Letter C Week September 23rd-27th

Letter C is for: cookie, cat, candle, cow, camping, candy cane, clock, carrot, cucumber, crayon and combe.  We started our week by learning uppercase C and lowercase c.  We learned a letter c song and practiced its sound (Don't forget we are learning sign language with each letter too).  We also watched a funny youtube video about Cookie Monster and C is for Cookie (We laughed and thought is was very funny-Miss Heidi can do the Cookie Monster voice very well).

This is our letter C game, everyone hides and Miss Heidi hides the letter c things.  Then, we all get to find one letter C thing.  We play this a couple times because we love it so much.

This is our writing paper that we usually do on Wednesday. Miss Heidi is already noticing huge improvement in how we hold our pencils, our writing and coloring.  We are getting better everytime we practice. Yeah!

Wednesday is also the day that we do our food experiences, this week was camping week, so we made smores (of course)! We put graham crackers with marshmellows on them in the oven to melt them just a little, then put a top on them and dipped them in chocolate.  We also put orange sprinkles on them, because that is the color of the week.

This is our color page for our color book that we are working very hard on.  We sing our color songs almost everyday.  We play color games and make our color page.  It will be a great book when it is done.

On Fridays, we do a science experiment.  This is how you make orange.  Red in one cup, yellow in the other-what do they make when they meet in the middle....ORANGE!

These are two of the books we read about camping this week, we also watched a Little Critter Video on Friday.  We watched the video in Miss Heidi's homemade tent in the basement.  Little Critter went camping with his Dad and he was a big helper.

-We had some super letter C snacks like: carrots, celery, fruit snacks, cheese, and cupcakes (for Mr. G's Birthday)...aren't we lucky?

-We had a great week full of fun, learning and laughing.

-Here are the sight words we have learned so far--a, an, and

-We need to work on our cutting skills, so if you think about it,  let your kids cut, cut, cut paper for practice.

-Next week is all about the Letter D, the color Blue and Dinosaurs.  Should be DINO-riffic!

Laters,

 Miss Heidi

Letter B Week & Yellow Week

B is for Bumble Bees, Baseball and Bats, Balloons, Bubbles, Banana's, and Bread sticks.  Here are some quick highlights from Letter B Week.

 Uppercase B page and Lowercase B page.  We learned uppercase and lowercase b, its sound, a song and played a game with the letter B.

 B is for Banana pudding parfaits.  We made them all by ourselves.  I hope they were a yummy treat.  Bananalicious!

 We played yellow games and sang yellow songs and made our yellow book page for our rainbow book.

 Here is our Letter B alphabet page for our book.  We are learning sign language for each letter.  And working really hard on our handwriting of each letter.

 We blew bubbles during playtime.  B is for Bubbles!

 For our science experiment we put vinegar in a bottle, then baking soda in a balloon.  We attached the balloon to the bottle and poured in the baking soda.  What do you think happened? We made a gas (carbon dioxide) and it blew up our balloons! We love hands on learning!

 For snack this week we had letter B bread sticks with pizza sauce, juice boxes, banana muffins, chips, graham crackers and juice.  This is one of our most favorite times of the day-so it is awesome when we can learn while making our bellies HAPPY!

Here are the Letter B stories we read this week.  We are getting really good at sitting still and listening and answering questions about what we have read.  

This week was great and we look forward to another fun week.  Next week is Camping week for letter C and the color Orange. Should be SMORE fun!  

We have learned 2 sightwords so far, they are: a & an.  

We have learned this much of the Pledge of Allegiance:  I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stand....  ...more next week.

Thanks for such an awesome two weeks.  The children are learning the routine and rules.  We are having such a good time getting to know each other and learning all the while.  I love your children and hope they love coming to school and learning.  I have always believed that if a child can experience things through all five senses (touch, taste, sight, sound, and smell) that they will learn it quicker and more deeply.  That is what I try to do with our food experiences, snack, songs, games, science experiments, play time, stories and projects. I hope that you know we are working hard at preschool even if no paperwork comes home.  Thanks for sharing your children with me.

Sincerely, 

Miss Heidi

Lette A Week September 9th-13th

Letter A Week, Apple Week and the Color Red, that was our focus this past week.

So on Monday when I introduce the letter, your child will come home with a page like this for every letter of the alphabet.  I put them on book rings and punched a hole in them so that, if you keep them each week at the end of the year you will have an ABC book.  This is lowercase a.

