Ending of our pet study

What a great way to end our pet study by taking a field trip to DogPatch pet store!  I love being able to bring a study to life for the children.   They were able to pet a snake, puppies, iguana, rabbit, and a guinea pig.  A very special thank you to Mr. Braswell and his staff for letting us come into his store, and having lots of patience! In studying pets, we have learned concepts and skills in the areas of literacy, mathematics, science, social studies, the arts, and technology.  We developed thinking skills as we observed, investigated, asked questions, solved problems, made predictions, and tested our ideas.

We focused on the letter T and number five this week.  We learned about Tom Tuttle using his timer and the sound it makes.  We added the words Tobi Lee, turtle, timer, and Townes to our word wall.  We made toothpick art, twizzler pets, and learned about the State of Texas.  We added telephones to our pet center, and built tall towers in the block center. 

Piper’s dog Meggie, came for a morning visit, and Colin’s dog, Lovey, came for an afternoon visit dressed in a school uniform!

In small group we worked with number cards.  The children were given cards with a numeral and its number word printed on one side.  They were instructed to use manipulatives to count out each quantity.  With this activity they are using number concepts and operations.  This is important because children’s understanding of counting, number symbols, and number operations are fundamental to their success with more complex mathematics.  To count well, children must learn one-to-one correspondence, i.e., that one number name is matched to a single object in a set being counted.