5 little Pilgrims and Indians

Today we talked about Pilgrims, Indians, and the first Thanksgiving. We looked at pictures of Pilgrims long ago, We saw the houses they lived in, the games they played, and the clothes they wore. We talked about things they did and didn't have and how it was very different then today, however, Thanksgiving is still the same.

Thanksgiving means Turkey. We colored and glued a turkey head and tail to a pine cone to make a fun turkey craft to take home. For snack we had corn bread and apple juice, a favorite pilgrim treat. Our game was also a pilgrims favorite, "Hot Potato".

We counted the points on a star, then glued 5 stars to our #5 today. We sang the songs, "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" and "Five Little Monkeys". The older class learned or practiced tracing around and inside a stencil star, and also around their hand and their 5 fingers.

Harvest Time and the #4

We Harvest by gathering all the fruits and vegetables after our gardens have finished growing. Sometimes we save these foods to eat later by freezing, canning or bottling them. This was fun to learn and then eat some of Miss Janalynn's bottled peaches for snack time. We made a corn stalk craft by practicing our cutting skills on a brown lunch sack and gluing pictures of fruits and vegetables around it. It made a fun fall decor or table center piece.

We read the book, "The Lonely Scarecrow" by, Tim Preston and colored our own scarecrow. We played the game, "Who Stole the Button Off the Scarecrow's Shirt" (Who Stole the Cookies). Then glued a button onto our scarecrow's shirt. Talking about buttons, Miss Janalynn introduced the number "4". We examined our buttons and counted 4 holes in each button. We then decorated our #4 by gluing 4 paper buttons with 4 holes onto our #4.

The older class learned to sew a button by criss-crossing yarn up and down threw a large plastic round lid with 4 holes in it. It was something fun and very different for the kids to learn.

Getting Ready For Winter and #3

The number today was #3

We took our snack of Teddy Grahams, and made sets of 3 with them before we ate them.

Along with the "Bear" snacks, and the theme of "Getting Ready For Winter", we read the stories, "Time to Sleep" by, Denise Fleming, and the Book "Bear Snores On" by, Karma Wilson. Afterwards, we used a lot of our small and large motor skills, to smash peanut shells to glue onto a paper acorn, for a fun and "Nutty" craft. We role played the story "Bear Snores On", and each of us played a different animal in the story.

For a fun and Crazy game, I had the children go into the other room, while I quickly hid some fake nuts around the preschool room. When the children came back into the room they were pretending to be squirrels. Before they could start, I would say this fun poem. After the poem they would race to find all the nuts.

Squirrels, squirrels, bushy and gray,

Please find the nuts right away.

Winter is coming and it will snow,

Find the nuts. Go! Go! Go!

After all the nuts were found we would separate and categorise all the nuts into shapes, sizes and colors. It was a lot of fun.

I recited the poem, "The Three Little Kittens". Then we glued pictures of those 3 little kittens onto our #3. We talked about sometimes we might make others sad, and then we need to make thins right by saying sorry or fixing what we did wrong.

The older class practiced printing 1,2,3, then glued 1,2,3, on to 3 strips of paper, and then helped Miss Janalynn staple the strips together to form a 3 corner hat. We sang the song, "My Hat, it Has 3 Corners", while making our 3 corner hats

What made me laugh today was Lucas commenting on the children not here today, "It's not the Fall season, it's the sick season!"

Autumn/Fall and #2

We talked about Scarecrows and why farmers use them. I also explained that some people including myself like to decorate yards in the fall with Scarecrows. We then learned a fun poem about 2 black birds:

2 little Black Birds sitting on a gate

One name John and one named Kate

Fly away John, fly away Kate.

Come back John, come back Kate.

We used our fingers to pull off the backs of Black Bird stickers and stuck them to our #2.

We then sang the song "Shoo Crow, Don't Bother Me!" While on the #2, our snacks was Graham Crackers. We took 1 Graham, and broke it into 2 grahams. We had a lot of fun dunking our crackers into milk afterwards.

Our Story today, "In November" by Cynthia Rylant was about different signs of autumn and fall season. We made a leaf wreath for our craft and even glued some candy corn onto our wreaths. I hope they make a fun decoration in your homes.

Instead of "Going on a Bear Hunt" game, we went on a "Leaf Hunt" game. It was a lot of fun up a hill, around a water fall, through the forest, and over a lake, in search of colorful leaves, until we pretended to hear and see a skunk. Then we had to quickly reverse our path back home.

For singing time, we started learning the list of fun November songs that were sent home with the November calendars.

Manners and #1

One little egg sitting on a wall.

One little egg tips and fall.

One little egg rolls down the street.

One little egg begins to peep.

the older children where confused why were making Easter Eggs, until we used our eggs to recite the fun poem,"One Little Egg". We kept saying, not two eggs, not five eggs, just ONE egg! It was fun. We also played a game of rolling a dice, if the one dot was rolled, then everyone wrote 1 onto their paper.

We decorated a #1 with ONE ribbon. We did this last year, and my preschoolers who came last year remembered it! I know it's a repeater, but it's fun for them to bring home their own numbers to hang up on the wall.

Manners is one of my most favorite lessons. This will be practiced the rest of the year. We learn a fun song to help us to have manners and be polite. I had to laugh at Steven and Mylee, because I had their older brothers in my preschool 2 years ago, and they both knew the song. I love it when things like this happen, it makes me love the children just that much more! I shouldn't be too surprised, because my own kids still sing it today, along with, "Halloween" song with the Boo, ending. Hope these songs will continue to be a family favorite :)

We made another traditional and repeat of the shape and color place mat. I like to doing these to help the children learn how to set the table and remember their manners at the table. My preschoolers are already polite and very well mannered, however we all need reminding from time to time.

Transportation

Transportation: Going Places

I tried a color by number train today for the older children. At first it was kind of confusing for them, especially since we haven't talked about numbers yet, however they seemed to catch on quickly. We have also been practicing "looking" for letters in our name. And also we started coloring grids to make patterns.

My favorite book to read is a fun rhyming book that the kids pick up on fast is, "Bunnies On the Go" by Rick Walton. It cover about every type of transportation there is to use from getting from place to another. We made a map of water, roads, sidewalks, and air and took turns choosing magnetics of different types of transportation to place on our magnetic map. Then, we made our own maps and used stickers of the different types of transportation to stick to it.

Color Review

We had Rainbow Fish crackers for snack today. We separated, grouped, and made patterns with them before eating them. Then we made eggshell leis with the different colors that we learned, by sewing a shoe string threw the shell. Some of the children were able to sew every other way to form a pattern. I was well please they figured that out by looking at my pre-made one.

For a game, we choose different animals and repeated the known poem Brown Bear, Brown Bear, what do you see, and by answering with a different colored animal with each turn. The kids love picking different animals each time. It was a lot of fun.