Little Flower (Preschool)
Latest news from the classroom…
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January Newsletter
Cheerful Chipmunks” Group
The children in the Cheerful Chipmunk Class are learning about forest animals: deer, raccoons, and foxes. We enjoyed watching the classic movie Bambi, which showed us many animals that exist here in the North American forest. How interesting to learn about animals like opossums, raccoons, mice, owls, spiders, squirrels, deer and chipmunks! We noticed a great variety of plants and trees, such as maples, pines, oaks, hickories, weeping willows, wild flowers, berries and bushes. The children were very happy watching Bambi grow and see him learning new words and discovering all the wonders of the forest.
We also are learning new words by playing animal lotto, memory games, and matching games. We are using other math games to count and do problem solving as well as patterns.
We are enjoying these winter days by expanding our educational themes and talking about how to dress and stay healthy in cold weather. We are integrating many of our new skills of counting, following directions and taking turns while cooking: preparing delicious hot chocolate, vanilla shakes, and even cake! January has turned out to be a great learning adventure for the Cheerful Chipmunks.
“ Wonder Pets” Group
After our holiday break, the Wonder Pets have been getting back into our school routine. It was so nice to see all our friends again! This month we are learning about winter and animals. The first week we read the story, “Frosty the Snowman”, as we played with our stuffed snowmen. The children drew a picture of Frosty. Christina drew her Frosty with a broom and Rocco put a coat on his. We used playdough to roll snowballs and made our own Frosty, and then we pretended he was melting and made the shapes we thought he would be in during the melting process.
We also brought snow inside and tracked our toy animals through it to see their footprints. We made snowmen and then watched as they started to melt. We filled a large cup to the top with snow and when we went to check on it the next day, there was only a small amount of water in it and the water was dirty! The Wonder Pets put their melting snow in a cup and added a few drops of food coloring to it. We put it outside overnight, and the next day we took the ice out and colored on paper with it. We were surprised to see that when our ice paintings dried, they were very light in color, because we had made our ice paint very dark.
We also mixed glue and paint together and found out that we did not need to use extra glue to make our snowmen—even the pompoms stuck! The children enjoyed reading The Snowy Day, and they all knew what would happen when the little boy put his snowball in his pocket and took it home.
”Jolly Ranchers” Group
The children transitioned smoothly after the holiday break, since they were all very happy to see their friends again. We enjoyed sharing stories of our holiday experiences with each other as we began the New Year. Although we miss them, we are happy for Alyssa, Sara and Ruimin, who have moved to the Blossom. At the same time we have been able to welcome our wonderful new friend, Max, who already seems like he has been with us all along.
We have been learning about hibernation and animals in winter. Which animals stay, which ones migrate, and which sleep during the winter, is the theme we will continue with throughout the month. The first week of January we focused mainly on the story, Brown Bear, Brown Bear. The children enjoyed working on our craft/project board as they were prompted to think about what a bear sees in the winter as opposed to the warmer months. Please take a look at the bulletin board in the Welcome Room and see the amazing ideas Alex, Eric, Lucas, Luke, Max, Ryan and Viktor came up with.
The second week we built caves and dens from cardboard boxes, brown paper and paste for our animal friends. We cut large and small entranceways in the boxes to accommodate all our animal friends looking for warmth in the cold and freezing weather. For example, we thought of squirrels, foxes, raccoons, skunks, rabbits, badgers and whoever else needed a warm place to rest. We then gathered these animals from our extensive school supply of plastic and plush forest friends and were pleased to make these homes cozy and comforting for them.
The fun continued as we sat on a large brown paper mitten while reading The Mitten. The children especially liked jumping off and on the mitten as the teacher sneezed over and over, just like the characters in the story! We also enjoyed hunting for mittens like The Three Little Kittens did, and then practiced putting them on and taking them off while we sang, “Thumb in the Thumb Place, Fingers All Together”. The remainder of the week we focused on memory recall, using the whiteboard and flannel board to place the animals in sequential order as told in the story. The Jolly Ranchers were eager to color patterns of these animals and glue them onto a white cardstock mitten.
We played various games such as Animal Lotto, Mommy and Baby Animals, and What Is Missing? We also fine-tuned our motor skills by pretending to be different animals as well as dressing our “feelings” bears puzzles. It has been a fun month for us all!
Books we read:
Brown Bear, Brown Bear; Bear Snores On; Animal Tracks; Winter Walk; Let’s Count It Out, Jesse Bear; We’re Going On A Bear Hunt; Animals in Winter.
Some of the songs we like to sing:
“If I Were a Grizzly Bear, I’d sleep (stay or move) when Winter Came”. (Tune: The Muffin Man); “This Is the Way We Put On Our Mittens”
Art
In January, the children in Little Flower continued to practice the basic concepts and skills they have learned this year, including primary colors, secondary colors, free painting, marker drawing, playdough making, and collage-making skills.
The first week we started with blow painting, which has become one of children’s favorite activities. First, children dropped blots of blue, magenta and yellow paint on paper, and then with a straw they blew hard on each blot to make a shooting firework—this is the fun part everyone loved. The rest of the first week we practiced blot painting, free painting with primary colors, and marker drawing. It is so impressive to see that everyone has been greatly increasing his/her skill compared to the beginning of this school year. Look at the children’s artwork and you can tell they are able to master the paintbrush and markers with so much confidence now.
