February - A trip to the dentist

February's theme is friendship which ties in so well with Valentines Day, but it is also Dental Health Month so we took a field trip to visit Dr. Matthew Tuft.  It was AWESOME!

Our letters in February were T is for teeth (obviously).

    

Here the kids were making mouths with 20 baby teeth.

We also learned U is for umbrella and under.  (We had snack that day UNDER the table.)

V is for Valentines.

W is for Washington (We learned about George Washington and the REAL story about his teeth.  Hint they were NOT made of wood.)  We read the book "George Washington's Teeth" and made this cute art project.  They are getting so much more competent with cutting out their own pieces.

I found this cute idea at http://www.dltk-kids.com/usa/mcottonball-washington.htm

We also celebrated Groundhog Day in the very beginning of the month.  Here the kids are pretending to be groundhogs by crawling through our tunnels indoors.

Here's a cute song they learned about Groundhog day!

Using good books, music, art and movement help to solidify information and helps children to associate new ideas with previous ones.

January - Responsibility is the key

The theme for this month is Responsibility and here was our theme song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZ2diAHg9a8   They love doing this little rap and the scenarios that the main character talks about really stick with them.  I've heard them months later say "Remember to do a good job on your work.  No scribble, scrabble (our word for hurried work)".

Our letters for January were N is for necklace, nickels, newspapers and numbers
                                           O is for owls  (Remember we covered P back in November)

                                           Q is for quilt, q-tips and queen

January was cold, snowy and icy so we couldn't go outside much, but the highlight of our month was making and eating real SNOW cones!

We also learned about Martin Luther King, Jr.  I told the children stories from my own life where I saw racial problems and how my family dealt with them.  We read the book "First Biography:  Martin Luther King, Jr."  When the kids heard how the people marched for equality they wanted to try it too.


We've been learning sight words since the second week of school and you can see they are beginning to spot those words and be able to write them.

Using movement, music, singing and role playing helps to cement new concepts.

December - A time for singing and celebrating

The theme for the month is love, so I put a lot of emphasis on how we treat each other.  I look for ways each day to "catch" them doing something kind or thoughtful for another class mate.  I encourage them to do nice things for their family members too and some of the best circle times are when they share what they did to help at home.

We stayed busy the whole month decorating our classroom for Christmas and making things to take home.

The kids really love to sing and there are so many fun Christmas songs to teach them.  We did "Jingle Bells" accompanied by wrist bands that had bells attached.  We sang "Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer", "We wish you a Merry Christmas" and "Must be Santa".

Our letters for the month were L is for Love, M is for Music and S is for Santa.

We worked on math by making advent calendars and counting down the days to Christmas.

We also began learning about money.  In our sensory station the kids dug out coins and separated them into quarters, nickels, dimes and pennies.  Some of the kids even began understanding and using number sentences.  

November - At time for gratitude

The theme was gratitude for the whole month and each week we focused on a few things that we were especially grateful for.
Week 1 - We are grateful for animals.  We were learning K is for Kangaroo so we made these cuties.

I got the idea from http://thestorytimelady.wordpress.com/2012/03/02/boing-boing-a-kangaroo-jumping-story/    There is a cute story that goes with it and the kids loved acting it out on our puppet stage.  We started out gratitude book which we added to throughout the month.  The kids chose their favorite animals to put on a collage page about animals.  They also learned about animal biomes.  We read "Grover's Book of Cute Baby Animals".  We learned the song "Please and thank you, please and thank you, It's what we say, It's what we say, We are very thankful, We are very thankful, Everyday, everyday".  It's sung to the tune of Frere Jacques.  We played animal games online from Sheppardsoftware.com

Week 2 - We are grateful for family and friends.  Our letter of the week is I is for Igloo.  We talked about being grateful for our homes.

We added three pages to our grateful book this week because we also spoke about the freedoms of our country since the following Monday was Veteran's day.  

Week 3 - We are grateful for food.  Our letter of the week is P is for Pilgrim.  We read "This is the Feast", "The Very First Thanksgiving Feast" and "Who will carve the turkey".  We sang a song about a turkey to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle.  The words are "Turkey, turkey look at you, please be careful what you do, Thanksgiving day will soon be here, We eat turkey every year, Go and hide out in the woods, We'll eat pizza like we should."  We literally counted our blessings and other Thanksgiving objects.

And even though we sang about eating pizza we had a traditional Thanksgiving feast.

October - A time for imagination and creativity

  As the weather cooled and fall set in, it was the perfect setting for celebrating Halloween and visiting the local pumpkin patch.  We went to The Farmstead in Meridian near the end of the month.  It was our first field trip and the kids did beautifully.  I'm lucky that so many parents wanted to come along that day too.  See some of the pictures below:

 This is both the morning and afternoon classes combined.

