Back into the healthy swing of things

This two day week has been a great time to cover fitness and nutrition after Halloween. We have been talking about making healthy choices and what kinds of foods are "sometimes foods" vs fruits and veggies a person can eat all the time.  

Monday, we had a mouth that ate unhealthy foods all the time and a mouth that ate healthy foods most of the time. The preschoolers were allowed to choose various food objects and had to decide what mouth would be more likely to eat that object.  For example, an orange would go into the healthy mouth and a cookie might go into the unhealthy mouth.

They loved talking about the foods and when they eat them and if they have tried certain food items as well.  

We got our exercise by playing a game where we chose a food item and sorted it by healthy or unhealthy.

At the end of the obstacle course they placed the food item in the correct bin as we checked for understanding. After each child went through the obstacle course, we counted the items and found out which bucket had more or less items in it.  

This week we practiced writing the word nutrition and heard the story The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle as the caterpillar ate healthy and unhealthy foods.

 

We made a watermelon project where the children took half a paper plate and colored the edge green then they had to add 10 black dots for the seeds so to the red paper and glue it on. They took great pleasure in asking teachers to check to make sure they had 10 seeds. 

 Another art project done this week was when we painted with celery. We cut apart some celery stalks and rubber banded them together then allowed them to dip them in red paint to make flowers out of the veggies.  They loved using something other than a paint brush to make artwork!  In early childhood education there are activities that deal with processes and other that deal with the end product.  This week, our products were the watermelons and the processes were the celery flowers.  More will be covered about these concepts in later blogs.

We ended the week by graphing the favorite type of apples in the class. Red apples won!
 This is a great math skill the children really enjoy doing.  Graphing is simple and can be done at home as well, cereal is the best tool because you can sort it and eat it.

What's Coming Up?

Remember there is no school on Monday due to Veteran's Day.

Next week we will be covering the favorite unit for the preschoolers: DISNEY!  Characters from movies, shows, books and more will be featured during our curricular activities.

Spring preschool registration will be coming at the end of November.  Keep looking for more information in future blogs.

Having a Haunting Good Time!

The week of Halloween was quite a busy one for us at
Pirate Pete Preschool. 

On Monday, the students enjoyed gearing up for Halloween as we made bats by tracing our hands and cutting them out to hang up in the room for our party. We made mummy's to take home right away to help enjoy decorating our houses for the big Trick or Treat day too. These were created from toilet paper rolls and streamers as the children were able to choose what colors they wanted to use on their mummy while they wrapped the toilet paper rolls.  Both of these activities were not just cute art projects, but great for fine motor development.

 However, we don't just focus on fine motor development each day, large motor development is equally important and one of the favorites of the children each day in school.  Walking beams and hula hoops are a lot of fun for the children to play with and use and they also help increase their balance. Large motor games aren't just great for indoor physical activity as it gets colder outside but we use it for math activities to get the kids moving around physically as well.  

This week, the children were shown a card with a number ranging from 1- 20 and they needed to tell us the number then jump the right amount of pumpkins on the floor that coordinated with the number they read.  This was wonderful for our older children who where given higher numbers and a great way to help our younger children with reading numbers.   

Recognizing numbers is just as important to kindergarten readiness as recognizing letters.  Please practice these skills at home by playing games like this pumpkin game or reading numbers as you see them on TV, in books, along the road, etc.  Even the microwave countdown can be a quick review of number recognition!  

Our Halloween Party was a great success this year!  We enjoyed trick or treating around the school and then snacks in our room.  Everyone looked wonderful! Thanks for turning out to support your children and the terrific things they do in school.  It means so much to them to share their teachers, classroom and artwork with friends and family.   

 

  

 Halloween week ended with a real treat!  Besides our fabulous party on Wednesday, we were able to take a field trip to the Orchestra Room on Friday!  


The day started with making Jack O' Lantern faces out of pumpkins using pictures of eyes, noses, mouths, etc.  Here you see them getting the directions for this project and later you see the story of trick or treating we read together in small groups. We played in our sensory box with corn, pine cones, sticks, grass and various preserved bugs and leaves with magnifying glasses then made 'goo' to take home too.

 After our projects, games and story, we were treated to a trip down the hall where violins, violas, cellos and more were waiting! 

Ms. Pham and her crew played us a musical tale and then allowed us to touch and try to play all the instruments in the orchestra.  What a wonderful time we had investigating these great instruments.

  

Check out the Palatine High School's Orchestra Calendar for upcoming events and have a great family night out.

What's Coming Up?

After Halloween, we will be discussing nutrition to get back into the swing of healthy eating!  After that, we will be enjoying Disney, Dinosaurs and then Thanksgiving!  What a busy November we have in store for us all this year.

No preschool this Friday or next Monday!

'Tis the Season for Fun

One might think there isn't a lot we can cover in a two day week of preschool, however that person would be wrong!  We address the changing weather and seasons daily in preschool as we go over the Today Board each morning and then discuss what Pirate Pete should wear.  The preschoolers choose to add coats, hats, boots and so on that are suitable to the weather outside each day.  

This week we chose to discuss each season and the weather that connects to those seasons.  The preschoolers worked on math with mittens by arranging them by color or pattern, then by size and for our older preschoolers, by eliminating which number is larger or smaller.  This is a game you re-create with your children at home any time!

After we matched our mittens, the preschoolers lined up around the circle of chairs that each held an image relating to weather.  Maybe there was a sun, a rain drop, a cloud blowing wind, etc and as the music stopped, the children sat on a chair and told the teachers which season their weather item belonged to before moving on as the music played once more.

One of our art projects dealt with fall as we colored giant coffee filters with various markers and rinsed them in the sink to hang up to dry.  The colors bleed together in a tie-dye affect looking like the changing colored leaves we see this time of year.  We will have these on display at our Halloween Party Wednesday, October 30th.

The focus on fall continued with reading
Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf by Lois Ehlert then examining leaves from outside and using crayons to create imprints of the leaves to take home.  This activity was the class favorite and is something anyone can do at home with some leaves, crayons and paper.  I challenge you to head outside this week and grab some leaves from the neighborhood to do this at home.  What a great fall activity to do as a family.

What's Coming Up?

Our Halloween Party is Wednesday, October 30th from 9:30 to 10:45 AM.  We will be trick - or - treating around Palatine High School as soon as everyone arrives and then will head back to the room for treats.  Please remember we only need 1 dozen of something since we have 21 preschoolers bringing items, we will have more than enough food.  

Friday and Saturday is the Palatine High School Dance Show, GLOW.  I bring my children every year and it is always a great family night out.

Check out Trick - Or - Treat hours on the Village of Palatine Page and other FREE Halloween events in District 211.