Our kids are out of this world!

This week our kids showed us how out of the world they are as we hopped into our rocket ships with a NASA video and we counted down and flew to the moon in a rocket ship!  We pretended to buckle up, ride the bumps, and soar through the galaxy!

 We drew constellations while lying on our backs as the teachers taped the paper to the underside of the table in order for them to draw.  

 We had a meteor shower with tin foil balls made to represent meteors and then threw them across the room to see who could get their meteor the furthest.

After our meteor shower we collected all of our meteors and then read the Eric Carle book, Draw Me a Star, where we drew a variety of items from the book on our white board.

We made alien faces with tissue paper and eyes this week after our trips to space.  After making aliens we practiced spelling our names putting the letters in the correct order to spell their names.  The children created rocket ships by attaching the letters for their names with triangles at the ends.  

After building our rockets we talked about the planets and their temperatures as they are affected by their distance from the sun.  The teachers made planets out of balloons and placed them in bins of hot water, warm water and cold water and then asked the children which planets might be in the hot bin, (the ones closer to the sun).  

We went on a planet hunt around the room and collected the planets to put them in order from the sun.  Then, we checked our hypothesis to see if we were right that planets closer to the sun are hotter by checking to see the names on the planets on the buckets.

Once we finished science we looked at the images of planets from space and noticed the swirls and patterns.  We then took shaving cream and paint and made swirl patterns planets. 

After painting stars and constellations on paper we heard a few stories about astronauts and trips to space.

We learned about moon dust and looked at pictures of the moon and learned the word crater too.  By mixing flour and vegetable oil with a little bit of gray paint (for fun) we mixed and mixed and got to create our own moon sand to play in for the rest of the week and then next week too.

By Friday we were fully aware of vocabulary words like, constellation, galaxy, moon, crater, full moon and crescent moon.  We used star stickers to make constellations and thread string through holes to make them as well.

We used all of the fabulous recycled materials that were brought in to work in teams to work at NASA and build rocket ships n groups!  We even had a group decide to make a rover!

What's Coming Up?

This coming week will be our last full week of Pirate Pete Preschool for the year.  We will be talking about special family members, like Mother's Day, Father's Day and Grandparent's Day.  

Our last full and normal day of preschool will be Monday, April 14th and graduation is Wednesday, May 16th.  

This last full week of preschool (May 7-11) is teacher appreciation week.  If you have any kind words to share with the high schoolers who have been your child's teacher this year, please email or text them to me so I can pass them on.  As a teacher, the kind words make all the difference!