Pet and "C" Week

We talked about our "Pets" this week and the letter "C".  This past week was our first FULL week of school, five LONG days.  Man, either I am really out of shape (could be) or I'm really getting old (yes, I am).  Oh well, either way, I survived.  Tired, but still hanging in there.  The children and I are still trying to get use to each other and each week I try to do something a little "extra" fun.  This week we started off by painting with balloons.  I read, The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle.  There were a couple of children who had not heard of this book so it was fun to watch their faces and hear them yell, "Read it again!".  After we read the book we talked about what we like to eat when we are hungry.  Much to my surprise, "cake" was a big response (more on this later!).  Anyway. . . we divided up into small groups and I headed over to the craft area to make our very own hungry caterpillar.  Everyone was so surprised to see balloons all blown up and waiting for us.  We started by dipping our balloons into yellow paint and making big "blobs" on the page. 

 

Next, we added big green blobs right on top.

And a big red blog for the head.

 

We added legs and little antennas and let them dry.  Afterwards, we added cute little eyes, a nose and of course, a happy smile!  

 

I just love these little guys, don't you?  I especially love the fact that they were 100% made by the child.  This is a little pet peeve of mine and I'm sure I will be mentioning it from time to time (sorry!). 

 

Another great book that we read this past week was If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by the wonderful Laura Numeroff.  I think this is one of my all time favorite books.  It should be, I've read it enough over the years!  We made a little chocolate cookie and added it to a "prompting note" to our parents.  It was easy, but it was fun.

 

I hope you can tell that the "chocolate chips" are our fingerprints.

This one made me giggle.  She said the mouse was hiding!

 

On of my special individual activities this week is our magnet box.  I was a little concerned about getting it out so early in the year.  I wasn't sure it we had people that put things in their mouths (something I am guessing is not a concern for Harvard professors!).  But, I kept a very close on it and everything went smoothly.  One of my students loved it.  He loved making a chain with the magnets.

 

 



During the week our circle time discussions generally were about our dogs and cats.  There was one day when we discussed what animal(s) we would like to have IF we could have any animal in the entire world.  Alligators and crocodiles were 2 of the favorites - YIKES!  It did make for a fun and lively circle time. 

 

Our letter of the week was "C" so we HAD to make a cat.  Now if you have read my blog before, you know that I big on giving the children choices.  Making our cat was no different, everyone decided on what color their cat would be.  First we painted a large paper plate and let it dry.  The next day we came back and cut some whiskers (it was "C" week after all!).  Most of the children had never cut with scissors before and most of them were quick to tell me they weren't suppose to use scissors.  After a little reassuring them that it was okay, they went to work.

 

Everyone did an amazing job cutting with scissors!!!

 

We added the freshly cut whiskers, ears, eyes and a little nose to make the cutest little cats!

On the back of each cat was a little note to the parents.  It said, "Guess who cut the whiskers?".  Everyone could hardly wait to show their parents!

On Thursday, we headed to kitchen to begin our weekly science experiment.  I had gone to my local Publix grocery store on Wednesday afternoon looking for fresh carnations (another great "C" word!).  The sweet manager finally located some for me way in the back of the store cooler.  It was a large bunch, big enough for EVERYONE to have flower!  We have a very sweet lady at the church who brings up empty Boost bottles.

She is so nice, she even takes the labels off of them for us!  They were the perfect size and shape for our experiment.   Each child selected his/her favorite color and we mixed the food coloring and water together.  Next, we carefully added our little flowers and waited . . . and waited . . . . and waited . . .

 

The next day we found a lovely surprise! 

 

 

 



Look very closely, can you see the colors starting to creep into the flower??  We sent them home on Friday and asked the parents to put them back into some colored water.  I cannot wait to hear how they are doing.

We read several stories about dogs this past week and one of the other teachers shared this next project with me.  It was really cute and easy.

 



I cut out the body, head and 2 ears.  The children had a great time painting them whatever color they wanted.  After they dried, we assembled them and added the cute little eyes.  One little girl was so excited, she now had a "real" dog of her very own!

Friday is always a fun day at school.  I want everyone to leave WANTING to come back.  After this week, I bet they ALL do!  We start our day with our Spanish class and everyone has so much fun with Mrs. Stacy.  Then we headed to kitchen to cook-up a little more science fun!  Our school is very good at using recycled products.  There is nothing that makes me happier then doing a project that cost little or nothing.  I found our big box of used and unloved crayons.

A lot of them already had the paper off so I just had to separate them.  The students picked out their favorite colors and put them into our little homemade bowl. 

We didn't have enough old muffin tins, so I just some aluminum foil

and made little crayon bowls. 

It worked pretty well.  They were funny looking and

the children loved it.

 

While the crayons melted slowly in the oven, we started working on our yummy "color-cake".  I mixed up 2 boxes of white cake mix (thanks again to Publix!) and each child got a large cup filled with batter.  Hold on, here comes the fun . . . . everyone got to add their favorite color of food coloring to the batter.  We spooned it into a cake pan

 

and popped it in the oven.  WOW, the entire school smelled SO good!  But we were patient and while it cooked, we got to use our new crayons!