 Just chillin on the hay wagon after picking pumpkins.

 Riding the cow train and playing in the old west town.

 They made it through the straw maze as a team!

In addition to the field trip we were getting ready for Halloween.  We played Dress UP!

And put on puppet shows!

We made some spooky ghosts!

And some spooky treats to eat.  Our spiders were made with Ritz crackers, peanut butter to hold them together, pretzel sticks and jelly beans for eyes.

Our jack-o-lantern masks were made with flour tortillas, butter and cinnamon sugar and then broiled.

Even with all this fun we learned 5 new letters!

E is for Elephant.  

F is for Fall. We painted beautiful fall leaves, jumped in real ones and went on a nature walk to see signs of the season.  We read the book "Harold's Purple Crayon" and talked about imagination.

G is for Ghost and goats.  We read the book "The Three Billy Goats Gruff".  We "discovered" hidden letter G's when we used magic paint to uncover them.

H is for Halloween.  We made our own shape monsters this week, read the book "Quick as a Cricket" by Don and Audrey Wood and learned to sing one of their favorite songs of the year.  The words are "I'm a mean old witch with a hat, and I ride on my broomstick with my cat and my face is wrinkled and my hands are too and you better watch out or I might scare youuuuuuuuuuuuu"

J is for Jack-o-lantern.  We read "The Little Old Lady Who wasn't afraid of anything", "The Dot" (another book about seeing things in a new way) and "Pumpkin Eye".  We had a Halloween party and added some new sight words to our vocabulary.  I try to have the kids see sight words in as many ways as possible.  Here they are "getting the feel" of the word by using play dough to cover a laminated card with some of our sight words.

It was a full month of discovery, learning and fun!

September - A time for new beginnings

Even though it's fall and lots of people think of this time of year as an ending, it's the start of a new preschool year and for my students it's been a time of new skills, new friends, new knowledge and new routines.  Sometimes all those new things can be a little scary so our theme for September has been COURAGE!

  

Making new friends and caterpillars.

Looking for bugs and answers to all our questions.

To support our theme we read books like "First Day Jitters" and "Chrysanthemum".  We went on a "Bear Hunt" and spotted several ferocious ones, but "we weren't afraid".   We learned a new song about being brave.  It's sung to the tune of "Bingo" and the words area:
If you climb a tree even though it's high, 
Then you are being brave.
B-R-A-V-E
B-R-A-V-E
B-R-A-V-E
Then you are being brave.

If you try something new even though it's hard, 
Then you are being brave.
Chorus
Then you are being brave.       
Ask your child to sing it to you.  They like to sing it with gusto!               

                                           Matching written letters to letter magnets.  They stick to the cookie tray!

We have also been working on letter sounds, names and shapes.  So far we've covered:
A is for apple and ants (We read "Apples, Apples, Apples" and "Apples A to Z")
B is for butterfly and brown bears (We read "Brown bear, brown bear" and "Once there was a caterpillar")
C is for caterpillars, corn, carrots (We read "The Very Hungry caterpillar" and "Ten Little Caterpillars")
D is for ducks and dots (We read "Make Way for Ducklings")

We've made art projects for each letter which are being compiled into an alphabet book.  They are so proud of their projects they always want to take them right home, so here's a little sneak peek.

B is for Butterfly!

We are also working on learning the names of our numbers.  This year I'm using a new DVD by Heidi Songs to help them remember numbers 0-10.  The kids love practicing.

We have also been working on practical skills and making an All About Me book which the kids will bring home this week to share with you.

   Looking for those ants we've been reading about!

 Learning to pour a cup of water.

                                                                                      Mastering a computer mouse.

   Getting all the pieces in the right places.

Listening to a story on tape.

 Blowing bubbles of all shapes and sizes.

Success! I put the puzzle together!

Peeling carrots is good for small motor control.....and it's fun!

We've also been learning the pledge of allegiance.  With someone to help I'll bet your little one can do quite a bit of it already. :)  They are all so bright and eager to learn.  The other day one of the little boys said, "Miss Cindy, I love to learn new things.  It makes me happy."  I agree and I'm lucky enough to learn new things along with the kids every day!  What a great beginning.

Using music, movement, play and art we learn phonics, math, literature and good social skills!

Fall classes are filling up!

I only have a few spots left.  Our AM class will meet M,W, F  from 9:15-11:45 am.   Our PM class will meet M,W, F from 12:30-3:00.  If you are interested or have questions, give me a call at  713-8113 or drop me an email at cindyspreschool@gmail.com


Through games, music, art and academics, we prepare children for a bright future!