Merry Christmas

Mrs. O'Connor and Mrs. Magee had some fun activities planned for celebrating Advent in the classroom.  Turns out the Bunnies had some fun plans of their own.  They had a blast making cards and ornaments for our big tree.  They used recycled Christmas cards and cut them up, added a pipe clearner as a hook and decorated our tree from top to bottom.  Charlie made so many ornaments that Mrs. Magee was calling him Christopher Radko. heehee!

Merry Christmas to all of you!

Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord

At School for Little Children, we keep our eyes focused on the real meaning of Christmas.  We try to give the children some reasons for the traditions we have in our homes and in our community.  There is a wonderful little book called Jesus, Me and My Christmas Tree.  It uses rhyme to explain what goes on a tree and why.  We have a teeny tiny tree and lots of decorations that follow the book.  The children got to decorate the tree and then we sang a cute song with motions to get us moving.

Chimes

Mrs. Vaughn, our music teacher, does a fantastic job!  She has been introducing the Bunnies to a variety of musical instruments.  One day she brought chimes and taught them a little song.  Each child got to play the chimes and Mrs. Vaughn sang along with their beat.  What a hoot!  Some kids played really fast and some played slowly.  The Bunnies really look forward to music.

Creation

Our focus on creation lasted the entire first semester of school!  It seems like ages ago that we began with light and dark.  Here's a recap of the activities you can see in the children's art above.
light and dark - marble art
sun - painting on paper plates
stars - fingerprints in paint and glitter
the world - water color on giant coffee filters
birds - owl faces on paper plates
plants - rubber stamping ferns, leaves
animals - farm animal stencilling and wild animal stamping
people and families - die cut shapes of Jesus' family and each child's family

The best way to teach children about creation is to allow them to be creators!

Construction

In every class there is a great builder.  We never know who it will be.  Usually a few months into school the identity of the great builder emerges.  What's neat about having a great builder is that they inspire other children to be great builders, too.  When kids see cool structures being built, they can't resist pulling blocks off the shelf and building one of their own.  It's a win-win!

According to the builder, this house has "lots of rooms and bathrooms and roofs and a loooong sidewalk".  Usually the child who is the great builder has very creative ways to play with other block enrichment toys.

Recognize that little blue tennis shoe?  He's our great builder!

Making Literacy Meaningful - A Three Part Series with a Fourth Part

Recently we read a fun book called Mrs. Wishy Washy's Farm.  In this book, the farm animals don't like getting baths, so they run away to the big city.  It's a classic fish-out-of-water story and when they return to the farm, they decide baths are just fine. 

To reinforce the concepts in this story, we had story props.  We had a bucket, little stuffed animals, felt patches to represent mud and a little scrub brush.  The Bunnies chose an animal, and pretended to scrub the mud off.  It was fun and they liked it.  However, it was a little limiting. 

To further the bath experience, we filled our sensory table with bubble bath and added our play farm animals and some small sponges. 

This was a big hit - everyone loved giving the animals a real bath!  We overheard one little Bunny talking to an animal saying, "See, a bath isn't so bad!" 
There are so many ways to connect to books!  At School for Little Children we provide a variety of play opportunities to develop literacy.  This is how children learn through play!!

Making Literacy Meaningful - A Three Part Series

Part 3


Stone Soup is an amazing story that has stood the test of time.  There are many versions of Stone Soup, but the lesson remains the same: sharing what we have makes us feel happy.

I absolutely adore Jon Muth's version because his art is spectacular.  The delicate Asian landscapes offer an airy and gentle path to understanding the story.

To reinforce the lesson of the story, the Bunny Rabbit children became chefs.  Each child brought an ingredient from home to contribute to the soup. 

They took turns adding their ingredient to the pot.  Our actions were "opening", "pouring", and "stirring".

There was so much stirring - no shortage of helping hands!  We quickly realized that this soup was going to be yummy because it smelled delicious.

Oh, yes, we put a stone in the soup.  It's the main ingredient after all!  No worries, parents, we scrubbed it with soap before we put it in the pot.

After we returned from the playground, our soup was ready and we gobbled it up!  Two girls said they did not like their soup, but one of them ate her whole serving as she told me she didn't like it.  Hilarious! 

We used science to reinforce literacy.  Cooking is science!  We experienced the properties of mixtures and heat while we renacted the story of Stone Soup.  It was the perfect lead up to Thanksgiving!!

Making Literacy Meaningful - A Three Part Series

Part 2

The Apple Pie Tree is a book that teaches how apples grow on an apple tree.  The seasons are beautifully depicted, and the illustrations show clearly how the tree buds in spring, gets gorgeous pink blossoms, grows tiny green apples, and people harvest ripe red apples.  The children saw how the apple tree moves through one complete growing cycle in a year.   At the end of the book, the apples become a yummy apple pie.

