Our PreSchool Blog

The early 3’s are working on their pinching, but not in the way you might think! We are working on using our pincher fingers to build our fine motor muscles. Many self-help skills like buttoning and zipping require a tight pinch, using the thumb and first two fingers. We practiced using pincher fingers when we picked up cotton balls and glued them to our sheep!

We took our pinching a step farther when we pinched clothespins open to hang our farm animals up to dry!

Mrs. Wishy-Washy has been a big hit in the Early 3s room. Today we made the duck all muddy while practicing our fine motor skills with sponges.

You can listen to Mrs. Wishy-Washy with your child on YouTube!

This week in Early 3s we are focusing on Math. The students watched Ten Little Numbers on the ipad during small groups. This is a fun way to practice numbers and counting at home.

Next the children practiced counting. We worked on one-to-one correspondence by placing stickers in boxes for each number.

We practiced one-to-one correspondence by matching bears to dotted cards during small groups today as well. This was a fun activity for color recognition and counting.

This week in Early 3s its been all about names. On Friday during small groups name recognition took things to a new level. We practiced our fine motor muscles while pinching clips. This is great practice for our fingers and classroom routines. At our centers in the room there are signs with clothespins (clips) for the number of friends allowed to play there. This is a big piece of independence in the Early 3s program. By practicing the action of pinching a clip in multiple ways the students are set up for success when trying to use them independently.

We went digging in the “dirt” today on the farm to search for our names.

In Early 3s we explored foods that grow on the farm. We talked about the difference between the inside and outside of foods. We discovered the way they smell, look, and feel. We talked about the colors of the different foods. Foods grow in all different ways on the farm. Ask your preschooler what foods they explored today!

This week in Early 3s we have been exploring our names.

Everyday during arrival a name recognition activity is on the tables for the students to independently match the letters of their name.

During small groups on Monday, we practiced the letters of our name while strengthening our fine motor muscles. We used toothpicks to poke holes in the letters of our names and create constellations.

Also in small groups on Monday we put together name puzzles with the letters in our name.

On Wednesday we did name rubbings with crayons to discover our name.

We searched for letters in our name and decided which ones belong and which ones do not.

Exposure to names at this age is helpful in any way! Ask your child about the letters in their name.

Today we started October with our book of the month, Color Farm by Lois Elhert. We went on a shape hunt on each page. The illustrator created animals from the farm out of shapes. Next we practiced our glue stick skills and shape recognition while creating a rooster.

While focusing on developing our fine motor skills this week, we practiced ripping paper and using a glue stick to create our very own ocean! We talked about how we pinch the paper in our fingers and pull to rip it. Then on Friday we practiced holding our glue sticks and learning how to put glue on the pieces of paper and sticking it in our “ocean.” The skill of ripping paper is a great exercise  in gaining fine motor control, and we can always use more practice learning how to glue!