The Ocean

The sensory table was filled with soft, cool sand this week. We hid and retrieved many different types and sizes of seashells. 

We counted sea creatures with Ms. Amy as we practiced our math skills. 

 

One of our favorite activities this week was following a three step process to create our own ocean bottles.    We used a wonderful little tool, a funnel, to help us get the ingredients inside our plastic water bottles.

 

 We added sand, shells & rocks, and then filled our bottles with blue water. We know that every ocean has a combination of these three things.

We enjoyed several projects at the art table this week.

 Easel paintings became ocean background for paper schools of fish.

Shark cut-outs were given triangle-shaped teeth (lots of them!), eyes and gills, after reading an informational book about Sharks.

Jellyfish were created from paper plates, streamers, paint and glue. They looked so colorful in our windows and now float above us from the ceiling, giving us an underwater feel.







Informational and fiction books were part of our week as we learned about the creatures of the sea.

Z is for Zoo

At the art table, we used our handprints to create ears for funny paper elephants.

We took turns working with Ms Amy, learning to carefully get just a drop out of the glue bottle. (It's very tempting to watch it drip and run as we squeeze.)

 Our friends brought in their "homework" and shared their favorite Zoo Animal this week during group time.

There is always a sense of pride and accomplishment when they have stood in front of our class and shared their own thoughts and feelings about a subject.

Adding stripes to an outline of a Zebra proved to be somewhat challenging for some of us. Even when we were careful to apply the paint in a striped pattern, we painted over them to create a solid black animal. I believe we must feel a sense of satisfaction when we have covered the entire paper (and that's OK).

 A large tub of tiny Legos was introduced to our room this week. A group of friends were quite busy constructing at that table all week.

Dress up is a part of Dramatic or Imaginative Play. It's an important part of each day at preschool and develops critical thinking skills, decision making skills, and cooperative skills.

While we have to discourage chasing Super Heros inside our classroom because of physical constraints, we encourage pretend play in general and use those situations to teach life-lessons.

Our Senses

 

We used our hands to move big things like the parachute? It felt silky and smooth as we moved it in many directions. 

We used our sense of touch to 

feel what was inside the bag before making guesses.  Everyone wanted a turn to choose something from the bag. 

New vocabulary words emerged as we described the textures that we felt.

A listening game using a music box helped us focus on our sense of hearing. We hid our eyes and on the count of 1-2-3, started listening.

Using our sense of taste, we tried something sweet, something salty, and something sour. It was a little tricky to differentiate those tastes and describe them accurately.

Art projects went 3-D with recycled juice and marker lids. We used a lot of glue to make this touchable display.











Combining a review of some basic shapes and our senses, we matched them together to make a robot face.

 

A fun read aloud about morning sounds had us using our ears and eyes as we enjoyed this book.

A special new addition to our classroom books is the A-B-C book filled with photos of many things found in our classroom and experiences through our school year.

Be looking for it to come home in your child's school bag soon!

Valentine's Day

We celebrated Valentines Day with a party and lots of new activities. Thank you to our party parents Michele and Joel!











Using a table full of foam stickers, glue and shiny "jewels", we decorated mailboxes and door hangers.








Joel helped us to play some gross motor games: Ball toss into a heart-shaped wreath and pin the Heart on the Bumble Bee.


















Michele helped us to figure out a fun game of Valentine bingo and we got to eat our candy markers!














We continued talking about our hearts and how they work.











After exercising, we felt our hearts beating fast.




We learned about how our heart pumps the blood that travels all over our body.












We used blue and red chips to follow and create patterns. We know that our blood looks red, but it's hard to believe that it ever looks blue.













Our pottery projects came back shiny!










Other art projects included stringing beads and foam hearts to make necklaces.























We were back outside with the warmer weather!










Hooray!

Love

Love is in the air at LAP this week.











We talked about Valentines Day and prepared for it with lots of art activities.















We used stamps, ink pads and crayons in the color scheme of red, pink, and purple.










Fine motor practice prepares our hands for writing.













We talked about the people we love (Moms & Dads topped the list!)















Heart collages were fun to construct using glue and sparkly sequins.



















We used our scissor skills to cut out hearts from folded paper.







What a surprise when we followed the curved line and opened the paper!



















New pink dough was the perfect medium for creating heart-shaped "cookies".









Many of our moms and dads came to school to help us paint pottery from Earth & Fire.