T-Th Preschool News - Week of Nov 15

Hello Tuesday-Thursday Families!

We were busy all week preparing for Thanksgiving! Secret art projects were being made for the parents, and we were all excited about the Thanksgiving "Feast" that happened on Thursday at preschool. I think you would all agree that there was a whole lot of Thanksgiving excitement going on in our building this week!

Here are some of the things we did the week before our Thanksgiving Break...
At greeting time, we looked at some books from our recent visit on the Bookmobile
For art, we made fun handprint pictures that we turned into Thanksgiving cards for you! We also made placemats for all of the guests at our Preschool Feast!
For fine motor skills, we cut out paper feathers and we played with play dough to increase our hand strength.
For math and counting, we brought out our Foam Number Puzzle again because it was so popular with so many of the children.
To truly celebrate letter G week...we invited Katie's dad to our classroom to play his guitar and sing some songs. It was so much fun for all of us! I think my favorite part of the visit was when he played "We're Going To Be Friends" by Jack Johnson (from the Curious George Soundtrack). Please come back to visit us again!
At our story time, we listened to the story Give Thanks to the Lord by Amy June Bates.
For music and large motor, we used egg shakers to move to the beat of "Riding on a Horse to Grandmother's House" by Geof Johnson. We really laughed a lot to this song, and we learned a lot of G words, too, such as Going, Grandmother, Giddyup and GO!! GO! GO!!

But the highlight of the week was certainly our Thanksgiving Celebration with all of you! Thank you all so much for participating - either by bringing a dish to share, helping with set up, or just by joining us! We are so thankful for you!

With gratitude on this Thanksgiving week!
Miss Jean, Miss Lacy and Miss Pat

MWF Preschool News - Week of Nov 15

Dear MWF Families,

We had a terrific Thanksgiving week. Our theme continued to be thankfulness and Letter G Week. For Show and Share one of our students brought in a plastic Grasshopper. How clever! Beautiful weather graced our week once again and we spent some time playing on the playground. The highlights of our week included the visit to the food pantry, listening to a special guest play guitar at Story Time, and our Thanksgiving Feast! The children really enjoyed contributing to our food pantry. They asked many questions upon their visit to the food pantry. It was exciting to see them participating and sharing with others in need. Many thanks to all the families who contributed! You were quite generous! On Wednesday we had a special guest Stephen Plumbhoff come in to play some catchy children guitar tunes. The students had many requests! And, of course it was a wonderful way to end our week with the Thanksgiving Feast! Thank you to all the parents, family and friends who shared in this Thanksgiving Celebration! Thank you for being a part of our preschool family! Enjoy your week and have a Happy Thanksgiving!

Here are some other highlights of our week...

Painted Turkey Handprints
Made a foam hand Turkey Craft using glue and feathers.
Explored Indian Corn and Squash with magnifying glasses.
Used Shaker Eggs and listened to and acted out…”Riding On A Horse to Grandmother's House."
Played Board Games; Boggle, Memory, Chutes and Ladders.
Practiced drawing and writing words to make Thank You Notes
Enjoyed the story Good Night Sweet Butterflies by Dawn Bentley
Listened to “Thank You God” CD Story-by Schoolhouse Specialty Publishing


With Gratitude and Thanksgiving,
Miss Lori, Miss Donna, Miss Pat and Miss Jean

Here are some of the empty shelves in our church food pantry....

And here is the cart full of donations from you!! Thank you so much!

T-Th Preschool News - Week of Nov 8

Hello Tuesday-Thursday Families,

We had a fantastic and fun-filled Letter F week! And along with all the fun, we've had some excellent opportunities to learn about our November theme of gratitude.

On Tuesday, Miss Lacy took the children to our church office in small groups, where Miss Nancy showed them our church food pantry. We use the visit to explain to the children that the food donated to the food pantry is shared with families who may not have any food in their homes. It's typical for the children to see one of their favorite foods there and want to take it home! It's a great time to talk to your children about how we are all part of God's family, and we are here to help each other!

