NOT A BOX

We read the book Not a Box by Antoinette Portis. The children were given paper with a box on it, and they had to turn it into whatever they wanted. This is one of my favorite activities because it shows each child's creativity.

WHAT CAN WE DO WITH BOXES?

What a fun filled week we've had answering our focus question what can we do with boxes? The children were divided into three groups. Boxes were chosen, ideas were voted on, and the creativity began! They created a robot, castle, and a rocket, and had a blast playing in/with their creations!

Groundhog Day!

We made our predictions on whether the groundhog would see it's shadow then we watched a video of the event only to find out....6 more weeks of winter.

Candyhearts experiment & graphing!

For our candy heart experiment we labeled three cups (water, vinegar, soda) and we predicted whether the hearts we dropped in the liquid would sink or float. Once the hearts were in we waited a few minutes before we discussed our observations.

We also incorporated math with candy hearts graphing! I gave each child a box of candy hearts and they had to sort, cout and graph the colored hearts! Fun and yummy learning moment!

Friday Fun Centers

FIELD TRIP TO GRIT FITNESS

We took a field trip to Grit Fitness to find out the answer to our focus question "what jobs are related to exercise?" A huge thank you to Amanda Rogers for setting this up and working us out!

LOVE is in the air!

Guacamole, Smoothies, & Energy Balls

This week we discussed what we can do to take care of our bodies and what our bodies need to move and exercise. We talked about how our bodies are like batteries, and we need to keep them "charged" or full of good things to have the energy to play and learn. If we don't fill up on foods full of nutrients, we won't have the "power" or energy to keep going, like a battery when it loses its charge.

We made energy balls, smoothies, and guacamole. I asked them all to at least try one bite of everything, and if they didn't like it, they didn't have to eat it. I was pleasantly surprised by how many of them enjoyed eating everything.

Letter Review

We are more than half way through the alphabet and we working hard every week learning new letters & numbers. I try to dedicate Friday's to letter & number review in some sort of way. Some days we use dry erase boards others days I let them write in shaving cream or flour. Today I had the class spread out on the floor and they wrote on large pieces of paper with markers (a favorite with these kiddos). I verbally gave instructions and they had to use things around the room for help if they needed it. They all did really well!

The Christmas rush is over and we are starting 2023 with our EXERCISE UNIT! We were so lucky to have the opportunity to hangout with Coach Chase and try out some fun exercises!

christmas program

This time of year it is easy to get caught up in the rush of the Christmas holiday and lose focus on what is the true meaning of Christmas. I am so blessed to be able to teach our students about Jesus’ birth and talk openly about God at St. James. The children have memorized songs, lines, solos, and moving parts which requires a tremendous amount of focus and commitment. It isn’t easy to perform in front of a large audience especially when it is full of your loved ones. I am very proud of their determination and hard work.

Bread with Mrs. Dorothy

It's always such a treat to have someone come and share their special talents with the children. Mrs. Dorothy, Tracy's mother, is quite the baker. This week, she shared her delicious sourdough bread recipe with the boys and girls. They learned what a "starter" was, as well as how to knead and roll the dough. She explained the importance of following a recipe, and even gave each child their own bit of dough to practice with. Without a doubt, the highlight of her visit was getting to eat some of her cinnamon bread, and take a small loaf home!

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Bread Tasting

We are wrapping up our bread unit and thought it would be fun to taste test some different kinds of bread. We tasted brioche, biscuits, sourdough, bagels, and cinnamon raisin bread. We took a class vote, and the biscuits won the class favorite!

Toys for Tots

Our community service project was collecting Toys for Tots and I'm so happy to share that we collected 218 toys! Friday morning we had a few special visitors come and pick up the toys and visit with our students.

PUMPKIN PATCH

The middle school student hosted a fun morning of reading, singing, planting pumpkin seeds, and so much more for our preschool students. Each middle school student wrote and illustrated a sweet book for their pumpkin patch buddy and read it to them while we were there visiting. They helped them pick a pumpkin that they actually grew and then talked to us about the life cycle of a pumpkin. Thank you, middle school kiddos, for everything you did on Halloween for our class.

PUMPKIN MATH & SCIENCE

Pumpkin math & science was a big hit with the children. First, the boys and girls used yarn to measure the circumference around the largest pumpkin. Next, they estimated the number of lines on the pumpkin. Various answers were given, and Caleb was the winner with an estimation of 22 . Estimations were also given with regard to the weight of the pumpkin. Ace came closet with his estimation of 5 pounds. Finally, we tallied who thought the pumpkin would float in water, and those who thought it would not float. To our amazement it floated! Hands on learning is always the best!

Sorting and Graphing

Sorting & graphing helps children look at numbers in different ways. Starting them with graphs when they are young helps them count items quickly, organize, compare, and discuss information. We used skittles on a turkey body to make graphing fun!

The gardening study was about investigating and learning how to plan and care for a garden, how to grow, who helps in the garden, how to harvest a garden.

