Sammy the SQUARE Snowman

I am fortunate to have some amazing parents this year.  Now mind you, I've had great parents before and I truly love each and everyone of them.  This year's group seem to "get me" when it comes to my obsession for "treasures" (I say "treasures" most people say junk).  Anyway, one of my Dads works for a farm equipment supplier.  He told me at the beginning of school that if I was ever out near his shop to stop by.  Well, on Wednesday of last week I did just that.  The first thing I saw when I walked in were these HUGE boxes.  Hmmmm . . . what in the world could I do with them. . . . .  I asked him if they were getting rid of them and he said "of course, who would want these big old things?"  Uhhhh . . . me!  It took some doing but meet "Sammy, the Square Snowman"!

He almost reaches our ceiling.  This is one really big snowman!  Oh and that big white ball next to Sammy, that's our "world's largest snowball".  I love "S" Week!
Thanks to Lee at Advanced Mowers in Bessemer, Alabama!  We love your boxes!

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!

"B", Blue and Squares Week

Last weekend was spent seeing my sweet son and Bill's family reunion, so there was blog time! So let's catch up!

"B" week is my all time favorite week. I know I say that all the time, but I mean it this time ;) There are so many wonderful ways to explore the letter "B". Let's start with some of our amazing art . . . .

Here we are spooning on big blobs of blue paint! Next we covered it is clear plastic wrap and rolled over it with a BOWING PIN! Yes, I was lucky enough to get my fat little hands on a real bowling pin! The children could not believe how heavy it was. They loved it!

Early in the week we made Square Sally and Square Sam. Everyone loved seeing and all the squares!

Everyone knows you can't have "B" week with a bumble bee! Here is ours

Yes, I know the bee's stinger goes on the back of the bee, but my students wanted his stinger on his nose. It is their art work after all!

One of my favorites this week was our "Butter Bean Blue Square". I drew out a large square on a piece of blue construction paper and then the children used blue glue to glue down butter beans. (the blue glue is made by simply putting blue paint in the bottom of a cup and adding glue. Then let the children stir. I love watching their faces when the glue changes color!

This was a very simple and inexpensive craft. But it allowed the children to use their fine-motor skills, which I think is very important.

Next was snack time! We ate a bowling alley of course! We used a graham cracker for the base and carefully added the marshmellow "pins".
AND the bowling ball was chocolate malted milk ball! YUMMY FUN!

Next thing you know we headed outside for a little baseball painting! Being the Mom of a former baseball player, I just HAD to find a way to use some baseballs for "B" week, so we headed outside! Here are our baseballs soaking up some lovely blue paint!

We used three different colors of blue paint! My "partner-in-crime", Mrs. Christi, patiently put disposable gloves on each child and then we rolled the baseball onto a large piece of blue butcher paper.

(Sorry for the bad picture, we were rolling on our carpool area and it is covered.) A little note for anyone wanting to do this - try to NOT do this on a windy day! We had to tape the paper down. The paper turned out so pretty that we have decided to use it for a special background during our end of the year art show!
We had one more surprise left - bottle bowling! I sent an e-mail out to my fellow teachers the weekend before asking everyone to bring in their empty 2-liter bottles. WOW, we got a bunch! So we went bowling!

One of things that truly surprised me during this activity was how everyone cheered and congratulated each other. It didn't matter if someone knocked down 1 bottle or 9 bottles, everyone yelled and high-fived each other. GOOD SPORTSMANSHIP!

"B" week was wonderful! I hated to see it end. But after "B" comes "C" hmmmmmm wonder what we will do. . . . . . .