A new year of preschool

We've just completed our first week of preschool and again I have two DARLING classes of students!  Our first week has been full and eventful.  

The kids have loved doing Guessing Can!  Guessing can is part of our circle time each day.  Children are assigned beforehand to bring an item from home that is usually tied into our theme or the letter we're working on.  For example, since we were studying the letter Aa they might bring an apple, a toy alligator or anything else that begins with an Aa.  Then they hide the item in a #10 coffee can and give the rest of the class clues to what's inside.  The class uses their deductive skills to guess what's inside.  This week it was so cute because several of the kids who were assigned guessing can just couldn't contain themselves.  When I asked one little boy "Is it an animal?" he responded "no it's applesauce".

We also learned what a #1 looks like and sang along to a DVD from Heidi songs  http://www.heidisongs.com/index.php about the number one.  The words are "Number one, number one, you are long and straight and tall.  Number one, number one, you're always first of all".  The kids LOVE to sing.  We learned the chant about 5 little monkeys swinging from a tree, because there's an ALLIGATOR in it and Alligator begins with A.  They enjoyed performing this chant for the parents during parent pickup.  They also sang "If you're happy and you know it" letting everyone know that "yes" they are happy.

We read "10 apples up on top" by Dr. Seuss, "Counting Apples" by Joan Holub and "The Pout-Pout Fish goes to school".  

We ate 3 types of apples for snack time and took votes on which one was best.  Red Delicious apples were the winners over Granny Smith's and Galas.  Another day we had friendship gorp.  Each child poured a different ingredient into the bowl, we stirred it together and everyone got a scoop.  The snack followed a discussion about how each of us in the class is different but we can all have fun together.

We practiced painting with watercolors and many of the kids opted the next day to paint additional paintings during free choice.

During our little scientist time we blended blue and yellow water and found out it makes green.

We made alligators from construction paper.  I got this cute idea from preschoolalphabet.blogspot.com!  

This next week we'll be studying the letter Bb, the number 2,  introduce our first sight word "and", investigate more science about the color wheel and talk more about "Courage" which is our overall theme for September.  We'll also begin work on our "All about me" books.