Dinosaurs Dinosaurs Dinosaurs

This week has been Awesome.  We have had such a blast learning about dinosaurs, fossils and Paleontologists.   Here are a few pictures of us playing with  dinosaurs in the sandbox.
 We read this book then took buckets of dinosaurs outside to play.

More dinosaur fun to come.  Have a great weekend. Make sure to grab some candy and plastic eggs to donate to the hunt if you go to the store.

Graduation

Graduation is coming!  This year has been such a fun one.  All our kiddos have had such big personalities and had so much to share.  They got really excited about everything we were learning.  I can't believe another year has passed.
We will wrap up our Preschool Year on May 15th.  That morning at 10 we will hold a graduation ceremony at our school.  All parents and family members are invited to attend.  We have a short program followed by refreshments.  We try to keep it to 30min or less so parents can get back to work.  All kids are participating and graduating whether they have been in our class for a year or a day.  We don't want anyone to feel left out! Please do whatever you need to do to have someone there to see your child that day.  Children need to be here by 9:30 so we have time to get the class lined up and ready.  We want to start at 10 on the dot!
Hope to see you all there!

Reading Aloud to Children

As you come into our classroom you may notice our Home Reading chart.  It looks like this...

Most of you are familiar with it and use it daily.  Your child and you put on stickers every day for however many stories you read together the night before. This is a fun welcome to school routine but that is not the only purpose.  You may not have noticed the sign hanging above the chart.  It reads: "Reading aloud to children has been called the single most important activity for building the knowledge required for success in reading."
Reading aloud to our kiddos is very important.  Here at AAK 4's we even changed our daily schedule a few years ago to include a 20 minute story time.  Plus we read chapter books to them at nap time.   We think it is very important for you to do this with your child.  When your child gets to Kindergarten reading at least 20 minutes a day will be a required part of their daily homework.  Reading with your child will help them be more successful in elementary school. 

I read a great article on reading with children by Amanda Morgan.  It is called "Teach Your Baby to Read in his Sleep*  (*sort of) "   Check out how you can build your child's Reading skills at bedtime.

If you don't know who Amanda Morgan  is you should check out her blog.  It is an excellent resource for parents and teachers.  I took class from her a year or so ago and loved what she had to say.  She talks about how in this Pinterest driven world where there are so many "cute" ideas to do with our kids, we need to make sure we know the purpose behind those activities and the reason they are good for our kids.  She also post lots of parenting helps, advice ect.   Her blog is notjustcute.com

Hope you enjoy reading with  your child and helping them be more successful in school!

Dinosaurs and Letters Y&Z

Letters Y and Z this week. This will be the last week we have letters of the week posted.  The remainder of the weeks of our preschool session will be spent reviewing our Kindergarten Readiness skills and having a lot of fun with some of our favorite units all year.

This week also kicks off our 2 week unit on Dinosaurs.  We will learn about fossils, paleontologists and all kinds of dinosaurs. 

Also coming up is our School Easter Egg hunt on April 19th at 10 am. Make sure to come early.  They will start the hunt at 10 sharp.  We have had kids show up late in the past only to find that all the eggs and prizes have already been found :(   We ask parents to donate plastic eggs and candy to fill them for this event.  Remember the more donations we have the more fun it will be for the kiddos.

FYI  Our Daily Preschool Schedule

9:30 Circle time- a group time where we gather everyone to read, sing, tell stories and learn.
10:00 Outside time- when it gets colder we will have an indoor activity time
10:30-11:30 Center time- Teachers set out centers and children have an hour to explore and learn. Teachers get down and facilitate learning but do not lead here. This is a time that they really get to make choices and grow.
11:30 Music or singing time
12:00 Lunch
12:40 Story Time
1:00 Naptime

Fun with Weather

 

We have had such a fun week learning about Weather!  Here are a few pics of our fun centers.

We did cloud jars.  The point of this is when the cloud fill up with enough colored water it "rains" into the  clear water below.  The kids had so much fun doing this.  Check out how it is done here

This would be a super fun activity to do at home. I think food colored water would work just as good as our liquid water colors!

 We also used water and cotton balls to absorb water into our clouds and squeeze out the rain. Here

 

We sorted and grouped our weather cards.

