tray play for my new little people i will have this year....

This is a stringing activity that caters to the little ones that still like to mouth things. I created it out of a pool noodle cut into about an inch thick pieces and a thicker rope as opposed to yarn or string. Usually I have done this activity with small beads but i know they are a choking hazard for my new age group. This activity is good for fine motor skills, counting, and color recognition. An extension of this activity can be to use two colors and begin to pattern.



 This is some mini water bottles I used to make sensory bottles. one has red water with silver glitter mixed in. On the tray there is one with clear water and colored water beads, yellow oil with blue colored water (when mixed it turns green), orange with confetti flakes,and yellow and green.

This is a great beginner transfering activity. It is plastic golf balls. I would first put this out for grasping and transering then add a ladel or spoon and then go to the tongs as motor skills build. An extension of this especially for a new sensory experience would be to put these in a tub of water and  use a small net to "catch" them. One could even use a shovel to transfer them out of a sand bin...endless possibilities. (fine motor skills, color recognition, counting)

 This is also a fine motor skill activity. Object is to use the clothes pins (the old time kind..lol) and put them on the side of the bowl. After mastering these kind of clothes pins, the ones you have to squeeze can be added to develop the pincher grasp.

This is two color sorting games. I used fish and gingerbread people buttons. This is good color recognition. as well as color matching. Thisactivity can be extended to patterning as well.

 This is a aluminum disposable cup cake tin. I cut out colored circles to go in each divider since this tray is so versatile. the object is to again first introduce this by grasping the colored objects and placing them in with the correct color. After grasping is mastered then spooning would be the next way to transfer.

Someday Crafts: April's Fool Day Ideas!

Someday Crafts: April's Fool Day Ideas!: "Welcome to the April Fool's Day Categorically Crafting Show where you can show off all of your practical jokes for April's Fools! Ap..."

a garden: woodworking with preschoolers

a garden: woodworking with preschoolers: "it's fun and exciting. and only a little bit scary."

SUMMER

Wow...as I log into this account after being MIA I realize just how quickly the summer is going by. I have approximately three weeks before I have to get back in the swing of things. The first week back though is our yearly conference the agency has for all the education staff and I really look forward to it. Last year (my first as the "official LEAD teacher") some say was a breeze for me and loooking back it was. The children I had were text book and behavior was unbelievably smooth. The same people aslo are saying next year will probably be downhill from there after all how can beginners luck continue?? well to that I say ....it'll be fine. Don't get me wrong the almost four years I've worked here there have been struggles. I love what I do and if I can touch each and every child in some way then I am doing a good job. With all the puch on academics sometimes its easy to lose the true reason why you are in the classroom. These children...yes that what they are children are three and four years old. Do they need to LEARN...yes they do but the need to learn how to be a kid. They need to learn there is a place called "school" that is there to encourage and build on their strengths to provide safety and nourishing LEARNING learning experiences. Afterall how can they be expected to learn 26 upper and lowercase letters, write their full names ,and count to 100 if they aren't allowed to just figure out what happens when they squeeze everydrop of glue out of the bottle onto their paper or eat a piece of that homemade oatmeal playdough? Now I am in no  way saying academics is not important. I just think the pressures on the teachers which in turns puts pressure on the children is not a healthy way to go about it. There has to be accountability I know to be sure all these funds are not being wasted and that the children are truely benefitting from the programs. this year I want the academics as well as the free flowing of the children being able to just...well just BE....be able to use all the paint in the paint dish...be able to lay that brush down and use those little fingers that may have never touched paint before. I want while in freeplay centers to be able to allow that child that is building a castle fit for a king to be able to FINISH it and not put it away because it is "time" to move on to the next scheduled thing. That is the true beauty of learning.....! I hope to get back to blogging on this as school time nears ...Maybe I'll take you into our conference and setting up of the classroom ...until then ....

Summer time

Though summertime is upon us I am looking at it in a different light. I am eager to find new and creative things to do both for myself and with the kids. This blog has been left in the dark for far too long and I am ready to come back to it and log all that has happened with the ending of the school year. (Pics and blogging to come). I am hitting the books super hard trying to get this A.S. degree completed.

Easter...

We got crazy and colored real eggs. I was going to pass on doing it this year as I found cool puffy stickers to decorate the plastic eggs we hunt but it was a fun experience that I know some of them never get to have.