 

 

I'm trying a little experiment myself.  On Friday's we are doing some free art.  This has no instructions and the children just have fun.  This week we had a lot of fun using crayons that we made ourselves!  INSTANT GRATIFICATION!!!

 

Soon the cake came out of the oven and we spread on some plain white frosting. 





 

 

As soon as we ate lunch we headed back to the kitchen to enjoy our cake!  

 

What a fun and yummy way to end our week!

 

Thank you for visiting with us.  I hope you stop back by and see what we will be doing next week!

The Letter "D" and Pets

Here we go again!  What a great week!  On Monday the class started our unit on "Pets" and introducing the letter "D" with a wonderful, easy project.

Unfortunately, I wasn't there because I was sick at home recuperating from a massive migraine (YUCK!).  But thankfully my substitute did a great job holding down the fort.  I like this project because it really isn't anything special - at first.  But look closely and you will see the precious little prints of the children.

Tuesday, I was back and ready to go!  We started our day with an interesting art project.  We made "Sam the Square Blue Dog".  As you can see, Sam was made entirely of blue squares.

  

 I think he turned out to be Darling and most importantly everyone was so proud!

We sent a note home asking the parents to send pictures of their child's pet(s) to school.  During circle time everyone took turns telling us the name of their pets and why they love them.  

Our class microphone came in very handy!  It seems this small little addition to my circle time REALLY works!  Everyone has already learned that you can't talk until you are holding the microphone.  YEAH!

Tuesday is also our "Music Class" day.  The entire class spends approximately 20 glorious minutes singing, learning new songs AND discovering new musical instruments.

Wednesday is always a super busy day.  We  worked again on our letter "D" and our "Squares" by making a dump truck filled with blue squares!.  With a room full of boys, I am sure that you know it was FUN!

Everyone had a good time pointing out all the different shapes we used.  

Wednesday is also our "Wiggles Day".  We head to our gym for 30 minutes of group activities.  It is really a Physical Education class for 3 and 4 year old children.  EVERYONE loves WIGGLE DAY!

Thursday starts out with our Chapel Class.  Again, it is church for 3 and 4 year old children.  We sing some of the most wonderful songs and then hear a fabulous Bible story.  Chapel last about 40 minutes and we love it.  I still am amazed at how well my class behaves in Chapel.  Needless to say, this class was no exception - their behavior was FABULOUS!  I was so proud!!!  We also head to "Spanish Class" on Thursday.  This is a short 20 minute class which introduces us the wonderful Spanish language.  I love hearing my class greet Mrs. Fish (okay, her REAL name is Mrs. Felicia, but no one calls her that!) by saying "hola" and "adi'os" as they leave.

The only problem with having Chapel and our "Spanish Class" on Thursday is that our art and circle time is drastically reduced.  I usually have to have something quick planned.  So this week we made a "Square Blue Collage".  SIMPLE, SIMPLE, SIMPLE but oh so fun!

Several blog post ago I mentioned paint chips and how I would be telling you what I did with them.  Well, if you look closely you will notice that some of the blue squares we have used on these projects were punched from paint chip samples!  

I LOVE IT!

Finally, it was our "FABULOUS FUN FRIDAY"!  I love to pull out special things on Friday.  My goal is for everyone to have so much fun that they can not wait to return on Monday.  I think this Friday did exactly that.  We started with an insane art project.  We called it 

We started with BIG half sheets of poster board.  Next, we made different shades of blue paint.  (Everyone really loved looking through the blue paint chips trying to find the shades of blue we made.)  Finally, it was time for FUN!  I have been saving different size square boxes to use as BIG stamps.  I like BIG things!  We used everything from old tea boxes (remember, I live in the south, we drink a lot of iced tea!) 

to old jewelry boxes  

But the fun really came when I pulled out this -

I found it at our lake house.  I think it was used for firework rockets during the 4th of July.   I'm really not sure, but we didn't care because the bottom was a perfect square!

You can see by the above photo that we also used an old tissue box.  We had a blast!

Soon it was time to head to the kitchen for our "Science" and "Cooking" class.  As everyone left on Thursday I told them we were going to "eat a dog" for Friday's snack.  I love the look on their faces when I tell them things like that!  Here are a couple of our "Dog" cookies -

Please notice our square heads.  And yes, they tasted as good as they looked!

Our science experiment for the week was "Does it Dissolve?"  Several of the children were given clear plastic cups (you only get to be a "Science Helper" if you are using your extra special listening ears) and we poured in different items to see if they would dissolve.

  

The grits and shaving cream were fun!

We ended up with eight different cups.  It was fun to look at them while we ate our snack.

We ended up our week by pulling out the ever-popular "Playdough", blue of course!  Everyone tried very hard to make our letter of the week.  Hmmm . . . . 

SUCCESS!

And people wonder why I'm very tired at the end of the week! :)

Thanks for stopping by!  I hope you will come back next week and see how we learn, play and have a great time!