I hope that your New Year is off to an amazing start, I am very excited to see where this year will take us as the children grow and as their interests change. We will still continue to learn and focus on a new letter every week. This past week, we had a new friend R start in our class, and also our friend G started visiting to begin transitioning to our class. We are very happy to welcome new friends and have our class grow. The last two weeks we have had strong discussions and have read many books on kindness, respect, compassion, sharing, including others, and knowing that it is okay to like and play different things. I always want our class to be a place where all of our children can feel like they can voice their feelings and opinions, and have a safe space for self expression and exploration of their surroundings.
This month we worked as a class to put together our January calendar and we were excited to get to change the year from 2013 to 2014. With the letter "J" as our letter for our first full week back after the holidays we had many activities planned.
A used her fingerprints to fill the "J"ar with many little colored "J"elly beans.
E spelling using ABC puzzles.
I love to see teamwork in our classroom. We had six friends working on building a huge snake out of pattern blocks. They were very proud of their hard work and creation.
Our friend E brought a hand drum called a "J"embe. Every Wednesday and Thursday when we share our class gets so excited to pass their sharing object around the circle and give each one of their friends a turn to try. Thank you parents for always helping your children think outside the box when it comes to sharing.
We have explored shaving cream twice in the past two weeks -- once in the afternoon in the Purple Room with the younger preschool children and another time in the morning with all of our friends from Blue Room. We mixed in a couple different colors and our imaginations went wild -- pretending to make ice cream and snow cones, making mountains, writing letters, and drawing pictures in the shaving cream. It was sooo much FUN!
One of our favorites...playing playdoh!
In PreK, Teacher Karen gave us our new awesome workbooks. Our PreK's look forward to their PreK days soo much. They read a book about Martin Luther King to learn about why we had the day off for MLK day. The PreK friends have started working in their workbooks.
"J" week called for making an all time favorite: "J"ello "J"igglers! We decided to add "J"elly beans. Cooking projects are always so awesome and the children love to measure, add the ingredients (although only 2), and follow the recipe.
J went to go check if the "J"ello was firm.
Z making his "J"iggler the shape of a truck.
I scooping out his "J"ello "J"iggler.
Everyone worked on making two beautiful collages for our classroom.
K, A, J, and A working on necklaces and bracelets with Teacher Karen.
For the past two weeks our friends have been interested in castles, so we brainstormed how could we build a castle of our own, and what the different parts of the castle were. Then we got to work using tape to connect the towers.
We also talked about how some castles have moats, and decided to add our own. S is painting our moat blue and green.
Our Friend I is very interested in BMX and he wanted to share with the class. I and his mom brought his bike and gear, and explained all about I's racing and the parts of I's bike. The entire class was very interested.
I showing us his helmet and how they flip his bike upside down when he isn't riding it.
P trying on I's googles.
S trying on I's Fox racing pants.
K also trying on I's Fox racing pants.
E wearing I's gloves and chest and arm protector.
I watching as his friend A takes a turn. Thank you so much I and I's mom for coming in the share I's love of BMX with us and letting everyone try on all of your gear.
Our friend J brought in a book about making paper airplanes to share with everyone.
We concentrated very hard to follow the many steps to making an amazing paper airplane. We practiced throwing them in the classroom then we took them outside to really see if they could fly.
J gave her pink plane a test run. Up, up, and away!
Letter "Z" for "Z"ebras! Our letter "Z" list was pretty short this week. Although we were very excited that one of our friends' name started with Z.
Our new friend R using a marble to roll back and forth and all around his box to make Zebra stripes.
On Friday we made "Z"ucchini Bread! There were a lot more ingredients than in Jello Jigglers. First K took a turn peeling the zucchini.
Then S took a turn grating the zucchinis.
A and P working very carefully to peel and grate the zucchinis. My cousin Jena came to dance with us and help us make zucchini bread.
A adding sugar.
S adding a second cup of sugar.
G and J cracking our 3rd and 4th eggs.
R scooping two cups of grated zucchinis and adding them to the eggs.
P mixing the wet ingredients and K mixing the dry ingredients.
Last look before we bake our zucchini bread.
It is always so interesting to see the transformation.
And even better yet to get to taste it! Thumbs up! We really enjoyed our "Z"ucchini Bread, it was a long process to make, but it was so worth it because it was super yummy!!
A quick note to parents -- if there is ever something that your child is really passionate about or that you think would offer a unique learning opportunity to share with everyone, please feel free to come talk to me about it and I'd love for us to figure out how best to share it with the children.
Hope you all enjoyed your 3 day weekend. Happy MLK day and see you Tuesday!
Hugs,
Teacher Kristina
