Our PreSchool Blog

The chartreuse wigglers literally glow in the dark and are at the sensory table all this week

The Sensory Table is quite a hit this week with our creepy crawling, night crawlers. These glow in the dark worms have made themselves a home in our Sensory Table Center for the next few days and the kids sure love handling these wiggly, squiggly creatures!

The colorful clips and clothespins hanging around the preschool classroom might seem odd at first glance but the system and reasoning behind them has added a whole new sense of responsibility and indenpendence in the students. At each of our many Centers there is a Center Sign along with its matching, brightly colored clips. Each of these centers offers a wide variety of ever changing themed choices ranging from Dramatic Play and ABC Centers to Bookmaking and Block Centers. During our Free Choice time you can witness the students participating in any number of activities; whether they are playing a game individually or taking turns with a friend the centers are always a place for FUN as well as academic growth and development.

You may have heard a teacher asking the question, “Do you have a clip on your clothes?” once or twice. Placing a clip on our clothes is chosing to play at a center and while at that center it is the preschooler’s responsibility to play a game or work together on an activity with friends. When a child is finished visiting a center it is their job to make sure they have put their tools and toys away so that the next child to chose that center may come play. They put the clip back on the Center Sign and move onto their next center of choice.
The children have done a fantastic job picking up the new ways to enjoy and take care of our classroom. Great work, preschoolers!

Our Tuesday class did step one in their two part art process to make their first forest animal…the moose.  The kids giggled and laughed their way through getting their foot painted with brown paint and stepping down to make the head of the moose.  We will complete the project on Thursday by adding our handprints for antlers.  Look for these cool creations to be hanging in our classroom next week and don’t be surprised if your little one comes home with a yellow tinged foot!

Ms. Lori taught the children how to create their own log cabins in the block center last week.  Today the kids began making their own cabins in the “woods.”  Wondering what your child is learning at the block center?  The block center is ideal for large motor development and coordination skills as the children, lift, move, and stack the blocks.  They are acquiring critical social skills as they work, share, and talk with other children while they create with blocks and block accessories.  Children are also acquiring knowledge and skills which will provide an important foundation for later learning.  The children solve problems and gain confidence while working with the blocks.  Building with blocks helps children learn what numbers stand for, and it encourages children to practice scientific, trial-and-error thinking.  Other learning opportunities in this center include critical-thinking and decision making skills, making comparisons (more/less, taller/shorter), recognizing shapes, classification of objects (by shape, size, color, etc), matching and sorting, experimenting with balance, seriation, equivalence and creativitiy.  Never knew the children could learn so much from a collection of blocks!

What does your child learn in the block center?

We practiced writing our names today in sand.  This is a great activity to do at home, you can simply use salt if you don’t have any sand available.  We placed about a 1/3 of a cup of sand in a shallow tray (a baking sheet will work but you need to use more sand/salt) and gently shook it to make an even layer of sand for our writing area.  We placed a name card on the table in front of us to help us with our lowercase letters (remember to always have your child use an uppercase letter for the first letter of their name and lowercase letters for the remainder of the letters in their name).  We then used our fingers and off we went!  This was huge hit, the big question was, “CAN I DO IT AGAIN?  PLEASE?”  This is a great way to help your child practice the letter of the week at home too!  Letter Hh is our letter this week and don’t forget the lowercase h!  For another letter activity that is a hit in the classroom you can do at home, just click the picture!

Practicing Letters in the Sand

Today we took a journey to our first country of the year, Canada!  If you were with us last year, it may seem that we haven’t gone too far, but we thought we would stay close by and study something relatively similar to our own country.  In our Pre-K class we talked about the different habitats that are found in Canada, including the Arctic habitat where we would found the Snowy Owl, the Mountains, and the Forests where we would find Bears, wolverines, bald eagles, etc.  We also talked about the ocean as a habitat.  We will focus on the Forest habitat during the month of October.  In our Preschool class we talked only about the forest habitat and what animals we would find there.  In both classes we located our own country on the map as well as Canada.  This will be something that will be repeated throughout the year with each country we visit.  The kid’s always love “traveling” and learning about new places and especially the animals that we find there!

Traveling to Canada

The preschoolers continued their focus on the numbers 1, 2, and 3 today with Ms. Manda’s very popular sticker activity. The students identified each numeral as they covered them with small stickers (great for those ever growing fine motor skills). Then it was onto the tricky part; How many is the number 1? The number 2? And the number 3? The students were asked to place the correct amount of smiley face stickers next to the corresponding number. The kids loved this activity and were very proud of their finished product. It was a great way to show the written form of the numbers as well as the spatial form.

Sorting, numeral sequencing and spatial arrangement. Unbelievable what a single exercise can convey.

exploring the sensory table

This week in our Sensory Table, the children are enjoying “Scooping up the Pom Poms!” We’ve placed shovels, spoons, scoops and tongs in the table along with our large, medium, and teeny tiny Pom Poms. Now, its the preschoolers’ very important job to make sure the colorful fluffs find their way into our Pom Pom containers. We love the soft and cuddly feel of these fuzzy Pom Poms.  Each week we have a new theme in our Sensory Table, whether its an ewy-gooy messy zone or a simple sand and water theme, the Sensory Table Center always has something exciting to explore!

Iron’s Fruit Farm Field Trip

Don’t forget to get your permission forms and fees in by this Friday!  We will be meeting at Iron’s Fruit Farm on Wednesday, October 7th at 12:45.  Click the Link Below to check out Iron’s Fruit Farm Website.

Today was a great day for puzzles, but not just any puzzles…puzzles of our very own names! The students put together puzzles of their names as well as the names of their friends.
A child’s name is quite possibly the most important word in their young and growing vocabulary and therefore can be a great avenue to letter recognition. They begin to not only memorize the letters in their own names but also the letters in the names of their classmates. The children took great ownership in their name puzzles and were excited to take them home to show to their families.
We will use our names for many activities and learning games throughout the school year and these puzzles are great preparation and practice for what’s to come.