Hop on in...

Thank You

Thank you for a wonderful year!  Mrs. Magee and Mrs. O'Connor had a great time with your children and we are grateful you shared them with us!
Have a wonderful summer and please remember to come visit us in the fall.
Bye!

Water Play Day

Water Play Day is a fun tradition.  We have one day in May when the children wear bathingsuits and play outside all morning.  We have a variety of activities for them including fishing, car washes and shaving cream.  We wrap up the day with popsicles on the porch.

Ladybugs

We grew ladybugs in our room.  Exciting!  We observed them in 3 stages of development before we released them.

The Bunnies really liked using the magnifying glasses to get a closer look at the ladybugs that started out looking a little like ants.

We released them in the courtyard and watched them crawl away. 

Mail!

After much waiting and wondering, a very exciting thing happened!
WE GOT MAIL!
The Seahorse class wrote letters to us!  Yay!

Each Bunny received a letter and a beautiful butterfly made by their Seahorse pen pal.

This was a big day.  The smiles on the children's faces were priceless!

These activities about mail were so fun primarily because they were completely driven by the interests of the children.  I certainly had not made elaborate lesson plans about the mail, but as soon as I saw how interested the children were in mail, I jumped on it.  This is the beauty of a school like ours where teachers have plenty of time and materials to let children guide their own learning.

More Mail

The Bunnies' fascination with mail continued on through the spring and we decided to take on an ambitious project. 
We created mail for our friends in the Seahorse class behind us.
Each Bunny got to choose a Seahorse friend to write to.  They selected a picture and glued it at the top of the letter.

Then they drew a picture for their friend and dictated a little story to tell about the picture.

They signed their name at the bottom and put the letter in an envelope and added a "stamp".

They took their letter to the mailbox for mailing.

Last, we added a letter to the class and delivered the whole mailbox to the Seahorse class.

And then the waiting and wondering began.
Would they like our mail?
Would they write us back?
Fingers crossed!

Color Mixing Experiment

We had a fun time learning about mixing colors.  We read great books like Mouse Paint
and we simply had to try mixing our own colors.
A great way to watch colors blend is to fill a clear cup with water and squirt shaving cream on top to cover the water.  Then choose two colors to drop onto the shaving cream.  The shaving cream is thick and slows the progression of the color into the water like slow motion, yet the original two colors remain on top of the shaving cream.

The children could really see what happened. 
The next day they painted with their new color.

The Bunnies thought it was really cool that they made their own paint!

Story Time with Parents

In the spring, we had parents come to class each Tuesday morning and read to the children.  What a blessing!

Parents generally brought books from home so the children got to hear the stories their friends like to hear at home.

The size of the crowd varied, but the enthusiasm was always high!  Thank you, parents!

Sorting by Attributes

Sorting is an extremely important preschool skill that gets successively more refined as children age through school. 

Here is a very simple example - sorting by color.  Most children can do this when they arrive in Bunny class at the beginning of the year.  It's a very early form of sorting.  Generally, they really can't think of any other ways to sort, so we spend time exploring other options as a group.  Then the children have repeated opportunities to do their own sorting independently.  They come up with exciting things!

In the photo above, the items are sorted into shape AND size.  Sorting by two attributes is for more complex than just sorting by color.

Sometimes the sorting seems to elude the adults, yet makes complete sense to the children.  Fair enough!