What season is it now?

The weather is quite wild these days and confusing to all of us.  So, we decided to make sure we talk about the season we have just ended, the one we are beginning and the one we look most forward to: winter, spring and summer.

We sorted and matched the snowflakes and mittens we tend to put away in the spring as we leave winter behind for some math on Monday.  The conversation about how we still have had to wear mittens and we have seen snowflakes recently even though our seasons have changed were quite entertaining. 

We made snow indoors with baking soda and shaving cream to build snowmen as we love to do in our small motor skills table throughout the year.  If you have a box of baking soda and a can of shaving cream, mix them in a bowl and have some winter fun at home any time of year!

Each day this week we learned about a different season.  Therefore, Monday we talked about winter, Wednesday was all about spring and Friday we hoped for summer to come soon!  During our winter talk on Monday we read some stories about animals like reindeer who like to play in the snow and all the clothes we humans have to wear to play in the snow in winter months.

We made quite a few projects this week about all of these seasons to really talk about the symbols that are usually used to represent them.  We filled penguin bellies with cotton balls and added little eyes and beaks as we talked about the parts of penguins that keep them warm in the cold atmosphere.  

Then we stretched ourselves out with some snow ball bowling using a giant snowball made of cotton and some snowmen made out of styrofoam cups.

We built snowflakes by gluing popsicle sticks together, decorated mittens with the correct number of items on them and then matched piles of snow to numbers given on sheets of paper.  Lots of math was integrated this week with art and large motor activities.

Once we moved into the spring season we started noticing the sensory table has been changed for a while into a seasonal table filled with items seen in various seasons.  We have pine cones to break apart and destroy as well as gourds, plant seeds, flowers, leaves, bugs and more.  Magnify glasses are a huge hit at this table right now as many children chose to investigate during their free time.  

We made bird nests in the morning and afternoon and also kites to hang in the room.  Many feathers were flying about as we constructed these various items and talked about seeing baby birds and kites in the spring season.

The discussion about caterpillars came up during our spring talks as well so we built some out of sticks and pompons.  We have actual butterfly wings in our sensory bins for the children to view with their magnify glasses and this is where many children went after this activity.  We also played "Wiggle Worm" as a fun way to identify shapes.  The children pulled a slip of paper out of a box and had to identify the shape; however if the image on the paper was that of a worm everyone had to jump up and wiggle until someone shouted, " a bird is coming!"

Butterflies and caterpillars are often found near plants and flowers and therefore we used colorful stones on some floral sheets that held just a circle with a number in the middle.  The children needed to read the number in the circle and then place that amount of colorful stones around the circle to make it look like flower petals.  There were lots of good conversations about numbers and children checking each other's work at creating their flowers at the tables.

We talked about other spring like things this week as well and after singing the song about rain washing a spider out, we used straws to show the "spout" and drew rain washing a spider away to reiterate what the song is all about.

After that, we colored the petals on some paper flowers then folded them to place them in water bins and watch them "bloom".  When the petals are all folded in and the paper touches the water, the petals open to signify the blooming process.  We had a lot of fun watching the paper flowers come to life!

We had planned to draw on the sidewalk outside this week as well but with the crazy winter weather we brought the "sidewalk" inside and the children used their imaginations to draw on the "classroom sidewalk" for some constructive playtime.

Our little fingers got some more work when they practiced making bracelets with beads.  This is a simple activity that is fairly cheap to buy and keep at home on rainy spring or summer days.  It promotes fine motor skills which improve cutting and writing. 

Girls and boys enjoy this activity alike as they can make bracelets or necklaces or keychains for their backpacks.  Including patterns in the crafting process also increases math skills and if you find the beads are not easy to use, either add some tape to the end of the string or cut up some colored straws and thread those or cereal instead.

As we moved from spring to summer we worked with bubbles and took turns blowing bubbles into colored soapy water to blow bubbles of various colors.  Then, once the bubbles were nice and high in their buckets, the children and teachers dipped paper on top of the bubbles to create bubble art.  This is fun to do at home using either water colored paint or food coloring in with your bubbles.  You can use bowls or cups to blow the bubbles (make sure you practice blowing into the straws like we did before you have them place the straws in the bubbles to keep them from drinking the mix.)

Our large motor time on the day we learned about summer was spent "shooting hoops".  We often pull out the basketball net for someone during free play time too so they can burn off some energy.  This is great in the summer to play outside but we utilize our space in the room to give the kids a chance to let loose a little indoors as well.

Watermelon is a famous summer fruit so we added some "seeds" to the watermelon according to the number written on the watermelon rind.

We also talked about spring and summer rains this week and made it rain in the classroom again in the morning and afternoon with our shaving cream and water experiment.  The only difference this time was that we made rainbows appear in the water using colored watercolor paint.  The children mixed and moved the paint around creating rainbows to enjoy by all.

The afternoon rocket science experiment was a lot of fun.  Again, with the snow and rain this week we weren't able to bring it outside to really set it off with chalk inside but the kids had a blast getting little scares the small film canisters caused as they exploded in the room shooting off to the ceiling with just a little bit of seltzer tablets and water.

Check out this video from the Ellen show where science teacher Steve Spangler kicks this trick up a notch.

We took a break at the end of the day on Friday in the afternoon to practice writing our names.  We are still working on this with the preschoolers and have been finding in the morning and afternoon sessions some of the children are trying to say they don't know how to write their names yet we have witnessed they can in the past.  Therefore, we will be continuing to work on producing materials that support the spelling and writing of names.

Lastly, we working on cutting this week as well.  We cut on lines that were straight, zig zagged and wavy to help the children get the hang of holding the paper with one hand and cutting with the other.   

At home, feel free to work on allowing your child to cut straws and play dough to get them used to the concept of holding something in one and and cutting with the other.   

What's Coming Up?

We are approaching Space Week and can't wait to pretend to go to planets, see aliens and ride in rockets!  Look for fun apps and silly stories to come home this coming week as we dive into this fun topic.

If you have cotton balls or toilet paper rolls or water bottles or baby food jars at home we are always in the need for these strange materials.   Please feel free to send them to school with your child at any time.  If you happen to still use a camera with film and have empty film canisters we would love those too-they are getting to be hard to find.

We only have 7 weeks left of preschool and it will be going by fast!  If you haven't saved the date for graduation it will be on Friday, May 27th at an earlier start time than normal.  Details will go out in early May but we wanted to make sure you have the date reserved.