Winter Holidays

We had a great day in preschool yesterday.  We started the day playing puzzles and reviewing the letter J.   We talked about the different holidays that happen this time of year: Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Christmas, Winter Solstice and New Year's.  We read tons of books about each one.  Then we made popcorn strings to feed the birds, a winter solstice activity.  The kids did fantastic with this activity, and I think they LOVED it.

 I had pre-threaded needles for each child with a bead tied at the end (to act as a stopper).  They are real sewing needles and it was explained that if you poke your fingers it will hurt.  They did really well "sewing" the popcorn into a string with only a few pricked fingers.  I was actually quite impressed by the fine motor skills they demonstrated.  We then played a fun game making a lantern the "sun" and rolling the Earth (beach ball) around the sun.  We talked about it in terms of birthdays.  The earth goes around 1 time and then it's your birthday again.  I explained that the new year is a party to celebrate that the earth has gone around the sun one full time again, sort of like a birthday party for the earth.

 We learned to play dreidel and the kids loved it.  I changed the rule for "Hay" to just be "take one" since "take half" is to far advanced for 3 year olds.  They spun the dreidel and moved their coins (toy money) appropriately.  In art we colored pictures of our holiday decorations and played with our new alphabet stamps.  We had a little time at the end to play instruments to holiday music.  What a great morning!

Preschool B started off with reading groups. We worked on baggy books only today.  Please encourage your child to read you the books in their baggy each day.  Return baggy books on the 29th and I'll send home new ones since we'll then miss school on the 31st.

 In art we drew pictures and wrote about what we drew.  I'm encouraging them to draw and write about things in their life, such as parties, decorations and activities that are interesting to them right now.  It would be great if you would encourage similar drawing and writing at home.  Maybe a journal is a good stocking stuffer?

 This class also learned to play dreidel and they thought it was the most fun game ever!  It's a fairly simple addition/subtraction game and they get to play with coins and spin a dreidel, what could be more fun than that?

I hope you all have a fantastic holiday week!  No school next week at all, Merry Christmas!

Christmas

I can't believe it's less than 2 hours away from Wednesday already.  How did that happen?  There is still so much to do before Christmas!  I hope you're all enjoying your holiday preparation.  Here are a few photos from Little Adventures Preschool on Monday.  Our theme was Christmas.  We started the day by playing the gingerbread Starfall game on the iPad as everyone was arriving. There is a maze where kids make the gingerbread follow a shape to make it to the end.

 We read some Christmas stories and played a "What's in the Sock?" game.  I filled four socks (star, bell, gingerbread shaped cookie cutter, candy cane) with Christmas related items.  We passed them around and used all our senses (but sight) to try and figure out what they were.  I love how A is so carefully testing this one.

 And J is listening to see if it makes a sound.

 M is ready for I to hand it over!

 We played a matching the alphabet game.

 And laced popcorn.  We had read "If You Take a Mouse to the Movies" and he laces popcorn in the book.  It was a great activity and they were all focused on it for longer than I thought they would be.

 Of course they got to eat popcorn along the way...

 The number of the day was 4 and since our letter was F we did 4 'f'inger prints on each number 4.

Polar Express and Christmas Pack

http://www.teachersnotebook.com/product/LittleAdventuresPreschool/polar-express-preschool-pack

This pack has been a labor of love.  I debated about the graphics for a long time and then struggled with the formatting, but it's done now!  I wanted it done by the end of last week, but done by the end of the weekend works too (10PM on Sunday night - whew!).  Please enjoy this pack and leave a comment if you download!  Let me know what you like and what you'd like more of so my packs can continue to interest you.  Happy playing!

In this Pack:

You'll explore:

·         Patterns

·         Measurement – Standard and non-standard

·         Tally Marks

·         Count the Objects

·         Short Path Game

·         Pattern Blocks

·         Word Family Bells

·         Beginning Sound clip cards or hot dot readers

·         Comparison Words clip cards or hot dot readers

·         Sight Word Matching Trains

·         Do-A-Dot Color Matching Train

·         Geometric Solids

You'll need:

·         A die - I made one from a block and drew 1-3 dots (twice) on the sides since that's our level of math understanding in our home

·         Printer and scissors

·         Glue or Velcro (for the geometric solids)

·         Counters - the more interesting to your kid the more involved they'll be!

·         Scissors and glue

·         Writing tools

·         Small brads

·         Clothes pins or hot dot pen and hot dots

Do-A-Dot Markers

Enjoy playing with the Polar Express and Christmas Pack, and as always - please let me know if there are any typos.  To download: just click on the image of the pack above.  Please leave a comment here if you download, I'd love to know who's using it! And, if you blog about the pack let me know!  I'll add a link to your blog under the printables section of mine.