The second week, we worked on several new techniques, which included string painting and watercolor with crayon resist. The children did the string painting in two different ways: first, they dipped a thick nylon string into paint and drop it randomly on the paper to make marks. Next they folded the paper in half and placed the strings full of yellow and green paint randomly on the right half of the paper. They then folded the left side over the right side, and pressed the paper firmly with the palms of their hands. When the paper was opened, a beautiful symmetrical design of yellow and green print appeared.
This month was the first time we introduced watercolor with crayon resist. Children made free drawings on mitten-shaped paper with very light-colored crayons like white and yellow, and then “washed” the paper with watercolors. They were so excited to discover their drawing magically appeared on a colorful background! We also spent time making a picture frame out of cardboard. The children painted the cardboard first, and when it became dry they decorated it with pompoms, sequins and foam shapes. The part they loved the most was spelling their name on the frame with foam letter stickers.
The third and last week’s theme was winter. We made a “polar bear” collage with cotton balls. We also made snowmen using materials that parents contributed to the class. We also explored painting with cardboard strips and rubbing with wet chalk. The children had a lot of fun making pictures with these varied materials. In our shape collage project, the children were able to express themselves freely using a combination of pre-cut shapes to make a picture. They made houses, trees, rocket ships, trucks, trains and even people! What great imaginations kids have at this age!
Music and Movement
This month the Little Flower Seedlings have been learning the days of the week in English and Spanish. They listened to the song “The Days of the Week”, singing and playing their instruments along with Greg and Steve.
The days of the week in Spanish are, starting with Monday, lunes, martes, miércoles, jueves, viernes, sábado, domingo.
One of the new songs the children learned was “The Finger Band,” sung to the tune of “Mulberry Bush”:
The Finger Band has come to town,
Come to town, come to town,
The Finger Band has come to town,
So early in the morning.
The children were also introduced to different musical instruments this month: the flute, clarinet, trumpet, violin, trombone, piano, and guitar. In some cases they saw the actual instruments, in others they saw pictures, and in still others they saw and heard them in a computer program. The children pantomimed playing the different instruments as they sang the song.
As usual, the children enjoyed singing the songs they know while moving to the different rhythms of musical activities.
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February Newsletter
February has been a fun month in the Little Flower with so many holidays, from Groundhog Day to Valentine’s and now Chinese New Year. In addition, the children have continued learning all about winter animals in the forest, hibernation and other nature themes, such as snow and ice. Songs, dance, parades and music have added to the enriching (and fun!) learning experiences. Read more to see what is happening in all the classes!
Music and Movement
This month the Little Flower children have experimented with different instruments and their sounds, from drums and maracas to clappers and rhythm sticks. They even have explored the sounds that they can create using their body. In a piece by Hap Palmer, Rhythms on Parade, children are encouraged to play instruments and then to make sounds themselves, with suggestions such as “slap your thighs, rub your sides, clap your hands… sounds that come from instruments and sounds that come from you!”
All this music-making gave the children the idea to create a band, which they decided to call The Marching Mice. The idea came from a song they enjoy very much, The Mice Go Marching, also by Hap Palmer. It is sung to the tune of The Ants Go Marching.
The mice go marching quietly by, Shh! Shh! (First verse)
The mighty monster marchers by, Kaboom! Kaboom! (second verse)
The mice go marching up the monster, Dear! Oh dear! (Third verse)
The monster sneezes suddenly, Achoo! Achoo! (Fourth verse)
The mice all laugh and squeak, “What fun, Tee hee! Tee hee! (Fifth verse)
We are all excited about being a band and looking forward to playing many more songs together.
The Cheerful Chipmunks
Andrew, Annabella, Chad, Kaila, Jude, Noah, Nicholas, Lucy, and Veebhu are learning about Animals in the Woods this month. We are also learning about some special holidays.
Valentine’s Day help us to talk about giving, sharing and being good friends.
We read two favorite books: “Maisy Loves You” and “The Rainbow Fish.”
These stories stress the need to let others know how much we love them. They also help us to see how the act of giving has a good effect in others: they feel happy and they feel loved. We counted Valentine cards, little treats and special things that we found.
Lunar New Year shows us how people around the world celebrate the beginning of a new year. Korean, Japanese and Chinese people shared this celebration. Here in our school we read two books: “The Lion Dance” and “My First Chinese New Year.” We took the opportunity to dance, march, play musical instruments and bring Asian items so children can see the beauty and all the work behind each craft. The children also had a dragon parades, with drums and music, too.
As we learned about Animals in the Forest this month we focused on wolves, foxes and bobcats. Children started finding wolves in their favorite stories: “Three Little Pigs,” “The Little Red Riding Hood,” “The Gingerbread Man,” “Chicken Liken” and “Dora”. The children loved to hear these stories and dramatize them.
They noticed that wolves and foxes are often portrayed as bad guys in traditional stories. The National Geographic videos help us to see how these animals really live in the wild, and how hard it is for each of them to survive.
