Oceans

This was a short theme, but I think one of the kids' favorites so far! We had 1 day spent on our field trip to Seaquest (thanks to a great preschool mom for getting us passes!), and then another short week because of Thanksgiving. Here's the fun things we did:

Dramatic Play

An ocean! And beach!




It changed a bit each day. The first day, we had the blue blanket for the ocean with lots of big and small ocean animal toys. There were beach towels, floaties and goggles for kids on the beach. The highlight is the sensory table with kinetic sand and seashells.


The next day, I added a few more dress-ups.


The last day, my son had requested pirates, since pirates sail on the ocean, so I added pirate costumes and a treasure chest. They had a lot of fun with it! Also, the small ocean animals were now in the water on the art table, but we happened to find another awesome bag of ocean animals at the store this weekend, that had a few animals we didn't have yet. So, more ocean animal fun!






I think my favorite part of their play at this center this week was wanting to learn all about the animals they were playing with. They wanted to know their names, what they ate, etc. So we spent a lot of time checking out the reading center to find books about their favorite ocean animals, so they could learn more about them.

Blocks

The sensory table was in the block area, but we had all these fun ocean-themed puzzles and games too! They're really starting to like puzzles and get them out often.

Art

I forgot a picture, but I have seashell rubbing plates they used the first day, before we left on the field trip.

Ocean animal sponge painting


Tub of water with toy fish


Small manipulatives

Folder game and book


Ocean animal lacing cards

Flat marble animal pictures from totschooling


Magnet board



Writing table

Ocean stickers


Ocean stamps
I made these with foam stickers and milk lids and they've held up great for 6 years now!


Snack

We had Jello from ocean animal molds, with some blue "ocean" Jello

Of course, Goldfish crackers!

Large Group

Our song was 5 Little Crabs from Dr. Jean. We focused on the counting and numeral recognition.

Our word was ocean and we talked about the difference between oceans and lakes on our big world map.

Day 1 was our field trip to Seaquest aquarium.

Day 2 we chose ocean animals from dramatic play and sorted them by their beginning sound. This is new to them, so I was really focusing on them isolating that first sound and hearing what their animal started with. Then I'd tell them which letter card it went by that makes that sound.


Day 3 we read Rainbow Fish and made our own Rainbow Fish by gluing sequins on a fish picture.

Small Group

Week 1, my group played an ocean treasures counting game. The other group played ocean dominoes.

Week 2, my group worked on counting and putting our ocean 1-10 puzzles together, while the other group drew their favorite ocean animal in their journals.

Pumpkins

This week started out amazing with a field trip! Pack's Farm was perfect for our group. We had great warmish weather for October, so that was nice too! First, we got to have a lesson on pumpkins from Mr. Pack, or Old MacDonald as some in our class believed, which he liked :) He read us a book that perfectly explained the life cycle of a pumpkin, then told us all about how he plants his pumpkins. He had pumpkins and gourds of every variety for us to see and he told us about them. Then he carved a pumpkin to show the kids. He was so fast, and showed us how much easier it is to cut out the bottom than the top and deal with a lid! This was life-changing at our house and we carved that way this year and it worked wonderfully! Afterwards, we headed out to play. We did the hay maze a few times, then went off to the play area. They had big slides, a corn box, a pump game with rubber duckies and water, a tire playground, and big tunnels the kids could run in together. They had a great time! After they were done, we ate a quick snack, then each picked a pumpkin. It was a great way to start off our week learning about pumpkins, because it introduced how they're grown, plus they got to visit a real pumpkin patch before coming back to school and playing in one here.

Dramatic Play
Pumpkin Patch


Blocks
Another kid request. Some were disappointed I didn't have leaves to rake during apple orchard week, so they came out now. There were also blocks and puzzles on the shelves all week that were used each day, in addition to raking leaves.
 

Art
Pumpkin Slime-I just mixed pumpkin guts with the typical slime recipe, glue and water with borax, and we got ooey gooey pumpkin slime. They all tried it, but some didn't love the texture and watched from a distance. Others were so into it!


Because they didn't all appreciate the yuckiness, I also added some paper and fall foam stickers as an alternative at the art table.


We made pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, then painted with orange paint. Minor frustration. I have gallons of paint from Wal-Mart, and others from Lakeshore, and my Lakeshore ones are coming apart! The orange gallon has turned yellow, so I tried shaking and shaking and it's this nasty dull yellowish red, not orange at all. I've barely had it a year, and it's so frustrating! Long story short, I'll never buy the more expensive Lakeshore paint again.

Beads. It had nothing to do with pumpkins, but my original plan was more paint, and we've been doing a lot of that and we needed a change of pace, so I got out beads and string!  


Small Manipulatives

Pumpkin do-a-dot pages and flat marbles and orange pom poms


Pumpkin lacing cards


Pumpkin shape matching

All of these are from tot-schooling.

Writing

Lots of pumpkin and Halloween stickers and stencils

 

Snack
We made pumpkin chocolate chip cookies.

