Foot Feel

Dear Parents,

We made a list of things we can do with our feet. The list included running, walking home, climbing, swimming, jumping, and kicking a soccer ball. 

We read Dr. Seuss’s The Foot Book. 

We drew a sketch of what our "foot feel" would look like before going into the big room. Everyone took off their shoes and socks to walk across the different textures on the stage. The children said it felt: scratchy, bubbly, rough, soft, furry, and itchy. 

We asked the class what they knew about yoga. Two friends said their mama’s go to yoga. Three people named a yoga pose. One person said they remembered last year they acted like balloons in yoga class. 

While half the class went to yoga in the big room with Julietta, the rest of us spent time examining our three small skeletons. We also took turns getting our height measured on a big drawing of Mr. Bones. We will measure everyone three times during the year to see if we grow. Later in the week, someone asked if we could measure a water bottle to see how much water it would hold.

On Thursday we played Duck, Duck,Goose. It was a big hit. One person laughed, kind of hysterically, the entire game. Only two people ran willy-nilly when it was their turn, and everyone had a good laugh while watching and cheering each other on. 

We used alphabet stamps and white paint to decorate our art folders. Everyone got to choose what color they wanted and stamped the first letter of their name. Some stamped soft and some hard. 

Children have been burying treasure in the sandbox and then digging it up. We have piles of leaves in the yard to prove it's fall and are watching and waiting for our trees' green leaves to turn. 

Enjoy the cool weather,

Therese

Feet Can

Dear Parents,

On Monday we started off in the yard. We watched a black squirrel chase after a grey squirrel around our jungle gym, then past our tables. They raced along the sandbox and finally up a tree together. We used our sense of sight to watch them run all over the yard for a long time. 

We read My Five Senses again, and talked about all of the senses we use during circle time.
In the big room everyone was eager to show us fast feet. We ran fast and slow, some medium, and mostly all in one direction.

One day during circle, we brought several kick balls into the center of the circle. We tried like the dickens to use only our feet to kick, and not our hands. We did pretty good. Someone shouted during the kicking and laughing, “This is so fun, it’s like a party!”

On Thursday we did an obstacle course. The children walked across blocks, stepped through a hanging hula hoop, swam over bean bags, crawled under a tunnel, and balanced on stepping stones. We went around and around the course for over thirty minutes, only stopping because we were running out of time. Someone said after twenty minutes, “I love this!” The longer we went, the more creative and challenging they made it. The children first stepped, and then hopped through the hula hoop. In the tunnel, they crawled first, and eventually many were sliding on their backs. 

We traced everyone’s feet on Friday and then colored them with crayons. We read Hello Toes! Hello Feet! When discussing what yucky stuff might be on the bottoms of our shoes, someone commented, “Did you know Staten Island is the cleanest place on earth?” We did not know. 

Have a clean weekend,

Therese and Nicole