Learning Station - Octopus Count

The kiddos counted out the correct number of arms and glued them on, then they added suckers.
Preschooler on the left, youngster on the right.

 

Learning Station - Alphabetic Shell Search

The kiddos hunted for sea shells in the sand.  The shells have letters on them.  They were identifying the letters as they found the shells.

A Week with Earth Day

This week we will be learning a bit about our planet earth and how to take good care of it.  Earth Day is Wednesday.

Journal Time - The kiddos found an Earth on their journal!  They colored it, some kiddos added volcanoes or sharks in the ocean.  We noticed that there is way more water on our planet than land.

Four Seasons Book - We talked about the four seasons we have and what we like to do in each one.  Then the kiddos drew pictures for each season.

Science - Wind Experiment - We talked about the wind and our wind experiences.  Then we talked about what we have seen blowing in the wind.  Next we decided to see if our wind (our breath) could blow anything.  It can! 

Then we pulled out the fan, which of course the kiddos LOVED.

 

Circle Time - Today being Earth Day, we discussed things we could do to make our Earth happy or sad.  Older class and younger class:

 

Painting our Earth - The kiddos painted their plates, then later added green tissue paper continents. 
A couple of the preschoolers were naming each of their "continents" as they glued them on.

Science - Wind Again - Part 2 -  Today we tried to fly paper airplanes and snowballs (crumpled up paper) in the wind.

The kiddos were thrilled by the mini airplanes:  how they flew and even how they stuck to the fan!

 

Earth Day - Trash Walk - The kiddos and I, armed with rubber gloves, took a walk up to the Park.  As we walked, we scouted for trash to pick up we also found some wonderful nature!

The kiddos found trash for our bag and dandelions for my apron pocket.

 

Science - Clouds - During snack, Ms. Sara announced that we'd be eating clouds for science today ... Whaaaa?!

First we explored the different kinds of clouds on Mr. Adam's cloud chart.  We discovered that today's clouds were cirrus-ish.  We also learned that there are scientists who just study clouds!  Cool huh!

We talked about rain clouds (cumulus) and how they fill up with water (water cycle!).  We filled some clouds (cotton balls) up with rain (dipped them in a cup of water) then let them rain!  Squeeeeeze!  ...  Well, that's almost how the clouds do it!  Ha!

After all that cloud fun, we munched our edible clouds and then created this cloud guide.

"Y" Stick - The kiddos found this fabulous letter stick.

Learning Station - Word Smack

We spread our word family cards (_at, _an, _ap) on the floor, then one of the kiddos would read a word, if it was right they smacked it with our word (fly) swatter.  Sometimes multiple smacks were needed, especially if it was a tricky word - ha!

Learning Station - Play Dough Words - Letters

The kiddos used play dough to create words from our word families we're working on.  The younger class created letters.

 

Learning Station - Word Hockey

The kiddos read me the word on their "puck" then shot it into the goal.  We are working on the _at, _ap, and _an word families.  The younger kiddos worked with letters.

 

The boys particularly LOVED this learning station.  I found this fabulous idea here:  On this blog.  And I also saw it here:  On this blog.

A Week on Monsters

This week we are learning with monsters! 

Science - Growing Celery - Wow!  Check out our celery after a week!

Monster Journals - Ms. Sara glued googly eyes in the kiddos journals, they got to create any type of monster they wanted.

Don't Eat Pete! - Back to monsters, we played this silly, tasty game.  A kiddo is "it" and leaves the room.  The rest of us decide which monster is going to be "Pete".  The kiddos comes back and begins munching a snack from each monster, when the kiddo reaches for the monster we decided was "Pete" we all yell:  "DON'T EAT PETE!".   It's a little crazy, but fun.  The kiddos chose whether they wanted to munch M&M's or goldfish, or a bit of both.

Monster Shirt - This kiddo arrived at preschool with the perfect shirt on!  She didn't even know it was monster week!

Kleenex Box Monster Feet - These are the best!  I save boxes all year long, just so we can do this project!  I run a couple of strips of hot glue on the bottom of the boxes, so they aren't quite so slippery on the carpet.  The claws are just craft foam, I've also used sponges before.

The boxes usually need some duct tape support before the day is done, but they are super fun and the kiddos love them.

 These kiddos didn't want to take off their monster feet at snack time, ha!

Crazy Weather - On Monday we enjoyed such warm weather (see monster shirt above).  Wednesday we had a surprise!  We played in the snow for a chunk of time and set aside our monster activities.

Snow Ice Cream!  Super easy to make:  Clean snow, milk, sugar, and vanilla! 
"This is the best ice cream I've ever tasted!"
"Put ice cream in your hot chocolate!"
"It tastes cold and hot!"

 We also enjoyed hot cocoa...

The Big Green Monster - Toddlers

The preschoolers created their own monsters...

 

 

Snow Bin - For the toddlers, I brought snow in for them to play with.


Cozy Corner - Secret Fort - The kiddos figured out this arrangement...

Tape Road - One of the kiddos created this fabulous road.

  
Monster Slime! - We made the traditional Borax and glue slime today.