Outside

Sensory table: kinetic sand with little pumpkins and acorns


Large Group
We learned the song 5 Little Pumpkins this week

Day 1, field trip

Day 2, we compared our pumpkins. We measured them and weighed them. Then we also reviewed our 5 senses by using them to learn about pumpkins.


Day 3, we made a gate for our 5 little pumpkins. It was challenging, because I wanted them all to work together, and that can be hard, but they did it! The only guidance I offered was it had to fit all 5 pumpkins. So when it was tall at first, I came to add the pumpkins, and it could only fit 1. So I asked them how to fit more, and they had to figure out to make it wider, instead of taller. And as 3 separate kids started their own gates, I would add a pumpkin and let them figure out it couldn't fit 5 without working with the other kids. It took awhile, but they eventually got it. They also liked adding random small blocks, and they saw as I placed the pumpkins, that those weren't very stable. I was proud of how they got it all worked out.


Day 4, We read Spookley the Square Pumpkin and then used play dough and they each got to make their own pumpkins. Like above, I gave very little guidance, I want them to figure it out. They got to choose their shape and figure out how to make it come to life.

Small Group

We did pumpkin seed counting.

We did a file folder game from tot-schooling putting pumpkins with letters in ABC order.

We did another worksheet for more cutting practice. They cut the pumpkins out and matched the faces. I really focused with them on holding scissors correctly, and I think we'll be doing a lot more of this to get them kinder ready.


Miss Kim played a matching counting game, and they did a number dot to dot.

Thanksgiving

Dramatic Play
We had the housekeeping/kitchen set up back. I added some turkey plates and cups to make it more Thanksgiving-ish. They loved cooking Thanksgiving feasts for each other!

Blocks
We played with mega blocks. I also brought out some trucks and tractors. I'm loving having this extra shelf for either dramatic play, or the block center, to add a few extra things the kids can pull out. There were also puzzles of things we learned about in past themes.

Art
We made turkeys, kinda :) I actually just had out glue and feathers and eyes, plus markers if they needed to draw anything. A few decided to make turkeys, but many made monsters, people, or just glued things together. It's why I love open-ended art! They can do and make whatever they want!


Day 2, we painted with feathers, and pipe cleaner turkey feet. It was funny watching them stomp the feet and act like turkeys as they painted.

Day 3, after our field trip, we did a turkey craft one of our moms supplied. The kids got to glue the turkey head and fathers to a body made of a brown paper sack. It was lots of fun, and really glue-y!

Small Manipulatives
The first day, we had our chameleons from last week out. They had been left to dry over the weekend, then I added the top spinning plate. They enjoyed playing with their plates and the stuffed chameleon.
 
We had out our favorite fall manipulatives, the squirrel pattern cards and apple counting cards.For Thanksgiving, we added turkey feather counting cards. They also liked playing with the feathers by sorting them by color.


I also added Leap Frog ABC magnets to the magnet board.
 
Outside
We played with wheat in the sensory table outside, along with all the other fun things to play out there! They really liked the wheat for digging and pouring. It's just so relaxing.

Large Group
We learned the word gratitude, and each day read a new Thanksgiving book. They taught about the pilgrims and Indians, and also about things we can be grateful for today. After reading each day, I also had them add thankful leaves to our tree, making it a thankful tree. Many ideas were pretty general, like family and friends, and some got pretty specific, like green popsicles. We also kinda learned the song, Over the River and Through the Woods.

On day 1, we reviewed our colors with Skittles turkey sorting mats. They got to sort their pile of Skittles by color, then they could eat them, or put them in a bag to bring home.

Day 2, we wrote in our journal about things we are thankful for. We also made our name turkeys, where the kids had to put the feathers with letters of their name in order. Their names were written on their turkey body to help. I didn't take pics, but you should have seen their turkey come home!

Day 3, was our field trip to Dick's! Thanks to all of you who came. Our host, Randy, was great with the kids and let them run and jump and be loud, so they all had a lot of fun. We toured the back of the store and saw where all the groceries are stored. We even got to go inside the fridges and freezers, and moo at customers from behind the milk.
We got to check out the loading dock, and ride up and down. They even got to go inside a frito lay truck, which they thought was amazing. Then they got to feed cardboard to the cardboard recycle monster. My son has been talking about that part ever since.
As we walked past the meat counter, we were also stopped by a customer who thought the kids were just so cute, she had to give each of them a dollar, including all the younger baby siblings. The kids loved that part!!
The bakery was pretty amazing too. We got to see glazed donuts, freshly dipped, and the giant ovens, plus watch the cake decorators at work.
The kids' favorite part was eating chocolate chip cookies at the end.
Once back at school, we added our favorite foods we are thankful for to our thankful tree, and they all said cookies!

Small Group
My group practiced rhyming words. I have a fall harvest game, with matching rhyming words. Rhyming is a difficult skill at this age, but I think worth introducing. They all did great at recognizing which words rhymed as I said them out loud, but did struggle with finding rhyming matches in the pictures by themselves. We worked as a group to match the rhyming cards. This is a skill we'll be working on all year.

Miss Kim's group played a harvest counting game. They all had harvest mats with pictures of grouped vegetables, and had to match the numeral cards to the correct amount of vegetables. They are doing wonderfully with their numbers and counting!

