Our Fine Feathered Friends

It may not seem like an exciting unit to some people, but we spent last week talking about "birds" and I'm not sure if our class could have had any more fun.  We have flapped our wings, tweeted and even tried to fly around our room, all while talking about our winged friends.  On Monday we made our "garbage birds", this was what one of my students called it when he realized we used an empty toilet tissue roll.  "T" said that toilet tissue rolls were suppose to be in the garbage, hence the name "garbage birds".

 

 

The are rather funny looking but we didn't mind because they were so cute.

On Tuesday we talked about the different types of birds that we see near our homes and school.  Soon the discussion turned to where birds like to hide to protect themselves.  Everyone agreed that a tree is the best place for birds to be.  So . . . . we decided to put a bird, or two (or three) in a tree!  First, we painted the sky.  We used several different colors of blue paint to make our sky look "real".

 

 

Next, we painted a tree branch and rolled a paper towel tube, wrapped with yarn, over our tree.

As soon as it dried, we put everything together!

If you look closely at our little birds, you may be able to tell that their wings and tail feathers were made with our finger prints.  Everyone was so proud when they took this home.

We also decided that we needed to "feed the birds", so we made our very own birds feeders.  Everyone strung "Fruit Loops" cereal onto pieces of yarn.

We added a straw so the birds would have a place to sit.

 

Hopefully, the birds will like Fruit Loops!  One of my sweet Mom's sent me this photo of the bird feeder in their tree!

I hope the birds liked it as much as we did!

We talked about baby birds leaving their nest and how the momma bird knows when it is time.  After much (MUCH) discussion about birds learning to fly (everyone had their own idea of how birds learn) we made one of my "saddest" art projects.  This one always makes our parents sad.

 

The children made the nest by using a ruler to draw the lines.  We had so much fun with the rulers that we set-up a center just to let everyone experiment with them. 



 

Our "Fabulous Fun Friday" got really crazy this week!  Since our letter of the week was "Y", we decided to explore YARN!  I simply went to our supply closet and grabbed ALL the yarn I could carry.  Next, I cut it into VERY long strips.  There was only ONE rule - do not tie anyone up with the yarn.  What happened next was a WHOLE LOT OF FUN!

 

 

These pictures truly do not do justice to the excitement and fun we had.  Of course there was a huge mess to clean-up (but when is that NOT the case?).  As a matter of fact, it was so much fun no one wanted to stop to go outside!  Now THAT is the sign of a good time!

 

Thanks so much for stopping in and visiting with us.  I hope you come back again!

My Class Soared with the Birds

This past week was very interesting to say the least.  Our topic was "Birds" and letter of the week was "Y".  That sounds pretty normal for a preschool week, right?  Okay, now throw in our class photos AND our annual Spring Concert and you have the makings for a humdinger of a week!  SOOOOOOOO. . . . here is our week in review!

On Monday morning I introduced the class to our new friends, worms!  My teacher-buddy, Mrs. Christi, dug up some good 'ole earth worms from her yard and I made them a cozy little home.

We added some old coffee grounds to the dirt and gave them lettuce and yellow squash to eat.  By Tuesday morning they were happily tunneling and seeming very content.  Each day we check on them.  Everyone loved them so much that I decided they would stay with us the rest of the year.

Like I said before, we had to have our class pictures made and Monday was our day.  I usually don't do messy painting projects on our picture days (it seems to upset the parents when we get paint all over those "special" clothes), so we enjoyed a simple bird art project.

I hope that you can see the yarn on the nest.  We talked all day about how birds build their nest and the different things they use. 

 

One of our favorite things has been rulers.  To a preschool child a ruler is totally fascinating!  I love to put rulers, markers and paper on our writing table then just sit back and watch.  Using rulers is a great way to work on our fine motor skills AND our eye/hand coordination at the same time.  We used our ruler skills this week with one of our art projects.  I gave the children half of a circle and a ruler. 

Everyone had a good time drawing lines and making our hand prints.  I added my big 'old hand print too and the final piece is really very sweet.  

 

The words read, "It is almost time to spread your wings and fly!  But I will always be here for you!  I love you, Mrs. Karen".  We spent the remainder of the day talking about how mother birds have to be brave and let their baby birds learn to fly and be out on their own.  Personally, I'm already missing my "baby birds".

I have an old book entitled "Weird Birds".  I don't even remember where or when I got it, but every year I pull it out and we all get a good laugh at the different types of birds all over the world.  The hands down favorite each year is the Blue Footed Booby Bird.  We had a wonderful discussion during our circle time as to why he has blue feet.  I loved it when some said the birds looked like "God dipped his feet in blue paint".  Hmmmm . . . they could be right! 

We also made a few simple birds this week.  First, we water colored a BIG parrot.