Planting Day

We took our tools, seeds, and watering cans outside to our raised bed. Everyone had a turn at putting some seeds in the hole, and covering them up with soil. We planted radishes, beans, lettuce, carrots, and spinach. We also planted chives, cilantro, basil, and mint in containers for our classroom.

Special Visitor

Nancy Bigar from the Miller County Master Gardeners visited our class this week. She shared some herbs and plants from her garden and talked to us about what a garden needs and what we can do to help our garden grow. She even gave us some seeds to plant in our class garden at school. THANK YOU, Nancy, for taking the time to come and visit our preschool class.

I also want to thank Mr. Tyler for building our raised garden bed and the parents and grandparents that have contributed to our gardening unit, whether that be seeds, tools, or books. Because of you, our students get to experience such neat things! Thank You!

Field Trip to H & N

What number is missing?

I placed ten pumpkins numbered 1-10 on the board, and then I had all the children cover their eyes while I removed a pumpkin. They then had to guess what number what missing. This game was so fun and they all did so good!

Estimation Jar

The children were able to explore my estimation jar filled with marbles. They each had a chance to examine it, and then estimate how many marbles they thought were in the jar. I explained that estimating means a real good guess without counting each marble. The total number of marbles was 28, and Caleb was the winner with a guess of 26.

Table Time with Manipulatives

Sweet As Pumpkin Pie

We baked Pumpkin Pie from scratch, and it was so much fun! We discussed why bakers wear aprons and hats, the difference between wet and dry ingredients, and why we measure the ingredients before we add them in. Ask your child what ingredient they got to help with it and if it was wet or dry.

D is for DIAMOND!

I had each child color the diamonds different colors and then cut and glue them in their fine motor journals.

P is for PLAYGROUND!

Let’s make the letter B!

Our class pet, Chilly, gets to go home with a child each weekend. Parents and students can write notes about their time with Chilly and add pictures, drawings, or anything they want. This is such a fun way to start our Monday mornings, reading about Chilly’s weekend adventures with everyone.

Alphabet Punch Cards

Using a hole punch is a great way for students to develop their hand strength and their hand-eye coordination. Most children love it, too. If the holes fall out onto the table or floor, picking them up allows children to refine their pincer grasp as well!

Handwriting Without Tears

Part of Pre-Ks curriculum is Handwriting Without Tears and we started working in our Kick Start Kindergarten workbook. We teach in the following developmental order: vertical and horizontal, magic C, big and little curves, and diagonals. We begin with capital letters as a group, seperate from lowercase. Instead of teaching 52 letter symbols with different sizes, positions and confusing starting places, we divide and conquer and start with 26. This week we started with F. The reason we start with F is because of the simplicity with lines and the amount of steps it takes to make the letter.

The students got a chance to examine the differences in dry and wet dog/ cat food.

CLASSIFYING

Exploration of objects, expanding knowledge of the world, and increased language skills contribute to children's ability to classify. When children can classify they can organize their experiences and manage enormous amounts of information that can be retrieved later. The ability to classify is important for learning and remembering. It supports the development of logical thinking. I gave the children several pictures of animals and had them decide if they were animals people always, sometimes, or rarely had as pets. We then played a game where the children had to determine if this is a domesticated or wild animal.

Table Time With Manipulatives

Reading Opportunities

Reading with 4th Graders! Ms. Cole and her 4th-grade class have offered to read to our class during library time. We are so grateful for this opportunity and are excited to see them every Wednesday this year.

Chester Hunt!

This week was all about Chester the Raccoon and The Kissing Hand! We learned it's ok to be scared and nervous, and no matter what, our mom's & dad's love is always with us! The kids have all enjoyed reading your notes, and we even made "Our Class Kissing Hand Book" which includes your notes and hand prints. Now, throughout the year, if they get sad they can go to our library center and find their notes from you. Finally, we had a CHESTER HUNT with both Pre-K classes! And oh my, did the kids love this! We had a special delivery of clues that led us all around campus and when we returned to our class, Chester had left us a special surprise. Please enjoy the video of our hunt today!

We had so much fun this week and all the kids did so good presenting their items they brought from home. All About Me week is to help children learn about each other and each others’ families. We talked about how special each us of are and what makes us unique.

P.E.

We are fortunate at St. James to be able to attend P.E. every day. Thursdays are station days where a different skill will be taught and practiced. This week they worked on galloping and tossing an object into a hula hoop.

Let's Measure!

HOW MANY BLOCKS....

In preschool we introduce units of measurement that children can really wrap their minds around. Usually those are with regular household objects and toys. In these activities children delve in deeper to understand measurement of length and height with blocks and cubes!

How many blocks will my shoe be?

This was a great activity that involved estimating and measuring. I traced everyone's foot on a piece of paper then asked each child how many blocks they thought it would take to go from the bottom of their shoe to the top and wrote down their answers on the whiteboard.