Thursday Update Sept 7 to 10

We had another exciting week in the yellow starfish classroom!    Even though it was a short week we have done a lot!!!  The students participated in some focused activities as well as a lot of exploration. J                                                                                  

This last week we…

*had a fun appearance from Professor Peabody (aka Ms. Jo) who gave us clues and sent us on a search! (The clues were all about the letters, and boy did we find them EVERYWHERE after that!!!)

*practiced writing letter Ss and read books such as Silly Sally, Smelly Socks, Swimmy, and The Stray Dog.

*observed like scientists (with our sense of sight) a real snake skeleton and drew a picture of it.

*played with snakes (pretend onesJ) in the sensory table

*wrote numbers on paper snakes and dotted the correct number of dots to practice one to one correspondence

*learned the poem The Sandwich and made real and paper sandwiches that are just like the ones in the poem!  Kiddos who wanted to made sandwiches, and independently spread butter, jam, jelly, and peanut butter on the bread to make them.

*worked with S pattern blocks

*learned the Alphabet Song and compared/matched the upper case letters with the lower case letters.  Can your child remember the number of letters in the alphabet?

*talked about what makes us the same and what makes us different and then made pizza faces for fun.

*made name bracelets to practice the letters in our names and other students in the class.

*read pattern books and made patterns with unifix cube blocks.  We also used the blocks to measure and compare.

*used wood and other natural materials to build.

FAMILY/IDENTITY BANNER

In your child’s zippy pouch are the instructions for your and your child to make a family/identity banner.  Please read them and have fun…the entire family can help with this project. J  (This is pretty much the only “homework” your child with have in Pre K J)  If you would like me to send home a piece of paper for you to use, please let me know what color and I would be happy to do so.  (I just wanted as much individuality as possible, but I can easily send paper home with your child if that helps you out J)

REMINDERS/IMPORTANT DATES

Friday, September 11^th:  NO SCHOOL

Thursday, September 24^th:  NO SCHOOL

Friday, September 25^th:  NO SCHOOL for students—Faculty Inservice

*Return blue Friday Folder bag and red library bag and library book on Monday

*Return Family Banners whenever they are finished.

*I will be talking with you soon about UN Day and cooking and volunteering in the classroom. J

Extra excerpts from our week

This was a busy, busy week!  Here are some extra comments and pictures from it!

Building, building, building!  From legos last week, to magnatiles and castles this week!!

Exploring letters everywhere!  When we read Silly Sally the cuties discovered S, connected it to our school SAS and then decided to look for SAS everywhere!

Some of our kiddos have been into making bead necklaces (you may have a few coming home!!) Many students found their name off the wall, and spelled their name onto their necklaces (along with many colors too!)

An exploration of color and reading such books as Mouse Paint, Little Blue and Little Yellow, Pete the Cat and Dog's Colorful Day led to painting and an "exploding colors" science experiment!

Friday Update Aug 31 to Sept 4

We have had another wonderful week in the Yellow Starfish classroom!!!!  We celebrated Jimmy’s birthday on Wednesday (HAPPY BIRTHDAY JIMMY!) and also had our first library day with Ms. Jo!  

One point of interest…I have watched your cuties become more and more independent as the days have progressed! Really encourage your child to practice being independent at home as well.  Feeding themselves, starting to help dressing themselves, doing up their bags, and also starting to practice things like using safe scissors to cut will really help them out! J

This week we…

*read the book Mouse Paint (along with quite a few others such as A Color of His Own, Dog’s Colorful Day, Little Rabbit’s Color Book, and Pete the Cat (which has turned into a lot of singing! J) and finger painted with the three primary colors. Can your child tell you what they are?

*the kiddos were SO INTERESTED in mixing colors I decided to do a fun experiment with them—exploding colors!  Ask your cutie to tell you about it!

*read the book “Silly Sally” and realized both words start with S!  This led to an amazing conversation and discovery that the words are very similar to the letters in SAS…our school!!!!  One of our cuties had the idea to go on a hunt to find SAS, and the kiddos ended up finding lots of them!!!!!

*our wonder of letters continued—some of us made name necklaces out of beads, some stamped letters into playdoh, some found different letters in books and we read the book Smelly Socks! 