To reinforce the concept of the life cycle of an apple, we had an apple tasting.  Each child got a slice of a red apple and a slice of a green apple to taste.

After they ate their apples, they got to vote for which color they preferred.  To graphically represent their votes, we wrote their name on an apple of their choice and they glued it onto a large chart.  When the chart was full, we tallied the votes.  The winner: red!  We connected literacy and math.

Making Literacy Meaningful - A Three Part Series

Part 1


Leaf Man is a great book.  It gets kids to look at everyday things, like leaves, in new and novel ways.   The pictures in this book are amazing!  There are cows, roosters, fish, turtles, birds, butterflies and other animals all made of leaves.  So creative!

In our Bunny Rabbit class we read the story and examined the pictures.  We talked about how the author made the art in the book.  To make a connection between the art in the book and our own artistic talents, we made our own version of Leaf Man.  The children gathered a box full of leaves from the playground.  They chose leaves to glue together to create their own leaf people or animals.

Art is one of several tangible ways to reinforce literacy skills.

Hat

How stinkin' cute is this?!!

Friends

It takes a long time to make a friend.  Many people think kids develop instant friendships, but it is no more true for children than for adults.  Children may know each other's names, share the same toys, read the same books, but until they really begin to talk to each other, they are simply acquaintances. 

This is the time of year when we really see friendships bloom.  We've all been together for a few months now and we know each other's ways.  It's wonderful!

The Not-So-Great Pumpkin Experiment

Despite the children's best efforts, we are sad to report disappointing results with this year's Great Pumpkin Experiment.  See that little sprig above?  We got about 4 more of those and that was it before the bottom rotted out of our pumkin.  Ick!
There's always next year...

God Made Plants

Along with encouraging our pumpkin seeds to grow, we planted grass seed.  We filled a tray with soil and sprinkled winter grass seed on the top.  We had interesting results.

Grass grew in half of the tray, but not the other half.  We have no explanation for this.  That's the way science works sometimes, isn't it?  Nontheless, the Bunnies enjoyed petting this soft grass.

The Great Pumpkin Experiment

A few weeks ago when we were talking about plants, we did this...

We cut open our pumpkin and we checked out what was inside.  Everyone thought it looked gooey so we left all the insides right inside.  Antd then we did this...

We filled the whole thing with dirt - all the way to the top.  Last, we watered it. 

Squirt bottles are a great way for young children to water plants.  The squeeze action is great for strengthening little hands and the controlled water flow is great for a low mess factor.  It's hard to overwater when using a squirt bottle.

Stay tuned to see what happened to our dirt pumpkin.

Ring Ring

             

Mrs. O'Connor will be calling parents soon for a brief phone conference.  The purpose is to let you know how your child is doing in school and to share some goals for the year.  Young children change and grow so much in one year.  It's a privilege to facilitate growth and watch it happen!

A Visit from the Fire Fighters

The day the fire truck comes to visit is always big fun.

The firefighters did a great job of showing us their cool clothes.  We talked about how their clothes glow in the dark so they can see each other in a smoky room. 

We saw their big, big hoses and learned that they are very heavy.  We also saw the neat tools they carry on the truck for helping people out of smashed cars.  The highlight of the visit was getting to climb through the truck and see where the firefighters sit.

Guess what?!  Firefighters wear seatbelts in their big truck just like we do!  Cool.

Words

Do you know the game Boggle Junior?  It's awesome!  There are pictures of three and four letter words, cubes with letters on each side and little places for the cubes to rest to spell the word on the card.  We have NO expectations that the children can spell words - they're three years old!!  However, this is a great way to show children that objects have names and the names can be represented with letters. 

Every now and then, we get a little surprise...

HOORAY!

The Warming Tray

The children have learned a new way to create art. They have learned to use the warming tray. It's just what you think it is - an old fashioned kitchen warming tray just like the one your grandma has. We cover ours with layers of paper to keep little fingers safe, but still let the warmth come through. The children put slick paper on the tray, and draw with peeled crayons. The heat melts the crayons and the children can create ribbons of smooth color across their paper. It's very soothing, and the Bunnies loved it!

Birds

Continuing our experiences learning about creation, the children had opportunities to learn about birds.  The Bunnies had a great time painting with feathers.  They dipped their feathers in watercolor and painted with them on white paper for very wispy looking art.

