December 1, 2017

What a busy week we had! Santa's Workshop, class pictures, a visit from Officer Hart and book buddies, how much more fun can we have?? The two favorites of the week were definitely meeting Santa and our visit with Officer Hart and his service dog. We loved getting to ask him questions about his job and learn all about what he does in our community. What a wonderful way to help us learn more about community helpers this week!

We really enjoyed having time to play in our centers this week too. We loved playing in the sand table, playing with the fire station, using mini white boards and working on creating numbers with mini erasers. We also really enjoyed learning about geometric solids, especially cones because then we got to talk about what kind of ice cream cones we liked to eat!

Next week we will begin our Christmas unit and talk about all the things that make this season so special. There is so much to talk about from the very important religious topics to the fun Christmas crafts that we wanted to make sure we had enough time to fit it all in. We will also work on reviewing letters we have talked about so far this year rather than introducing new ones. We will finish up Unit 3 on Our Community once we return from Christmas break.

Next Wednesday is our Polar Express Day!! Be ready to have some Polar Express themed fun!! Wear your PJ's!!

Look what I wrote!

"Will you send this to my mom?"

We love white boards!

Making numbers with mini erasers!

Thank you for visiting us Officer Hart!

We loved learning about your job as a community helper!

Santa's Workshop!! We got to see Santa!!!

Geometric solids at the Math Center. Sorting and matching.

Fun at the Sensory table.

More number fun!

Thanksgiving Wrap up...

What an exciting and very short week we had last week. Everyone did such a wonderful job at the show! Have you ever seen a cuter group of Pilgrims before?!?

We did do a little bit of learning before the big day. We talked about location words to continue our learning from the week before.

Here are some pictures to show a few of these words and a few of our of adorable Pilgrims!

Working on our position words..."on top of"!

Here come the cutest little Pilgrims Ever!!

Working on our position words..."Under"

"In between"

Finally Catching up a bit....

We sure have been busy! We began a new unit all about Community this week and were lucky enough to have Mr. Spillman come talk to us about his job in our school community.We learned so much about how important his job is! We also talked about the many things in our community that we visit such as the post office, grocery store, park and library. We are really enjoying this unit so far.We also worked on the letter Uu during center time and at the writing table. We are doing such a great job with our letters!

We have loved playing in our pretend grocery store that is set up in our dramatic play area too! Of course, in honor of Thanksgiving next week, we had to put some Thanksgiving fun in there as well. Our sensory table is full of cranberries to sort, count and examine with friends. We learned all about cranberry bogs in technology and we get to have a pretend one in class as well! So fun! In our science center we used our light table to examine gel bags full of corn kernels and beans. It was so fun moving them around inside the gel and seeing what they looked like on the light table. Learning can be so much fun!

Just a reminder, our Thanksgiving Show is TUESDAY at 9:00 in the gym. After the show there will be a feast in the cafeteria with the  Preschool and Kindergarten classes to kick of Thanksgiving break. Dismissal is following the feast. There is no lunch or extended day offered on Tuesday. Please be sure to let us know when you are leaving so we know everyone is safe and accounted for! We look forward to seeing you there!

Here are a few pictures from the last few weeks so you can see all the fun we have been having learning and playing!

Exploring things at the light table

Grocery shopping!

Sorting cranberries in the "Cranberry Bog"!

Who doesn't love Mr. Potato Head??

Look at this little bean!

We love making numbers with blocks!

Carving out our pumpkin

Deciding what our pumpkin should look like.

Eww. Look at what is inside the pumpkin!

Look what I made!

Fr. Joe came to visit us during our Halloween party!

Boo! Happy Halloween!

When we can't make a pile of leaves we find the next best thing!

Halloween Party Fun!

