Valentines Celebrations
Thank you for helping us have a very special Valentines. I think the children really had a good time getting all of their heart decorations, cards, mailboxes and snacks ready this week! Not only did we talk about who we love in our families and amongst our classroom friends, but we also made sure to acknowledge all of the different classrooms around the school, the front desk staff, and Linda.
This week we took a visit to the Infant-A classroom to exchange Valentines with each other. We made cards for the five babies: Antoine, Una, Cleo, Annabelle and Teagan. We got to sit down with the babies and hand them their cards. We also explored their classroom a little bit and noticed that they have some of the same books that we do! And now everyone has met Teagan, Rachel's baby. They were so gentle with light touches and brief kisses for the babies.
We also took turns going around the school and delivering our special snack: chocolate drizzled pretzels! It was fun and exciting to see how happy everyone was to receive our Valentines cards and treats!
Spanish
Mitzi has been doing a wonderful job teaching everyone Spanish. She incorporates the songs from our weekly Spanish specialist, and has then been finding new songs and books to really give your children more basic Spanish language. This week we started adding more colors to our knowledge bank, shapes, numbers, weather, emotions, and days of the week. We started reading the book "Mis Colores," which also identifies the object (i.e. the red apple).
Clay
We used heart cutters to make our clay in the shape of hearts this week. After our clay hearts dried, we each chose a different color to paint with and added some glitter on top! Next week it will be back to basics with clay and water and adding a few new tools to see what we can create.
Cooking
We did a lot of cooking this week! Diane came on Monday and we used the kitchen aid to make some chocolate pudding. We have been comparing and contrasting foods that embody "creamy" "crunchy" and "chewy." Our crunchy element was sprinkles, and our chewy component was marshmallow. It was a delicious, special treat for the holiday.
For our regular cooking project, we dipped strawberries into chocolate. Again, a special treat- back to our normal healthy routine next week!
We also made the chocolate drizzled pretzels (but we only tasted the pretzels).
Sensory Play
Playing with sand helps us build so much language, social skills, mathematical concepts, and scientific concepts. You can also tinker with cause and effect as you watch lines and tracks appear, erase them, and start over. The children fiddle with weight and density as they fill different containers with sand. We have been working on sharing space, and sharing toys, and the sandbox is a great place to work on these skills.
Tissue paper and glue - working on the concepts of sticky and adhesive.
Playdough has been a wonderful tool for storytelling and imaginative play. Our playdough has been made into many pizzas lately, and also gets rolled into a lot of balls. We have noticed that the size of the ball has been sparking interest- the language we overhear not only includes "big ball" and "little ball" but also "Daddy ball" "Mommy ball" and "Baby ball." Everyone has started to relate size to family role.
Music & Movement
To embrace the theme of love this week, we started listening to some music that supports the idea of loving yourself and helping yourself regulate and calm when you feel angry.
The first song has been dubbed "The Monster song" by Parker- it's about calming down the anger monster inside by taking calm deep breaths. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mZbzDOpylA
The second song we listened to is about all the amazing things that we are, and what makes us special. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyVzjoj96vs
We also started listening to a new Shapes song this week! Next week we are going to start using our bodies to make the shapes (like having four children lay down to make a square). We will turn our body shapes into a fun book for our library! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfRuLS-Vnjs
Special Reader
A big thank you to Cristina, Mia's Mommy, for reading with us this week. Thank you for bringing in some wonderful narratives for us!