Both of these games were found at Kelly's Kindergarten.

Safety

Field Trip
We started out Safety week with a field trip to the fire station. Thanks to all you you who came! The kids had a great time. We started with a video about fire safety that talked about having a plan to get out of your house in case of a fire. The fire fighter also taught us about not playing with fire and matches to stay safe, and we practiced Stop Drop and Roll and calling 911 in an emergency. Then we got to tour the Fire Station! Most kids liked it, and others were nervous. It can be a scary thing, and fires can be scary to kids, but I think it helps to meet the firefighters and see that they're nice and there to help you. Especially when they show the kids what they look like in their full gear, they're showing the kids that if they come to help them dressed that way, they can trust them. Some kids took a turn to drive the truck and hold the hose. We also got fire hats they all thought were cool! We ate snack at the park and played a few minutes on the Fire Station playground too. Back at school, the kids got some free play time before we did small groups.

Dramatic Play
We played Fire Station all week. I had more fire fighter coats this year and that made it a lot of fun! They had lots of fun dressing up and playing firefighters all week, and I think it was great to go to the fire station first so they could see what they do.
 
I even made oxygen tanks by spray painting pop bottles yellow.




The second week, after they had learned and practiced calling 911 and being dispatchers, their play really expanded with them using the phones to call and giving an address to the firefighters. There were pictures of houses on the wall in the block area with numbers, and they were good at giving those numbers as their address. Learning math and life skills in play!


 

Blocks
The block area had a doll house the first week, with dolls and some firefighters. My firefighters were about half the size of the dolls, but they didn't seem to mind! They had some great make believe play!
 

The second week we had out the car mat and cars. Both were a great extension of the fire station, as the kids used them together to put out fires in the doll house and in the buildings on the car mat.

Art
We played play dough.
We made collages with glue and a variety of different things to glue on our papers.
We made fall leaves for our tree. We did marble painting, by rolling marbles in paint, then dropping them in large cans with our papers inside. We shook the cans to spread the paint, then took our papers out when they were ready. Once they dried, I cut out the fall leaf shape and added them to our classroom tree.
 
 



I somehow forgot to get a pic of the finished tree!

We also finger painted. I tried this recipe, but it didn't turn out great. It kinda dried to a gelatin consistency. I added more water and stirred more and it worked, but it was lumpy. The kids still enjoyed it and it was a great sensory experience (like our gelatin molds), but I don't think I'll use it again.

Small Manips
We did 2 different fire fighter floor puzzles.
We played a community helpers game and did a community helpers floor puzzle.

Outside
We had wheat in the sensory table, and added the firefighters to it the second week.
We also had out balls and other toys.
The kids are loving the swing set and spend most of the time swinging and sliding!

Snacks
Besides the regular snack rotations, we made traffic lights for snack one day. The kids spread their frosting on their graham crackers, then added skittles to make it a traffic light.

 
 

Songs
We learned 2 new songs, one about fire trucks one about calling 911.

Hurry, hurry, drive that fire truck,
Hurry, hurry, drive that fire truck,
Hurry, hurry, drive that fire truck,
Other verses:
Hurry, hurry, turn that corner
climb the ladder
squirt the hoses
Slowly, slowly, back to the fire house

911 (tune of Bingo)
There is a number you can call when you need someone's help.
You call 911, you call 911, you call 911 when you need someone's help!

Large Group
Day 1 was the field trip.
Day 2 we had eaten our traffic lights for snack, and learned more about them in large group. We read about traffic safety, then played Red Light Green Light.
Day 3 we read about Playground Safety, and did a safety experiment on our playground. We took 2 apples outside. We made predictions about what would happen if we dropped them on the grass and cement. Then we did it. The one dropped on grass had nothing happen to it. The one that I dropped on the cement broke open and juice came out, which they immediately connected to being blood if it was them that fell. We talked about the safest place to run on our playground, and they knew it was the grass because if they fell, the wouldn't cut their knee open and bleed.
 
Day 4 we read a Sesame Street safety book and wrote in our journals how we can stay safe.

Small Group
I taught the kids about calling 911. We practiced using real phones, and one child got to be the dispatcher while another called to report an emergency. We also talked about what emergencies are that we would need to call 911, and times when we shouldn't. As with most lessons this week, I emphasized with the kids that they are small enough there should always be an adult or baby sitter watching them who would know what to do in an emergency and they could count on them to know if they needed to call 911.

Our mom volunteers read an interactive safety book to the kids that posed different situations, and the kids got to pick the safest answer. They pushed the button to see if their answer was right. I was so glad to have small groups to get to use this book, since they love having turns to push the buttons and that's hard to do in large group!

Week 2, I read the kids a book about strangers and we talked about "stranger danger." Hopefully you read my other blog post about Strangers with links to great articles on how to talk to our kids about this topic. We talked about the situations in the book and what would be safe (like not wandering off from our parents and finding a "safe" stranger like a mom with kids or a cashier or police officer if we did get lost).

Our mom volunteers played a community helpers game with the kids, and also helped them place ambulance cards with numbers 1-10 in order.