March 25 - 28

Time is flying! I can't believe this is the last week of March!

Reminder: April 11th is Arts Night

This week, we continued our spring theme and began to talk more in depth about seeds and plants. We graphed how we thought watermelon grow. We then looked at some pictures of watermelons growing (on a vine of course) and watched a science discovery video about how watermelons grow.

We even learned the song “Down by the Bay”

                Down by the bay

                Where the watermelon grow

                Back to my home, I dare not go

                For if I do, my mother will say

                Have you ever seen _____________________

                Down by the bay!

You can fill in the blank with some cute rhymes like: A fly wearing a tie, A llama wearing pajamas, A bear combing his hair, or a whale with a polka dot tail!

We also had a blast sorting seeds! We had some cucumber seeds, yellow bean seeds, green bean seeds, and squash seeds to sort. Each student sorted their seeds (most by color) then glued them onto a sorting paper.

Planting was the real treat this week. We planted some pea plants and some flowers. We talked about what plants need to grow (sunlight, water, warmth, and soil).

The A.M students wrapped up our latest bird discussion with a painting activity. We learned how birds are ma ny different colors but that most of the birds in our area are white, black, brown and variations of those colors. We then set off to paint a wooden bird these colors.

No birds in our window bird house yet. Keep your fingers crossed for us!

The P.M students painted flower pots on Thursday as our art project. They love to paint things that have another purpose. We will plant in them soon and watch our plants grow.

I want to thank the many parents and grandparents who donated to our seed and plant unit. It feels so nice to have so many supportive adults willing to enhance our preschool program! All of the soil, seeds, pots, and wooden birds were wonderful products of generous families. Thanks again!

Onward to next week, a continuum of our spring unit. Hopefully we'll get some SPRING weather too!

Mrs. Reid

Arts Night - April 11th

Arts Night – April 11^th

Arts Night will take place on Thursday, April 11^th. Arts Night is a school wide event that happens in the evening at 6pm. It will showcase Grade K – 6 artwork and will include a school wide musical performance. This year, The Afternoon Preschool class will be singing on stage with the Kindergarten class. Because this is an after school event, your preschool aged son or daughter has the option of participating. Students participating are often encouraged to arrive at 5:30pm.

Both Mrs. Reid and Miss Kate will be present before the show to help your son or daughter into place and help to guide them onto the stage while you enjoy the show as part of the audience. After the musical performance, students will return to their classrooms where you will need to pick them up and sign them out. This is important so that we know each child has left our classroom with the appropriate adult. I appreciate your help in refraining from taking your child directly from the gymnasium.

The A.M students will not be participating in the musical performance.

Last but not least, Mr. Hines (our music teacher and leader of this wonderful night) has requested that children participating in the performance try their best to wear bright, spring time colors.

Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

The afternoon class has been practicing their Spanish song during music class and I hope you are able to come enjoy their work!

Thank you,

Mrs. Reid  

March 18th - 22nd Short Week!

Hi everyone! This week felt like a fast one! We began our Spring unit this week (casually

  and yes, even though we had a huge snow storm!)

We started our week off with a fun little science experiment. The Preschool Scientist are wondering... WHAT makes a peep dissolve? We graphed our predictions onto some chart paper and this is what we think...

Water: Sage, Eloise
Juice: Jack, Sean K.
Vinegar: Charlotte, Faline
Soda: Sean H., Michael, Omar
Laundry Detergent: Tessa, Aurora, McClellan, Benjamin, Caleb, Sam

I thought that overnight we would have our answer, but I guess peeps are more indestructible than I thought! We have left them all week, and there's only a slight sign of ONE peep beginning to dissolve  The scientist will check back in on Monday when (hopefully) we'll have our answer! Not exactly "spring" oriented, but it's preschool after all and we need to have some fun!

We continued to work on our letter identification, number identification, and handwriting this week. The P.M class is really gearing up for Kindergarten. They have been taking responsibility for their own number packets by getting them from their baskets at the beginning of group time and putting them away in their baskets after we're done. Impressive!

I brought in a birds nest I found in my garage along with a three sided bird house (brought to you by the fine craftsmanship of Mr. Reid!). We began talking about birds. My hope is to mount this three sided bird house onto the window so we can get an up-close view of the bird(s) inside! We have started discussing what we already know about birds and what we would like to find out by watching.

We made some tulips as part of our art project on Thursday. We will hang our beautiful tulips along with some rain drops out in the hallway on our seasons bulletin board.

Looking forward to some spring time weather.

Mrs. Reid

March 11th - 15th - Eric Carle

We continued to talk about Eric Carle's books this week. We moved on from out favorite "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" and read his other books, "The Mixed Up Chameleon", "Mister Sea Horse", and "10 Rubber Duckies". We graphed our favorite book at the end of our Eric Carle author study and "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" took the cake!

After hearing "The Mixed Up Chameleon" we watched a video in the library about camouflage. Kids saw many different animals that use camouflage to blend in to their environment. Once back in our classroom, children took their own Mixed Up Chameleon (an overhead, clear peice of paper with a chameleon print) around the room to change it's color and make it blend in. They took their scientist job very seriously as the graphed how many times their chameleon turned red, blue, green, orange, or yellow. We talked about which color they turned the most and which color they turned the least.

