Top Ten! - A Year in Review

We finished up a fantastic school year last week.  Right after our end of year celebrations I took the boys and headed to Utah for Memorial Day weekend.  That's where my family all lives and it was great to get away for a few days.  Thinking back on the school year I wanted to to a TOP TEN post of my favorite blog posts.  Did you have a favorite day or post?  Let me know.  Here our my top ten favorite blog posts:

Animal Friends - Tot School Thursday (9.20.2013)  Remember way back in September when we were outside every day?  I loved this Animal Friends Tot Pack and we had a blast dressing up like animals, playing with animal toys and even painting and making egg carton ants to learn the letter A.


Bubbles - Tot School Tuesday (10.9.12)  What's better than learning the letter B by popping bubbles, painting bubbles, and making bubbles all day long?  We had so much fun exploring the different bubbles and playing with the Bubbles Tot Pack.


Scarecrows - Preschool (11.14.12) We were on a roll in November learning new letters all of the time and beginning to read.  It is so fun to go back and flip through the year to see the progression of learning.  We made fun art projects, read with the scarecrow, and were starting to learn to categorize objects in Preschool A.  Preschool B was learning their first set of 25 sight words and picking up the idea of reading quickly with Bob Books. Be sure to check out the awesome Tot School Scarecrows day as well.


Polar Express - Tot School Tuesday (12.11.12)  Who doesn't love coming to school in their pajamas?  We LOVED Polar Express day, playing with trains and bells and listening to the story. We were talking a little bit about graphing in our Polar Express Tot Pack (an introductory and very hands-on for the adult type lesson).


Dancing Dinosaurs - Tot School Thursday (1.31.13) Playing with the dinosaurs in the grits and cornmeal sensory bin was a great way to start the day.  We had so much fun playing with the Dancing Dinosaurs tot pack, the dinosaur skeletons and the hand puppets.  We also played with the letter D on Starfall.com on the SmartBoard. The kids were all growing and learning and so happy to be exploring their world around them.


Valentines Day - Preschool B (2.13.2013) It just keeps amazing me at how much toddlers and preschoolers learn in such a small amount of time.  Preschool B kids came in August with a need to review and learn a few letters of the alphabet.  Then by February they are reading Starfall.com books and working on learning more advanced phonics such as digraphs (th, sh, etc.).  They're still kids who love art and playing in the sensory bins and taking on challenges like tic-tac-toe.  Awe, man.  I love these kids :)



Wheels - Tot School Tuesday (2.19.13) I feel silly every time I say "Today was one of my favorite days ever!" because that happens ALL.THE.TIME.  No joke.  Wheels day was awesome.  We played with everything that had wheels - including construction trucks and a bucket of soil.  We explored the Wheels Tot Pack and even gave our cars a bath in shaving cream.  I really enjoy doing these types of activities because quite often parents don't want to let their home get extremely messy (and I don't blame them) but giving kids the opportunity to explore their world sometimes gets messy and I love to give them that chance.


St. Patrick's Day - Preschool A (3.13.13)  For St. Patrick's Day we got to play a more advanced version of Hop Along the Path.  Each child got a die, rolled it, then jumped that many spaces.  We were really working on our one-to-one correspondence with that game.  We had a blast with art, practicing our reading and music skills on the piano as well as exploring 3D shapes.  Can you believe how much these preschoolers had learned?


Rain, Rainbows, Mud and Worms - Preschool (4.29.13) - Tuesday Tot School (5.14.13) - Thursday Tot School (5.16.13)  I love Mud and Worms day.  It's a great experience to hold worms and squish in the mud.  Most of the kids love it as well.  I was so sad this year that we had to keep postponing it.  I'm glad we finally got it in!


Z is for Zoo - Tot School Thursday (4.25.13) It's nice when we can finally go outside again in the spring time.  Learning about letter Z outside with all the zoo animal games and activities was so much fun.  Toddlers are at the age where they are beginning to get into dramatic play and acting like animals.  They're exploring books and scissors and love painting.

These kids make me smile every day and looking back on all these fun times makes me smile and miss them all so much.  I hope everyone is having a great summer.  Be sure to check out the blog in a few days for the post about the summer tot packs and preschool packs I'll be using with my boys.