Saturday, February 18, 2017

Valentine's Day

Dramatic Play

Post Office! What better way to celebrate Valentine's Day, than sending mail! They were the cutest little mail carriers. They loved working at the cash register the most, and stamping all the mail. We took turns being customers to buy paper, valentines, envelopes, post cards, stamps and boxes. They also had a great time delivering them with their hats and bags to the mailboxes around the room. Like I said, they were so cute.






Blocks

I had out a play castle my son has been begging to have out for a few weeks. They liked it so much, they were sad to clean it up, so I kept it out another day.

Art

We played with chocolate scented play dough, and heart candy boxes. It was a big sacrifice over the weekend for my kids to have to help me eat all the chocolates :)
The kids really enjoyed it, and were making valentine presents for each other and they got delivered to their friends through the post office.

The second day, we played with the play dough again for the first while before we got out ingredients to make oatmeal pancakes. They really love cooking, and all took a turn to add and mix ingredients. They then ran off to play some more while I cooked them.

Small Manipulatives


Valentine number sequencing puzzle on the magnet board














Valentine dot cards with flat marbles. This was the first time we'd done this, and they were excited to play with these marbles. They made patterns and counted as they played too.

Writing

Valentine stamps










Outside
We stayed inside out of the mud one day, and danced with ribbons and played with the parachute. The next day, we enjoyed the sunshine and got out and played after snack! It is so nice not having to get all the kids in full snow gear again! We've got spring fever!

Large Group
We learned the song, Skidamarink.
We read a valentines book, then handed out valentines to each other

The second day, we played with Sweetheart candies. First, they glued hearts onto the letters of their names to spell them. Then, they each got a box of their own candies and we sorted them, graphed them, and made patterns with them. They were amazing at the sorting and graphing, and were all able to do it on their own. With the patterns, they did great at extending mine, and a few could make them on their own. They're doing great!

Friday, February 10, 2017

Oceans

Dramatic Play

We played at the warm and sunny beach! There was a wading pool with balls and ocean animals, towels, picnic supplies, goggles, sunglasses, beach balls, and floaties.






The first day, my small sensory table had ocean animals and water beads to play in. The kids absolutely loved this!

The second day, we added fishing poles and magnetic fish. This led to a lot of fun play. The fish they caught were added to the picnic, then the kids insisted on cooking them, so we got out some cooking supplies, and made "grills" out of baskets. They then took turns fishing and grilling and we all got yummy fish sandwiches.

The third and fourth days, I added molding sand into the sensory table, and seashells. They loved this as well, making prints of the shells in the sand, and filling them with sand. The table was always crowded with kids, these two days.

Blocks

Each day, we had a different ocean puzzle. They were also stored on the shelf so we could try different ones over and over.

Art

Ocean sponge painting

Sensory table filled with ocean animals and water beads. We had them out in the small sensory table before and they loved it, but putting them in the big tub of water was a different sensory experience. It's especially fun to have the clear water beads in there where you can't see them, but can feel them. They had fun searching for them and surprising each other.
 
Painting with textured rollers
 
Small Manipulatives
Ocean animal magnets

Ocean lacing cards
 
Ocean file folder games (thanks to my son's over the top and amazing Sunbeam teacher at church)
 
Number sequencing puzzle

Writing

Ocean stamps. I'm pleasantly surprised at how well these homemade stamps work. They're just foam stickers on milk lids!

Ocean stickers

Snack

Goldfish crackers

Ocean Jello animals

Outside

More playing in the snow, but we also had to miss a few days due to extreme cold, so we played parachute inside. We played counting games with the fish, where we bounced them on the parachute, then would count how many stayed on, and how many bounced off. They loved this game! We also danced around and sang songs with it, like Shape a loo and Snow is Falling, from previous themes.

Large Group

We learned the song 5 Little Crabs by Dr. Jean. It's on her Totally Math cd. We also learned Baby Beluga by Raffi. We also danced to Raffi's version of Octopus' Garden. We used ribbon streamers as we danced and moved. It was especially fun on days we couldn't get outside and needed more movement.

Day 1, we read Hello Ocean, and went over what our 5 senses would see, hear, taste, smell, and hear in the ocean or beach.

Day 2, we read Coral Reef Homes. We also looked through another ocean I Spy book I have to see the different types of ocean habitats (coral reefs, kelp forests, arctic oceans, etc.) and what animals lived in them. We then did an ocean animal sound sort, where we listened for the beginning sound and sorted them into groups with the same sounds. They were great at this. Isolating beginning sounds is a very important pre-reading skill.
 
Day 3, we read Rainbow Fish and then made our own rainbow fish. We talked a lot about things that were happening in the book, and how we can apply them to making friends at school too. I had a few of the other Rainbow Fish books too, and as they were finishing, we read those as well, at the kids' requests. They were dying to know what happened the rainbow fish and his friends.

Day 4, was our Field Trip to PetSmart! Thank you to those parents who came and helped drive and supervise. The kids had a great time looking at all the different types of fish they had. They also got to see birds, watch the employee feed the guinea pig and a hamster, touch a tortoise and a snake, plus see lizards, turtles, and crickets. They also loved the cats and seeing the dogs in the grooming area. We had a super fun time!

Small Group

Miss Kim played the game, Ocean Treasures, with them, which is a counting game. They had to place numbers 1-10 in order, then count fish to match them with the numeral.

My group observed and classified sea shells. They used magnifying glasses to look, and they got to touch and hold them. We talked about their attributes, (swirly, flat, bumpy, etc) and then sorted them into groups of shells with similar attributes. It wasn't just sorting to them. They loved exploring, then as I'd ask them about their shells. I'd encourage them to find others similar, and pretty soon we had piles of swirly shells and flat shells, then those groups were divided into big and small. They also learned how to properly handle fragile shells, before I put them out in the play area the next week.

Week 2, Miss Kim did the counting ocean puzzles with them, which are put together by placing the numbered pieces in order, 1-10.

My group fished for our number fish, and put them in order 1-10, then counted fish flash cards and matched them to the numeral. Lots of counting and numbers with this theme!