We put large photos of birds at the easel with white paper and markers for the children to attempt to draw birds.  At this age, children's art is sometimes hard to identify, in the eyes of adults.  That's OK.  The purpose is to give the children some inspiration and some tools (markers, paper) and see what happens.
The Bunnies learned the story Owl Babies and got to play with props for the story.  We read a book called Feathers for Lunch which is about a cat trying to catch birds, but all he gets is feathers.  We discussed how some birds in the story had an advantage because they had three ways to move - walk, swim (paddle), and fly.  The cat only had two ways to move - walk and climb.  Simple discussions really get the kids to think about attributes.

Science in Action

While the Bunny Rabbits learned about the oceans and fish God created, they also had the opportunity to explore properties of water.  In the sensory table, the children found a variety of items and a bowl of water.  They got to see which would sink and which would float.  The most fun part for Cade above in the red shirt was seeing which items he could push down to sink and then pop back to the surface to float.

In the next few weeks, we will be conducting an experiment with a pumpkin.  Stay tuned!

Kitchen Fun

As in any preschool class, the kitchen is a popular place to play for both girls and boys.  In fact, usually there are more boys in the kitchen than girls.  Don't these girls look like they are having fun - pouring tea, serving little food, setting the table!  Ideally, this is how the kitchen area would be every day.

Ummm, sometimes it gets a little out of control in the kitchen. 

Now, the little girls above were not responsible for this chaos - the culprits shall remain nameless - but the lesson is the same for everybody.  We emphasized that at home parents do not cook food and put it on the floor, nor do they put dishes on the floor.  It will be the same for school.  Dishes and food go on the table, on the stove or in the cabinets.  No one wants to eat food off the floor even when pretending!

How effective is this lesson? 

That is yet to be seen, but we have high hopes!

Book Makers

Lately some Bunny Rabbits have been very interested in making books.  These are simple construction paper books stapled down the spine.  The children can color or write on the pages and the grown-ups can write words.

So what does book making look like?

Music

This week, we began music time with Mrs. Vaughn.  She had darling songs and the Bunnies had a great time.  Mrs. Vaughn will visit our class every Monday morning.  Yay!

Creation Continued

We have continued learning about the world God created for us.  What a gift!  There is so much to talk about!

In the photo above, Henry made stars by dipping his finger in white paint and stamping it on the black paper.  He made the stars sparkle by shaking glitter all over the stars.

We read the story It Looked Like Spilt Milk to help us learn about clouds.  The Bunnies made their own clouds by putting a scoop of white paint on blue paper, folding the paper and rubbing to spread the paint.  Then they described what their clouds looked like and Mrs. O'Connor wrote down their words.  (All of these clouds will become a class book.)

Our creation experiences will continue with ocean animals and other activities with water.  Stay tuned...

First Fire Drill

In my experience, this was the best fire drill ever!!  Look at all those cute feet lined up so nicely on the yellow line!  As usual, the children were disappointed the firetruck wasn't actually coming.

Names

I'm not sure if you can tell in the picture, but one little Bunny wrote her name on her work.  At this point in the year, there is a huge range of ability in writing one's name.  Some children can do it well, some children can sort of get a letter or two and some won't even attempt it.  All of those are appropriate.  We typically encourage the children to just start with the first letter of their name.  Some are receptive to the suggestion and some aren't.  Writing is a later developing skill and we are not at all concerned when children aren't interested.  Everyone learns to write at some point, and it will be different for each child.

Woodworking

What kind of woodworking can three year olds do?

 This little Bunny is using a plastic (lightweight) hammer to pound golf tees into a big styrofoam block.  It's great for developing hand-eye coordination.   The plastic hammer prevents owies.

Opening and closing locks is a woodworking skill.  This is a lockbox.  It has tiny doors with a variety of fasteners to manipulate.  Some are quite hard requiring you to do two moves to open them.  To the kids, it's just fun!

Viewmaster

Remember this from childhood?  Guess what!  It's still around and kids love it.

Let There Be Light

We have begun talking about how God created our world.  We read the story in our preschool bible and over the next several weeks we will express our understanding of how God created everything by being creators ourselves.  To represent light and dark, the children rolled golf balls dipped in silver and neon yellow paint onto black paper.  Harris was by far our most vigorous and enthusiastic creator.  I'm pretty sure God is very pleased by that!

The Office

Is this art or is this literacy?

What you see on the table looks a little like art - markers, scissors, colorful paint chips being glued onto equally colorful construction paper.  Believe it or not, this is literacy development.  The children are using office supplies and writing with markers.  Can we read what they write?  Rarely, but that's beside the point.  All of the marks they make that look like scribbles will continue to refine and refine until they resemble the marks we make for letters in our language, then they'll actually resemble letters.  It's a long slow process and lucky for these kiddos, we give them plenty of time and opportunity to develop.