 

Now, if you read my blog regularly you know I do not like worksheets or color sheets.  But, this big bad boy is fun and I will periodically pull him out.  I don't think you can tell by the picture, but he is really BIG.  He was copied onto a piece of 14 x 17 inch piece of paper.  After he dries, I cut him out.  No instructions were needed, we just painted.

I love hand prints!  Maybe it is because my son is all grown-up.  Or maybe it is because I see those few hand prints of his and wish I had more.  Who knows???  Whatever the reason, I love them.  This week was the perfect time to squeeze in a hand print peacock.

Everyone had a fun time picking out their favorite colored sequins!  I just love him!  We spent the entire day talking about how the daddy bird is the one with all the beautiful colors and the momma birds are plain. 

Our big spring concert was Thursday and we had to squeeze in one more rehearsal.  But that didn't stop us from doing a fun and interesting alphabet craft.  I cut out some large "Y"s from scrap poster board and handed everyone some yarn.  Away they went . . . .

Yarn wrapped "Y"s!

 

Our Fabulous Fun Friday had to be special.  It had been a rather unusual week and I knew we all needed something "extra" (and I include "ME" in that statement!).   First we made a beautiful spring wall hanging.  We traced and cut out the children's hands and part of their arms.  We used half of an old plastic Easter egg for the bird and the children added some feathers and flowers.

The results were very sweet and definitely cute!

Okay, that was fun but it was NOT special enough.  Here is when things got totally FUN!  After our circle time I ask each child to go and get a chair.  They could put the chair ANYWHERE they wanted to in our classroom.  Next, I cut long pieces of different colored yarn and sat back to watch.  Here is what happened . . . .

 

 

 

The children had an amazing time wrapping and tying the yarn around everything in our classroom.  We even had yarn tied around our door knob.  Nothing was off limit and everyone had a great time!

After lunch we headed down to the kitchen to "eat dirt and worms"!  Yes, I had been hinting all week long that we were going to "eat dirt".  Luckily my class is use to me so they usually giggled and told me (more than once) that they "trusted me".  Of course we ate . . . . dirt pudding!

Complete with a couple of gummy worms.  I cheated a little and mixed up the pudding earlier in the day but the children really loved crushing up the chocolate cookies and adding their worms.

All in all it was a fun and exciting week.  Thanks for stopping by.  Next week we will be discussing the letter "Z" and "Zoo" Animals.  I hope you come back and see what we did!

"Y" Week and Mother's Day

Opps, I did it again! (AHHHH! Do I should like Britney Spears?) I'm not sure why the end of the school year/Mother's Day/Art Show week always seems to sneak up on me, but once again it did. To say the week of May 2nd was busy is like saying preschool children have a lot of energy! First we were finishing up our wonderful Mother's Day surprises. For my children's special gift we dress them up in old clothes and take their pictures. I always turn the pictures into sepia tone and well you just look at the one of the pictures and tell me if there is another word besides adorable to use . . . .


Too cute! But of course the children have to make them their own so we got busy!Everyone painted their frame their Mom's favorite color. Next we added finger print flowers. PERFECTLY done! I forgot to take pictures of the final product, so I just cropped this from another picture OOOOOOPPPS!

Now everyone knows that you have to give your Mom some flowers for Mother's Day, right? But I'm not a big fan of cut flowers, they just die, so we made our own. These can be kept for years and years.

I think the reason I like these SO much is that they were made from scraps of paper and recycled mailing tubes that I retrieved from the garbage last summer. We even used some shredded paper (not sure you can see it) for dirt. I wish I had one of these of my son's hand. Hmmm . . . do you think I could talk a 24 year old police officer into making one of these?????

We didn't forget our letter of the week. "Y" is a difficult letter to learn. Not a lot of fun "Y" words but I tried. We take all different color yard and wrap it around a "Y" cut from poster board scraps. For some reason the children adore this. They sit longer than I ever expect and wind the yarn, round and round. Fine motor skills; I like it! Here is our "Yarn Y" - Of course we spent the entire week "Y"awning and using the color "Y"ellow as much as possible. We also put a "Y"awn in our mouth as we traveled down the hall. FUN, FUN, FUN!

Our Fabulous Fun Friday came way to soon this week. We wanted to make one more little surprise for our Moms. Luckily for me, my dear friend, Myra, told me about making a flower from styrofoam cups! OOOOOOHHHH yes, a science experiment AND a Mother's Day gift all in one - PERFECT! We started with a styrofoam cup and colored it with markers and crayons (just a note, the crayons did much better). Next, the chidren cut the sides of the cup.Finally, into the oven.We had our oven set for 350 degrees. Watch them VERY carefully because it only takes about a minute. Add a craft stick , some leaves and the final results are amazing -







THANKS MYRA!!!!


I hope you will come back and check on us as we finish up our school year and talk about the letter "Z"!