We used a fan to experiment with wind.  Pinwheels and balloons were used.

We danced to our Rainy Day Favorites music.

We read the book "It Looked Like Spilt Milk" and imagined clouds were pictures.

If you ever wondered what we do all day I hope this helps!

One more thing.  We need donations for the Easter Egg Hunt by next week!  So far we have only had one parent donate.  What we need are plastic easter eggs and candy to fill them.  Whatever you can donate would be VERY appreciated

Have a fantastic weekend!

PS Make sure to let me know if you are uncomfortable with your child's pictures being on the blog.  I personally love parents getting a visual of what we do all day so I hope you all will too.

Kindergarten Readiness Skills

Is my child ready for kindergarten?  Is a frequently asked question this time of year.  As we wrap up our preschool year next month and move on to our fun summer curriculum it is important for us as teacher and especially you as parents to keep working on those basic skills.  I found a great list of Kindergarten skills over at Ready Set School.  I like this list because it not only list the academic skills that most parents worry about but also the very important  self-help and social emotional skills.  We forget that a child needs to emotionally prepare for the change kindergarten brings.  Daycare kids often have an easier transition than stay at home kids because they are used to: being away from parents, a daily schedule and interacting with other children. But it is still a big change of environment and rules. 
Here is the list from Ready, Set, School. Read it and assess where your child fits.  If you think there are areas where your child has a deficit work on those skills at home and let us know. We will try to include those in our lesson plans.

Self-Help Skills

• Eats independently.
• Uses restroom independently.
• Washes hands after using the restroom.
• Removes outerwear independently.
• Asks questions and seeks out adult help when necessary.
• Knows how to care for and use books.
• Cleans up after self.

Social/Emotional Skills

• Tries new things.
• Takes turns.
• Shares materials.
• Listens while others talk.
• Shows concern for others.
• Plays cooperatively with other children.
• Works well independently or in small groups.
• Separates from parent without undue anxiety.
• Knows parent or guardian's first and last name.
• Knows own first and last name and can tell an adult.

Large Motor Skills

• Hops, jumps, and runs.
• Bounces, catches, kicks, and throws balls.
• Walks in a straight line forward and backward.
• Balances on dominant foot for five seconds.
• Participates in simple games.

Small Motor Skills

• Holds writing instruments correctly.
• Holds scissors correctly.
• Uses scissors to cut straight or curved lines.
• Turns a single page in a book.
• Puts together simple puzzles.

Math Skills

• Counts to ten.
• Creates groups of up to five objects.
• Places like items together (e.g., red cars and blue cars).
• Plays with, identifies, and names the shapes (e.g., circle, triangle, and rectangle).
• Uses comparative words (e.g., heavier, shorter, less, taller, bigger).

Language and Literacy

• Listens attentively and responds to stories and books.
• Speaks in complete sentences.
• Speaks clearly enough to be understood by unfamiliar adults.
• Has a vocabulary that includes words to name colors, parts of the body, and positional words (e.g., in/out, to/from, around, upside down).
• Expresses feelings and ideas.
• Knows poems and songs.
• Identifies signs, symbols, or logos in the environment.
• Identifies 10 or more letters of the alphabet, especially those in own name.
• Writes using drawings and made-up or real letters. 

  Parent involvement in their child's education makes all the difference!  Teachers can only do so much...
Have a great day and let us know if you have any needs.

Letters W&X

This week has already been super crazy.  Thank you to all the parents who came out to support us at the Courthouse.  Your kids were so awesome. I heard that we made people cry... SWEET that was the goal ;)

Welcome to the 4's class blog that has not been  updated FOREVER.  I took on this project a couple of years ago and it went really well.  Then I started worrying about putting pictures of kids on the internet and all that stuff and got a little overwhelmed. That being said I would like to try again.  This blog really is a valuable resource for those who use it. 

This week we are studying the letters W and X.  Our theme is Weather.  We have spent time talking about the Water Cycle, wind, rain, snow, and sunshine.  This has been a perfect week to study weather because we've had so much variation  in weather conditions! 

I will see how this experiment goes and hopefully you will be hearing from me again soon.