Our cooking activity this week week went with our theme which was dinosaurs. I changed it up a bit....It was called dino nests....I used a square graham cracker, and cream cheese...i colored mine with green food coloring and I also sweetened it with powdered sugar. Then We used three jelly beans  for the eggs....The kids loved it! 

Update on our garden.....These are the potates, onions,and the massive squash plant...

We have several squash growing.....

 These are our green beans, but they are yellow....

And our corn.....

We now have two tomatoes growing.

April 2011

Shave cream play on the table. I try to do this once a week or so...sometimes I leave it white and sometimes I will add paint to support our color. This is great for practicing writing skills.

 Puple of course was our color so I brought out the purple paper and the sticks to make V's as that was our letter for the week.

Our dramatic play area.

This was made for child abuse awareness month which is April. I had the kids color on the white paper and then made the fans....I made the blue ones, on April 6th which was child abuse awareness day we took the kids out around the hey and took a picture.

fine motor skills activity.....beading ocean creatures onto string.

look at how she grouped them by color....LOVE IT!!!

This is a dray table I set up for sensory....

The water table is ALWAYS a hit!

I have been dying rice for quite a while but decided to try a new idea i read about. I dyed the rice with grape kool-aide to make it purple......it worked great and boy does it smell GOOD!

April Child abuse awareness month

So, it is April 4th...we had a teacher workday on Friday the 1st. I was away on a field trip with my son to a theme park. We had fun and fortunately we made it a family day ...all five of us went.


Today the 4th we are back in school. This week is sea life theme. We also have a new color and shape, purple....and diamond.

this is the water table in the front room...water with sea creatures .

MARCH 2011...

This is outside play...sometimes the importance of gross motor skill is overlooked what with all the VPK standards and school readiness skills that must be taught but this too is as important. Teaching our little ones today the importance of good nutriotion and plenty of movement and exercise is vital to the health of our future!!

We had a birthday....so yes the occasional sewwt is ok...don't worry though our nutritional snack was also given....lol

We had our plant theme this month and boy did we plant. This is a pic of a strawberry plant,onions,potatoes,squash and beans.

 corn is also planted in there...as well as two tomatoe plants

 OH...we had a little green visitor causing a stir....that little leprechaun...he turned our coolwhip green that was to be for our pots o gold cooking activity....then when we went outside he turned our water table water green.....then our pt. co-teacher arrived all blinged out with jewels and a big(catn the hatsize) green hat and crazy green shirt on....she said the leprechaun ran by as she arrived and she tried to grab him but all she caught was his hat and her shirt turned green and she had all the bling on her neck.....lol....SO we thought all was well until we started lunch and out came our cook with green milk......that pesky little guy did it AGAIN....the kids had SOOO much fun.....and yep we did too!

We had a picnic....a stomache virus hit the school and this was a day of only 8 out of 17 kids so we said ...why not have a picnic outside......they had a blast!

This was our last week for yellow so i changed it uo and made a scoop and sift tray...renewed the whole concept and the kids played forever with them!

reptile and amphibian tray..

We even got busy and held a sign that will be going to the people who are in charge of seeing to it that the funding stays or goes for our program......and boy does this sign say it ALL!!!!

Jan thru Feb. 2011

Transportation month.....the trainset was brought out for by rail

We made airplanes as a cooking activity for By Air.

This was On Wheels week....

For Valentines week we made frienship heart cookies for our cooking activity.

I used pink because that was the color of the month and of course heart was our shape of the month.....all teachable moments.

Here is shaving cream trays...the trays allow for spacial awareness...and of course I tinted the shave cream pink for clor of the month.

This is a graet literacy activity......gripping a pencil at this time was difficult but look how well he made his R ....building confidence for writing skills.

this was opposites week. I put the cotton balls (soft) and black rocks (hard) in the table...also figured the color contrast would be a great teachable moment ....the kids decided to put the scale in table....they did sort the cotton and rocks...heavier and light but was unable to get a pic in time.....love it when they extend what I add to centers.

Again opposites week.....sink/float activity. YES this is water IN the classroom.....any type of tub will work....get that water in your room....set boundaries...the kids WILL learn where the water belongs!!!

I tiold you a few posts back that by Dec. the real woodworking would begin.....well here it is....and boy is it LOUD!!!!

Water table outside....

 I did a small workshop/presentation about "tray play" this is a tray I set up for plants theme..

another for building fine motor....again pink for color of the month...and hearts for shape.. 

I set this up early for picture purposes...it was two weeks away but this was for bugs and insects theme....Our color of the month changed so I dyed rice yellow and used that as a medium....