*we went on from this to learn the sound, formation, and hand motion for the letter Ss.

*learned the poem “I Am Special” and drew a picture of ourselves on the poem

*we had a lot of building going on this week!  We had a group that moved from legos, to magnatiles, to blocks to castle blocks!

*we continued to talk about ourselves and how we are alike and different.

ALL ABOUT ME

This week we practiced learned specific vocabulary for parts of the body. We played Simon Says using these names and also sang Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes using different parts of the body.  We are concentrating on those parts of the body that we might not normally be familiar with:  forehead, eyebrows, eyelashes, chin, earlobes, biceps, elbows, wrists, knuckles, abdomen, chest, thighs, waist, knees, ankle, and heel.  Give your child a butterfly kiss with your eyelashes, just for fun (just flutter them against their cheek or arm! They will love it!)

REMINDERS

*Check in your child’s Friday Folder (the BLUE BAG) take everything out and return bag back to school on Monday.  We keep certain projects/activities here at school to put in your child’s portfolio (in case your child was talking about something you didn’t see.)  Also, SONG BOOKS are coming home again, so be sure to return those on Monday as well.

*Return Library books and RED LIBRARY BAG on Monday.

*ALTERNATE DRESS DAY on WEDNESDAY!!!

*NO SCHOOL NEXT FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 11^th

*Please send in a family photo if you have not done so yet!

*Please make sure to send in healthy snacks! J  Chocolate and biscuits are good treats, but don’t give us the brain food and energy we need for our learning. Thanks!

Have a wonderful weekend!   

Lynsey  J

Friday Update August 24 to 28

It was so wonderful seeing so many of you Wednesday night!  Thank you for coming!  I know you have had lots of information thrown at you during the past few weeks.  Please do not hesitate to contact me if you need any clarification.  The kiddos LOVED hearing your messages of inspiration, and ask to have them read over and over! 

The yellow starfish are doing a fabulous job, are figuring out our routines, and are becoming pros!  Here are some of the events this week.  Please take a few minutes to discuss them with your child.  We…

*brainstormed lots of ways we can be KIND and RESPECTFUL to our friends. (focus: friendship)

*graphed the number of letters in our classmates names. (focus: graphing, more)

*learned the words and hand motions for Hello Neighbor and put a copy in our Songs and Poems folder.  Have your child teach you the hand motionsJ

*read the book “Who Stole the Cookies from the Cookie jar, and made our own book.

*went to the block area and built houses with blocks.

*decorated paper “friendship” dolls to look like us! (focus: body awareness/friendship)

*were introduced to Pete the Cat and began a review of our colors

*read Chrysanthemum and talked about how important and special all of our names are.

*decided what we wanted on the front covers of our identity/creative writing books

*continued to explore the classroom and materials in it

*found so many ways to fill each others’ buckets!! J

A LOOK AT NEXT WEEK

Next week we will continue our theme of identify, and really look at ourselves and our families. We will also focus on how we are alike and different from our classmates.  We will do some work with colors and really delve into the cuties’ interests.

SONG BOOKS!!!!

Your child’s Poem and Song book is coming home in their blue Friday Folders today.  Have fun as they use their “magic music wand” to “read” the words and sing the songs to you.  You are encouraged to sing along and help them at any point.  This helps with directionality for later reading, and even if your child is pointing no where near the words on the page, encourage them on their amazing singing!!!  Please return the Poem and Song book AND the blue Friday Folder to school on Monday.

REMINDERS

*FRIDAY FOLDERS COMING HOME TODAY!!!!  Please have your child read their poetry and song book to you and return them on MONDAY.

*Check your “zippy pouch” nightly as it often contains important information from school and then return it the next day.

*Please return lunch menus, even if your child is having lunch from home so the cafeteria can prepare.

*Please send in FRUIT for our morning fruit snacks!  We have very hungry cuties in the mornings!!!!!!!!!!

*Ms. Aidah is away from school on sick leave until September 15^th.  We have had Ms. Chai Hong in our classroom as her sub—she is amazing—has been an ECC sub for a long time and knows the routines and really gets to know the kiddos.

Have a wonderful weekend!