Our PreSchool Blog

We are making great progress in our patterning skills.  Some children have progressed into extending their patterns much further this week while others began making more difficult patterns independently.  We observed some of the children choosing to create their own patterns at the art center this week with the halloween stickers available.  In small groups we used our fall felt stickers to create fun fall patterns to take home and share our progress with you.  We will be wrapping up our patterning unit next week and will revisit it at the end of the year.

patterning independently

Cooking with children is a wonderful way to teach them the benefits of measuring, numbers and working as a group.

Today we worked together to make apple crisp!  We sat around the table and talked about how we use measuring cups to help us make different kinds of foods.  For our apple crisp recipe we measured flour, sugar, and baking powder and stirred it all together.  We sprinkled cinnamon and sugar on top of our crisp apples and put it in the oven to bake!  The kids loved the smell of our wonderful creation as we all sat and ate it for snack!

Helping promote the recognition of healthy emotions in the toddler classroom

Today at group time we learned the song “5 Little Pumpkins Sitting on a Gate”.  We are also talking about the color orange this month so it was fun to talk about the color of the pumpkins!  The shape we are focusing on this month is a triangle.  The kids loved playing the pumpkin face game by telling me what shapes I  should use for the face of the pumpkins.  The concepts of “happy” and “sad” are also important to talk about with children at this age.  The children laughed when I made one pumpkin a happy pumpkin and the other pumpkin a sad pumpkin.

Below is the song we learned today so you can sing it at home!

“5 Little Pumpkins Sitting on a Gate”

5 Little pumpkins sitting on a Gate,

The first one said “Oh my it’s getting late!”

The second one said “There are witches in the Air!”

The third one said “But we don’t care!”

The fourth one said “Let’s run and run and run!”

The fifth one said “I’m ready for some fun!”

Ohhhh Ohhhh went the wind!

And OUT went the lights!

Then five little pumpkins rolled out of sight!

During the month of October we talk about fire safety.  Today Jessica was our group time helper and modeled what a fire fighter wears when on duty.  We went through each item of clothing as she put it on and talked about how fire fighters stay protected.  These items are also in our dramatic play area so all the children were excited to get their chance to be a fire fighter!

There are so many fun ways to learn about colors at this age.  The toddlers are so excited during group time to play color matching games.  Their independence seems to grow with every day they come to school!  The best part of group time is when they get to come up to the magnet board to have that proud moment of accomplishment where they show us where something goes.

Independent color sorting

Group time with the Toddlers

It is only the third week of school and it is amazing to see how well the children sit so patiently at group time!  This morning we read a story about sharing with our friends and talked about how to be a good friend.  We also played a fun game on the magnetic board by putting different color crayons in the corresponding pockets of the overalls.  The kids loved getting their turn to go up to the board!

Introducing our special "letter birds" as the eager Early 3's beginning picking eggs from the letter bird's nest.

Every Monday we will be introducing a letter of the week.  Today during group time our special bird flew in to help introduce the new letter.  Each student got a chance to pick a egg from the bird’s nest and open it to find out our special letter.  This picture is showing everyone opening up their eggs and holding up the special letter “L”.