Weekly Update-October 27, 2017

What a busy week we had this week talking all about the way we help our families at home as well our STREAM unit on Pumpkins. STREAM stands for Science, Technology, Religion, Engineering, Arts and Math. Each grade at BSS completes two units per year and this year our Fall unit was Pumpkins. We chose various activities pertaining to pumpkins that met the different criteria of these categories and had so much fun doing it. Who knew building gates with Lincoln logs for the 5 little pumpkins was engineering?? Or that carving out our class pumpkin to examine the insides and count the seeds was both Math and Science? We thought we were just having fun!!

We didn’t just have fun all week, we did serious work too. The letter we focused on this week was the letter Hh. We worked on writing it in small groups as well as coloring in pictures that begin with it to help our fine motor skills. We also worked on building it with our wooden blocks on the rug. We also worked on independently writing it the writing table if we chose to. Each child works at their own pace and we encourage them to do so.  It is amazing to watch them learn something new and really love it!

During small groups we worked on identifying and recognizing uppercase and lowercase letters, segmenting words into their onset and rime and we worked more with syllables and compound words. We are really doing a great job with it. We also worked with identifying small groups of numbered items without having to count them. This was tricky at first but we really got the hang of it! We talked about the many different ways we can make various sets of the number 4 using both fingers and concrete items. They were really impressed by the fact that they were adding like “big kids” do.

Even though it rained this week we had plenty of time to play in the classroom. We got extra time to play in the sensory table which is full of Halloween themed items, we played with balls at the train table and we even got extra time in the dramatic play area. We made the best of being stuck inside!

Have a great weekend!

Building a gate for "5 Little Pumpkins"

Carving out our class pumpkin, learning about pulp and seeds!

Loving the light table!

Our class Jack-O Lantern! We all took turns guessing how many seeds we thought he had inside....347!!!

Some Halloween fun at the sensory table this week! Making patterns and sorting spooky things with friends

Working on counting

Morning fun building!

More pictures coming soon!

This past week...October 16, 2017

Our focus this week was on the question: How do family members care for one another? When we read our classroom poem about families, we learned one way families are alike is that they show they care by sharing responsibilities.  Mommy was feeding a younger sibling, while Daddy was making dinner and older Brother was feeding and walking the dog.  Everyone can do something to show they care!

We invited our school nurse, Mrs. Lannigan, into our classroom as a special guest.  She spoke to the children about caring for one another and safety.  The children enjoyed her visit very much.  We decided as a class to work together and write a personal thank-you letter to Mrs. Lannigan.  The children then ‘hand-delivered’ it to her office. What a great experience of showing caring and kindness within our school community!

During Literacy circle and Small Group time this week, we focused on onset and rime.  Children were asked to look at a picture (and then the word) and listen to the funny way the teacher would say the word.  Then together combine the different parts to form the word. For example, boat /b/ - oat = boat.  As the week progressed, the children engaged in two and three syllable words as well.  They really got excited as they were successful in figuring out each word.  We also worked on the Letter Bb and the Letter Ee.

During Math circle and Small Group time this week we reinforced the concept that when counting, the last count (number stated) tells us how many. We also focused  on one-to-one correspondence and counting.  Everyone wanted to engage in this activity as we used candy corn pieces as counters! What a great opportunity for us to make the connection that just like the three colors of

the candy corn are one, there are three persons in the Holy Trinity.

All three are God, yet together they are One.  

Story time book this week was Oonga Boonga, by Frieda

Wishinsky.  Baby Louise won’t stop crying.  Many family members

try to cheer her up, but only her big, brother Daniel has success.

Hope you have a chance to get outside this weekend and enjoy this beautiful weather!!

We love our school nurse!!

Fun with friends in the Math Center

Building letters on the rug

Fall Counting

Ipads with Mr. Hall!

We had Art in the Art room this week! So fun!

Being creative in Art class!

Puzzles are always fun with a friend

Working on numbers and counting

We love when Mr. Hall comes!

Open art time! Happy Fall!

Enjoying the nice Fall weather while we can!

Playing family in the Dramatic Play