It sure doesn’t feel like it is winter but we are still celebrating it in the classroom! This week we practiced number recognition and counting with a snowman game. First we rolled a koosh and whatever number it landed on or closest to is how many snowflakes we counted! We had so much fun with this activity and everyone already asked when they will get to do it again!
Exploring classroom centers is some of our students favorite time of day! We change the centers once a month, and the children are so excited to explore all the new activities and experiences each month. Learning centers are an important part of preschool. Learning centers are defined areas with activities, within a classroom, where children can explore and learn with hands-on materials. Learning centers allow for independently guided play with peers, social interactions and problem solving practice. Research shows that young children learn best through active, hands-on play; learning centers engage children and make learning fun. Children manipulate materials, explore ideas, discover consequences, build, create and express themselves through art. To parents it may look like children are “just playing,” but this is play with a purpose. Through carefully planned learning centers, children learn important concepts and life skills in ways that are meaningful to them.
Notice the “snow” that’s EVERYWHERE? It’s the favorite new center for January…the Antarctic habitat in the sensory table. It may be everywhere…messy is the most fun!
We spent the last 2 days before break having some great Christmas fun in the Preschool Class. We practiced counting by counting “Skittle” Ornaments onto our Christmas trees.
We practiced our tracing skills and traced a Christmas tree working extra hard to keep our pencils on the lines.
We also worked out hand strength and had some fun playing with red and green playdough.
On Friday we celebrated Grinch Day! We read the story the Grinch and talked about ways we could make the Grinch happy.
We then got to make some special Grinch Dust that we will sprinkle in our yard on Christmas Eve to let the Grinch know that we have all taken great care to keep Christmas spirit in our homes and love our loved ones!
We got to end our day watching Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch and enjoy a special Grinch popcorn snack.
The Preschool and K Prep students have been reading variations of the Gingerbread Man all through the month of December. The K Prep students have been comparing and contrasting the setting, characters and ending of each story. Some of the books include:
The preschool class got to do an art exploration activity with scented paint! We used cookie cutters to stamp different Christmas shapes and used green peppermint paint and red cinnamon paint.
The preschool class celebrated their Thanksgiving Feast last week. The week leading up to it, we learned a little about the first Thanksgiving and prepared almost all of the food that we ate.
We made homemade applesauce in the crockpot. We got to crank the apple peeler and break the slices apart.
We made individual pumpkin pie cheesecakes and we got to smell the yummy pumpkin!
We prepared green beans by snapping the yucky ends off.
We made homemade bread by mixing it in a Ziploc bag. We squished it in the bag to get it all mixed up after taking turns adding the ingredients.
We also made our own butter by shaking heavy cream. We had to shake for a VERY LONG time!
Then on Monday and Tuesday we got enjoy all our hard work and eat the food we made as well as some turkey and mashed potatoes! We wore special pilgrim hats too and had such a fun time!
Creative Tots has specialized in the private education of both toddlers and preschool age children for over 15 years. We began in the heart of Madeira and now also have a new Mason location. We are specifically designed to focus on early childhood development for children ages 18 months to 5 years.
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