On Thursday, we learned a little bit about the First Americans who lived in the United States. Miss Jean brought in an authentic deer skin dress that is similar to what may have been worn by a woman many many years ago, long before you could buy your clothes at the mall! The children were already in a giggly mood for the day (they must be anticipating Letter G week!) and they really laughed when they saw that dress on their teacher! When I asked them what was funny, one very insightful young man said, "Because it's different!" Of course, we used that as a quick opportunity to tell the children that just because someone may look different from them, it doesn't necessarily mean it's funny. (don't worry though, we will still be sure to give the children plenty of encouragement to laugh!!)

Here are some of the other things we played with this week...
For art, we started a super secret Thanksgiving project using our fingers and we used colorful paper scraps to decorate fish.
At our exploration station, we had fun stacking and smooshing green foam circles (they were originally swim noodles!)
To help us learn about numbers, we played with a foam number puzzle and we learned the song Five Green and Speckled Frogs using our flannel board.
In small groups, we played a very silly game called Leaping Frogs that helped us develop our large motor skills. We also worked on large motor skills when we kicked a foam ball to each other out on our playground!
We heard the story In the Pond by Milbourne and Waters and the story Giving Thanks - A Native American Good Morning Message by Chief Jake Swamp.

Looking forward to seeing you next week for more fun and learning!
Miss Jean, Miss Lacy and Miss Pat

MWF Preschool News - Week of Nov 8

Dear MWF Families,

This week our themes were Thankfulness, Thanksgiving and Letter F Week. For Show and Share one of our students brought in a Flag, which fit in so well with our themes and the fact that Wednesday was Veteran's Day. Beautiful weather graced our week once again and we spent some time playing on the playground. Several highlights of our week were the Chapel, the Rainbow Fish Art, and the dramatic play of the grocery store.

At the Chapel Pastor Greg and Miss Jean acted out a skit/parable which related to giving to others. (I must say we have some fine talent at this preschool!) The children recited a finger play to Pastor Greg entitled “Thank You God.”

The Rainbow Fish Art Project was quite fun and it was exciting to see the children create their very own version of a colorful fish. The children loved playing grocery store with our many pretend food items, play money and cash register. We also explained how very different it was to live during the times of our ancestors. They had to plant, grow, harvest, and hunt their food.

On Wednesday, November 18th we will be visiting our food pantry. Please have your child bring in a canned good item by Wednesday! We look forward to next week as our theme of Thanksgiving continues with our Thanksgiving Celebration on November 20th @ 10:30. We hope you join us! (Please RSVP for our Thanksgiving gathering by Tuesday morning!)

Here are some other highlights of our week…Drew with Farm Animal Stencils
Practiced counting and sorting with pasta, beans, dice, and muffin tins.
Explored Indian Corn - the students loved picking off the kernels, and Miss Jean even ground up some kernels to show us cornmeal.
Listened to Native American Music, “Kid’s Pow-Wow Songs” by Black Lodge.
Played a “Colorful Feathers” Circle Game, a great recognition color game.
Heard the story This First Thanksgiving Day by Laura Krauss Melmed
Enjoyed the story The Great Fuzz Frenzy by Janet Stevens and Susan Stevens Crummel. (This is a great fun story which addresses themes of friendship, forgiveness, and cooperation.)

With Gratitude and Thanksgiving,
Miss Lori, Miss Donna, Miss Pat and Miss Jean

T-Th Preschool News - Week of November 1

Hello Tuesday-Thursday Families,

With conferences this week, we had a very short week in the classroom, but we still had lots of fun and learning! Since it was letter E week, we decided to spend the day learning a little bit about our Earth! We read part of the story What A Wonderful World which was based on a very familiar song that you may have heard Louis Armstrong sing! The illustrations by Ashley Bryan are beautiful and "depict children of many backgrounds performing a puppet show that brings the lyrics to life."

At our science table this week, we brought out several of our Usborne books that describe our earth including In the Pond, On the Seashore, and Under the Ground. It's a good time to talk with your children about our earth and all of the life on earth that God created.

Miss Jean also took one last day to take care of some assessments before meeting with all of you this week! Here are some of the other things you might have caught us doing...

Playing with orange playdough and ABC cookie cutters at greeting time
Using green, blue and brown crayons on blue circle shaped paper to make our own earth pictures
Painting with brown paint at the easel
Singing the song "At the Easel" by Thomas Moore (see words below)
Playing with a Spill and Spell dice game
Practicing our name writing skills
Playing with dress up clothes and a challenging USA puzzle in the curtain area by our cubbies
And last but not least...taking a walk on a very beautiful fall day!

