High Flying Number Kites
We practiced writing our numbers again today in small groups. We then counted out the right number of gumballs to match our number and glued them inside our gumball machine! Tracing numbers aids in our fine motor development and proper pencil grip. It trains our hand to feel comfortable moving in the small movements needed for successful independent writing in the near future! Make sure that if your working with your child at home in writing, that they are using the correct grip. It is easier to train than retrain the brain.
The kids have loved exploring the new activities in our science and math center. They have been working on number recognition and counting with stars, putting numbers in order using the planets in our solar system, making rocket ship puzzles, and matching animals with their homes. 
This afternoon during small groups, we worked on our math skills with this snowman counting activity. Each snowman had a number on it’s belly and the kids had to put that many buttons onto their snowman. We are getting really good at our one-to-one correspondence counting!
Today we used our new graphing chart during group time. Each child has their own clip with their name and picture on it which is not only good for for name recognition but also for using their fine motor skills! The question for the day was, “What is your favorite color?” The children each had a turn to come up to the board and pinch their clip on their favorite color ribbon. To end the activity, we counted how many children liked each color and put the corresponding number above each ribbon. We will continue to practice graphing in many different ways. 
This week we have been working on number recognition with the number 3. For our arts and craft project the children were able to decorate 3 gingerbread men with glitter and sprinkle glitter on the number 3. We counted each gingerbread man and talked about what the number 3 looks like.
Here is a good rhyme for remembering the number 3.
Round the tree,
Round the tree,
That’s how you make the number 3!
We encourage you to participate – Thank you for your comments. We love to hear from all of you!