Dear Parents,
We began our week reading Leo Lionni’s The Greedy Python. We reread
It’s Mine! and discussed the animals in the book not being such good
friends. We asked the children to complete the sentence, “I like when
my friend...” They answered: shares, listens, plays with me, goes with
me to Michigan, shares food and Halloween candy with me.
We made new and improved play dough. The children helped add all the
ingredients, stir it up, and finally mix in a color. They got to
choose between blue and yellow. After everyone mixed their colors in
we decided to share a little blue for a little yellow with each
friend. People immediately noticed a new color.
During circle, we read Little Blue And Little Yellow, another story by
Leo Lionni.
We went to the table to paint in pairs using yellow and blue paint.
One person said we were using teamwork! We were. Once again everyone
talked excitedly about a new color emerging on the paper.
We brainstormed trees we know and made a list. The children came up
with a cherry tree, apple tree, orange, coconut, lemon, banana, and
pineapple tree. Everyone voted on which tree to make our family tree.
Coconut and orange tied so we had a runoff. And the winner was...
We have been watching our tree in the yard to see the change of
leaves. The children notice they are half green and half yellow now.
We took our group fall photo under the tree.
We began the trunk of our family tree. The children cut bark out of
paper and burlap. They glued it to the trunk along with popsicle
sticks. We talked about what things come from trees. The children
pointed out wood in our classroom: the tables and chairs, the book and
toy shelves, the water table, the dollhouse, the door, and walls. They
also named things in our yard that are made of wood.
We read The Giving Tree and talked about all the tree gave to the boy.
One person said the tree gave everything!
Next week we will continue creating our family tree. We received two
family pictures, fourteen to go!
Have a seasonally appropriate weekend,
Therese
Feelings, nothing more than feelings
Hi you all,
We began our week Monday talking about feelings, good and bad. The
children named some of both. Good: safe, happy, surprised, and loved.
Bad: angry and sad. We asked what color would happy be? Sad? Angry? We
read I Am A Wrecking Ball! and noted the feelings in the book.
We talked about what makes us feel happy, sad, or angry. We read I Was
So Mad by Mercer Mayer and discussed why the child in the book was
mad. The children said they feel mad if someone pinches, hits, or
kicks them. The good news is there is not much of this in the
classroom.
Please bring in a family photo! We will begin creating our family tree
in November. Which is now.
We brought our Mr. Bones down to be closely examined on Halloween. We
read Me And My Bones, again, and bent our bones at the joints. We sang
The Leg Bone’s Connected To The... In yoga people were seen bending,
standing straight and tall, listening to, and looking at Frank.
We read It’s Mine! by Leo Lionni and talked about how the frogs felt
when their friends would not share the air, the water, or the land. We
talked about how we feel when our friends don’t want to share. In the
yard, it came up again when a friend didn’t want to share an imaginary
game of fire trucks.
We played Duck, Duck, Goose, and someone reminded us we had to use
patience to wait for our turn. Everyone had a turn running around and
around and around. Some children just kept running. After the game, we
ran around the big room some more, then went out to play. Friday we
played another circle game where everyone had turns to get up and
wiggle, a necessary part of our day!
Did I mention the family photos? Please bring in a family photo, a 4x6
is fine and it can be a computer print out. Thank you.
Have a marathon weekend,
Therese