And here are the words to "At the Easel" by Thomas Moore...

At the easel, at the easel
I can choose any color I want
(two times)
I choose red!
I paint the house red
I paint the dog red
I paint the sky red
I paint the grass red
Today I must like red!
(repeat with other colors!)

One final thought before signing off. To celebrate letter E week, EVERYONE should go outside this weekend to enjoy our wonderful November weather! See you soon!

Miss Jean, Miss Lacy and Miss Pat

MWF Preschool News - Week of November 1

Dear MWF Families,

This week our theme was Emotions for letter E Week. We really enjoyed discussing the different emotions/feelings such as happy, sad, angry, and scared. Our Show and Share helper brought in a letter E item which was a small elephant.

We were fortunate to have two good weather days! On Monday we went outdoors for a fresh air walk and sang some songs led by our very own parent helper! On Wednesday we were blessed again to have another parent helper and sunny weather! We were very thankful to go outside and play on the playground, especially after many recent rainy days.

We also celebrated another birthday! We used the Easel this week for painting and our children had a great time creating their own masterpieces. Our students have such great creativity! Our paintings are right outside the classroom. Please take a moment and enjoy the children’s art gallery as you are walking by.

Thank you to all of our parents for coming out to Parent Conferences! Your children are doing so wonderfully in Preschool! We appreciate everyone’s feedback and suggestions, as you help us to continue to grow to provide an excellent class for your child.

Remember to join us at Chapel @ 9:00 a.m. on Wednesday November 11th!

Our BROWN DAY is Friday November 13th. Please encourage your child to wear BROWN!

Here are some other highlights of our week...

Painted with Paint Dobbers on Elephant Shapes
Built Railroad Tracks and played with Trains.
Looked at Number Books at Greeting Time.
Wrote with Pencils on Note Paper and used Envelopes too!
Listened to Glad Monster Sad Monster by Ed Emberley. This book also has different masks to display various emotions.
Heard the story The Way I Feelby Janan Cain
Listened to a Rebus Reader Elephants Are Not Little by Anders Hanson
Practiced a Rhyme/Fingerplay “God Made The Sun”

With Gratitude,
Miss Lori, Miss Donna, Miss Pat and Miss Jean

News from the Director - Week of Nov 1

Hello Preschool Families!

Thank you all so much for taking time out of your busy schedules to meet with us for parent teacher conferences. We truly enjoyed the opportunity to give you a better idea of how your child is learning and growing here at preschool. We also enjoy hearing more about how your child is learning and growing at home!!

There are many factors that influence your child's growth and development, and preschool is just one of those factors. We are only with the children 2 or 3 mornings a week, and we know that there is a whole other world outside of the classroom. Because of this, we also use our conference times as a way to "walk with you" on the ever challenging path called parenting. Between the 5 teachers on the preschool staff, we have 11 children and about 100 years of parenting "practice" under our belts (Yikes!), so we really do have an idea of what you're going through as you grow your families. I hope that all of you take some time to look through the handouts that we prepared for you, because they have a wealth of information that will help guide you on your parenting adventure!

Several of you have requested our recipe for the home made play dough that we often use in the classroom, so I'll share that with you here. Enjoy the lovely weather that we've been blessed with this weekend!
Miss Jean :)

And for letter E week, let's remember to "Encourage one another!"
(Hebrews 10:25)

Home Made Play Dough

1 1/2 cups flour
3/4 cup salt
1 Tablespoon cream of tartar
1 1/2 Tablespoons vegetable oil
1 1/2 cups water
1 package unsweetened Kool Aid powder for color

Mix all of the ingredients in a large pot. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly. When it starts forming into a large ball (about 3 - 5 minutes), remove from heat, cool and knead. Store in an airtight container or zip loc bag.

Important Upcoming Dates...

Thursday, November 19: T-Th Class Thanksgiving Celebration
Friday, November 20: MWF Class Thanksgiving Celebration

Class starts at 9:00 & the party starts at 10:30
Family members are welcome to join us
Watch for RSVP sheet in your cubbies next week!

Saturday, November 21: WPC Craft Sale & Bake Sale
9:00 - 3:00
The bake sale is a preschool fund raiser! Let's all make some delicious goodies! We'll also be selling Usborne Books as a fund raiser! See you all there!