The Wonder Pets
This month has been lots of fun for the “Wonder Pets”. Carly, Christina, Rocco, Jylls, Kirsten, Marina, Kaitlyn and Jefferson enjoyed making colored ice floats to use with “our blubber”. When our ice floats were ready, we put them in a large container and set small toy animals afloat on them. Some of the animals got to play in the cold water. We learned how the animals stay warm while playing in the water. We took blubber (shortening) and placed it on one finger. We placed that finger and a finger that did not have shortening on it in the water. One finger got cold and one did not. Guess which one stayed warm? We were surprised to see how fast our ice floats melted.
We also learned about different holidays this month. We started with Groundhog Day. We painted toilet paper tubes, glued pompoms, added eyes, put it all together, and made our own groundhogs. We used flashlights to make our shadows and a measuring tape to see which was bigger: our shadows or ourselves. We used Katie’s Room as our burrows. Each groundhog got to crawl through a the tunnel, up a smaller tunnel and then got to decide if they were going to come out or crawl back into his/her burrow. Rocco, Jefferson, Carly, and Kirsten came out and saw their shadows. Jylls and Christina did not and went back into their burrows.
For Valentine’s Day we used pink, red and purple hearts for counting, sorting and sizing. We got to pick our favorite color. Pink won, but Rocco was the only boy that day, he had picked red! We hoped everyone liked their wreaths and the card that the children worked so hard on.
We also have been celebrating Chinese New Year. Jylls has been having lots of fun teaching everyone how to say “Gung Hay Fat Choy”. We used red circles that we counted and shared with our friends for good luck. We painted our red lanterns with gold paint and hung them up in the art room. We had lots of fun making our firecrackers, which we used to scare the evil spirits away. We read about the Lion Dance, and learned that the dragon always comes last and that red is a lucky color. We made our own dragon and marched in a parade making lots of noise. The Wonder Pets would like to wish everyone “Gung Hay Fat Choy”.
Books that we read this month:
Marcy Mouse, Charlie Brown’s Groundhog, Mrs. Vanilla’s Valentine, Care Bears Valentine, Guess How Much I love You, A Puppy To Love, Lucky New Year, The Lion Dance and My First Chinese New Year.
Song that we sung: ABC; Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star; Mary had a Little Lamb; I Love You and Wheels on the Bus.
The Jolly Ranchers
Alex, Eric, Lucas, Luke, Max, Ryan and Viktor have been exploring feelings and family traditions with Valentine’s Day and Chinese New Year being our themes these past few weeks. And best of all we celebrated Max’s birthday!
What are feelings? Who has them? What do we do with them? We started by looking at ourselves in a mirror placed in the center of our table. The boys really got into it as we sang “I Look In the Mirror and What Do I See?” (sung to the tune of Brown Bear, Brown Bear). They were taken aback when they saw how their facial expressions changed with each emotion we were displaying. A few of them thought their angry face looked very silly and started to laugh when they saw themselves.
We used our dollhouse toy families to examine facial features and ask ourselves: What they might be feeling? And why? Some of the children decided the adults looked very serious because they had to go to work and didn’t want to leave their children. One child was certain the daddy was angry because he had to work with a broken computer. We spoke about ways to deal with being angry and practiced sitting down and taking a few breaths and blowing them out, coloring and scribbling on paper and pounding and kneading playdough, all ways that helped our angry feels pass. We felt much different after these activities and the children were happy to realize feelings do come and go.
Then we went on to feeling scared. What do we do? It was unanimous that their moms and dads helped them at night by coming to sit near them. Getting into bed with their parents also was a strategy they all agreed made it all better. This smoothly led us into the subject of feelings of Love. How do we show someone we love them, and how do we know we are loved?
We talked about the expressions of love such as hugs, kisses, a gentle touch, and a smile. And how does someone we love feel when we smile at them? How do we feel when someone is grumpy with us? We soon realized it is much easier to be happy, and it makes everyone feel good. The children enjoyed making valentine hearts for you. They put their “heart” on the paper as they glued, placed and sprinkled glitter with their tiny fingers and were asked to write their own names.
We hope you had a wonderful Valentine’s Day with your little ones.
This week we are celebrating Chinese New Year! We have marched as lion dancers in our own parade. Then the children chose a musical instrument of their choice to play as we marched in a parade to scare away bad feelings and bring good luck. We set the table with oranges and rice cakes after we swept the classroom to rid this year of bad luck and bring us good fortune in 2010. We are realizing how much fun, how much love and family preparation goes into this wonderful, ceremonious holiday.
Songs we sang:
You Have Feelings, So Do I
If You’re Happy and You Know It
Books we read: How Do Dinosaurs Play With Their Friends? How Do Dinosaurs Say I Love You? I Want To Say I Love You; Family Time; Lucky New Year; My First Chinese New Year
Wishing a very Happy February Birthday to our brand new Little Flower, Max!
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March Newsletter
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May Newsletter
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June Newsletter
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July Newsletter
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August Newsletter
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September Newsletter
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November Newsletter
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December Newsletter
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