And this is uppercase A.  When I introduced the Letter A we learned a song and played a game.  I hid 10 things that each begin with the letter A.  Then the students came in and had to find one thing that begins with A.  This is a picture of our objects; arrow, art kit, action figure, airplane, alligator, apron, anchor, apple, astronaut and ants. 

On Wednesday, we are going to be working really hard on our writing skills.  So this is the alphabet page that I keep and make into a book that will come home at the end of the year.  We are also learning sign language for each letter.  I wanted this page to really focus on coloring and writing (both fine motor skills) since most of the class is 4 and will be going into Kindergarten next year.

On Wednesday we made Mini Apple Pies, the recipe is from this website http://thestir.cafemom.com/food_party/155325/easy_mini_apple_pies_recipe.  I made the dough ahead of time to make it easier.  So the kids helped make the filling.  Yummy!

On Friday, I try and do a fun art project that goes along with our topics for the week.  I thought this was a fun poem/book about apples.  

We also played games with our color of the week.  Each student had 20 seconds and had to run around the room touching as many red objects as they could.  We learned a red song, and we are working on a rainbow color book.  This is our first page.  

These are the books we read this week.  We also had some terrific letter A snacks like; applesauce, string cheese, granola bars, frosted animal crackers with apple juice and angry bird crackers.

During circle time this week we learned some of the Pledge of Allegiance, "I Pledge Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. We will learn more next week.  

We played our baby picture game this week and hopefully you all received your pictures back safe and sound.  

We are working on show and tell this week.  Try and remember it is best if your child's show and tell corresponds with some of the topics for the week.  Hopefully everyone will have a turn this week.  Sorry about the mess up last week.  

New this year we are trying to learn some sightwords, I am still trying to figure out some type of flashcards or book to help us keep track of all the sightwords we are going to learn.  This week we learned the word  "a", so when you are reading with your child, remind them and have them point the word out to you.  

Okay, this is getting long, so it was a Apple-rific week and next week we will go Banana's, with Letter B, its sound, uppercase and lowercase, Bananas, sightword-an, and the color yellow.  Yeah!

Thanks for all you do, 

Miss Heidi

WELCOME BACK September 4th - 6th

"First Day of school!" "First Day of School!" I think of Finding Nemo every time I say that. So on our first day of school we...

*took first day of school pictures (and got a little glare on the sign ). Normally I don't post pictures of the kids, but I couldn't resist.  And I think her Mom will be okay with it. 

*We read the book the "Kissing Hand", by Audrey Penn. Ask your child about Chester the raccoon and going to school. 

*We made "Kiss Me Pies" for our snack, pie dough cut into circles with a Hershey Kiss in the middle, then fold it up and pinch it at the top.  Bake and eat.  We had bananas, kiss me pies, apple juice and some goldfish for the non-banana lovers, and some goldfish for the hungry...which was all of them.

*We played outside and jumped on the trampoline and swung on the swings and released some energy.

*We worked on our "Get to Know My Class", book. Mostly Miss Heidi just asked questions and wrote whatever the children said.  This is a cute book that will be coming home for you to read with your child and then return on the next preschool day.  I think it is nice for you to put a face with a name, especially when you hear your child talking about their friends at preschool.  

On Friday, we celebrated Mr. S's 5th birthday.  He brought us such a fun snack that he colored all by himself.  His Mom also came and showed us a fun poster all about our friend Mr. S.  We love BiRtHdAyS!

*We read "A Pocket Full of Kisses", by Audrey Penn,  the sequel to the "Kissing Hand".

*We played outside

*We played inside

*We do a lot of playing these first few weeks while we are learning to sit again, and learning the routine.  

*We played name games and shared our brown sacks with our favorite things.  

*We also had a very special guest, Miss A's Mom, she played some name games with movement with us.  She teaches dance and will becoming this year to teach us movement/dance with books and stories.  We are so lucky!

*We also had our first circle time-which consists of; the Pledge of Allegiance, roll call, calendar, months of the year, feeding Peek-a-Boo (the turtle), weather, counting days, show & tell, and seasons.  Whew!

*We had a few minutes for some wiggle songs and fingerplays.

I am sure there is a bunch of other stuff I didn't tell you about, but I am trying to get back into the routine of taking pictures throughout our day too.  Next week, we will be learning the Letter A, its sound, uppercase/lowercase, the color red, all about Apples and a new thing this year sightwords.  Our sightword for next week is -----a.

Thanks for such a great first week, I love all of your compliments, I love all of you children, I love teaching them, and spending my time with them.  This is going to be a super-de-duper year!

-Miss Heidi