We continued to discover what camouflage meant when we did yet another science experiment. We tried to make a colored bingo chip blend into water by adding colored water to our chip with an eye dropper. I think teachers down the hall could here "My chip is camouflage!!!!". Great fun!

After reading "10 Rubber Duckies" the scientist tried their hands at some duck counting. Using stamps, preschoolers learned number recognition by counting their ducks and stamping them with the corresponding number stamp.

We also worked on letter recognition, formation of letters, number recognition, and number formation this week with our Handwriting Without Tears program. A.M students worked on letters, while the P.M students (who already know almost all of their letters) worked on numbers.

On Thursday, we read "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?". Although it is not an Eric Carle book, he did illustrate it! After hearing the book read aloud, I asked the students to place blobs of paint onto a white piece of paper. We folded the paper in half to turn our small blobs of paint into one giant blob, the I asked students the million dollar question - "Preschoolers, Preschoolers, What Do You See?" Teachers then recorded their answers onto their art work. We hung them on the wall for visitors to see.

I sent out an email as our upcomming unit of study will be seeds and plants. Here are some things I am looking for if you happen to have them at home and are willing to donate:

- Toilet paper rolls
- Paper towell rolls
- small terracotta plants
-potting soil

Looking forward to a fun week in preschool talking about spring (although the impending snow storm makes me second guess this - BUT Wednesday is the first day of spring, so onward!)

Mrs. Reid

Notice - Optional Parent Teacher Conferences

Hi Preschool Families,

This post is a follow-up to a notice that went home in Communication Folders this week. Sunderland Elementary School is holding optional parent/ teacher conferences on Thursday, April 4th from 12:00 noon to 3:15pm and Friday, April 5th from 12:00 noon to 3:15pm.You do not need to fee obligated to sign up for a conference, especially if you do not have concerns about your preschoolers progress. On the other hand, I'm happy to meet with any parent during these conference times if wanted. You may email me to set up a conference or request one in person during drop off or pick up.

Thank you,
Aleshia Reid

March 4 - 8; Eric Carle's Hungry Caterpillar

It felt so nice to have one strong focus point this week. We studied Eric Carle's book "The Very Hungry Caterpillar". There were new things we learned each time we read the book. We worked on sequencing the items the hungry caterpillar ate and discussed the life stages of a caterpillar. First the egg, then the caterpillar, then he gets fat, makes a cocoon, and then at the end, turns into a beautiful butterfly.

Some Eric Carle inspired activities we did this week were:

Each child filled in with "writing" what their hungry caterpillar might eat. Then drew a picture to accompany. We will have this book for you next week (except if we have a snowday friday!). We'll keep it near the fish, so you can find your child's page and check it out.

We did some caterpillar math. Some students used round counters while other used circle stickers to count. There were numbers in front of our caterpillars then corresponding circle outlines. Kids practiced counting the circles then took a look at the number. I'm hoping the afternoon class learned some number recognition in the process and for the morning class, they just solidified their counting skills.

We practiced writing our names on our very own constuction paper hungry caterpillar cut out. For the morning class, many of them are just beginning to independently write their names (some letters might need a creative eye to be seen!) and some of them are still practicing with hand over hand help (a teacher places their hand over the childs hand to help them form muscle memory of how the letters of their name are formed). We will hang them up on the wall for parents to see.

Using pictures of the foods the caterpillar ate, we worked in groups to sequence the book. For example, the caterpillar ate one apple first, then two pears, then three plums, four strawberries, five oranges, then a whole bunch of sweets, and finally a leaf to settle his stomach.

We also used our finger prints to make a hungry caterpillar. We then found pictures of food to glue next to our caterpillar to show what he might eat.

Next week, we will continue to look at some Eric Carle books and sequence a variety of stories.
Mrs. Reid

Feb. 25 - 28 Dr. Seuss Week!

We celebrated Dr. Seuss this week! One thing I love about Dr. Seuss is his creativity and imagination. His books and ideas lend themselves to many fun preschool activities. Some things we did this week were:

Making our wonderful Cat in the Hat hats. This was a great opportunity for children to practice painting a red and white patterm, just like the Cat!

We also measured truffula trees! There were some that were tall and some that were small. We used rubix cubes to count how many cubes high each of the trees were, then we practiced ordering them from largest to smallest.

The morning class worked on color matching after we red the book "Red Fish, Blue Fish" by Dr. Seuss. They are getting quite good at matching, so we played a memory game using colored fish!

At snack time, we graphed colored goldfish for snack. I was so impressed with preschoolers as they sorted, graphed, and counted their goldfish before eating them!

Afternoon students worked on rhyming words by producing words that rhyme with "cat". Teachers recorded ideas onto a hat cut out and the kids colored them however they liked. Rhyming is an important early literacy skill and it's great to see the kids getting excited about it.

On Thursday, we made Dr. Seuss's Oobleck! We mixed water with cornstarch which makes an oobleck that feels like a solid when squished then feels like a liquid when left to rest.

Next week, we will be beginning a new author study about Eric Carle with particular focus on "The Very Hungry Caterpillar".

Mrs. Reid