Happy Monday!

Hope everyone was able to enjoy their weekend!

In K/PREK1, we read ‘Thidwick, the Big-Hearted Moose’ which is about Thidwick allowing various animals to live on his horns. But eventually, there are too many animals and something quite drastic happens—ask your child to share the ending of the story with you!

Once we were done, we focused on various aspects that make up the story including characters, setting, and specific events. I wrote the words as they threw out ideas. This week, we’ll be focusing on identifying characters, setting, and events, which is something we talk about quite a lot in group.

Before we completed calendar, we looked at various equations and talked about the terms greater than, less than, or equal to. The first few questions dealt with equal signs and addition. The last couple of questions revolved around greater than and less than. We use an alligator mouth as a reference. The alligator always wants to eat the bigger number so friends worked together to identify the bigger number and which number the alligator would eat.

K.RL.2.3: Identify important elements of the text (e.g., characters, settings, or events).

K.NS.7: Identify whether the number of objects in one group is greater than, less than, or equal to the number of objects in another group.

In PREK2, friends each got a turn to circle the greater number when working with two numbers. For example, Sophia explored the numbers 7 and 3 and was able to identify that 7 was greater, circling it at the end.

The rest of our day consisted of stories, art table creations, new dress up clothes, and some fresh air.

What a start to our week!

Breakfast– Whole wheat toast with butter and fresh pears/banana.

Lunch– Whole wheat noodles with shredded chicken and butter, fresh oranges/pears, and fresh carrots.

PM snack– Whole milk yogurt with fresh pears.

Wee Sprout– Fresh snap peas/cherry tomatoes.

Have a wonderful night!

-Mindy

Link to pictures: WF 2/10

Good Afternoon and Happy Friday!

Today we engaged in a fun sensory activity…. shaving cream

We took cars and washed them and zoom’ed them through the fluffy white cream. It reminds of us the snow we are experiencing outside, just not the coldness.  

Breakfast: Whole grain brown rice cakes with cream cheese and oranges.

Lunch: Turkey and cream cheese roll-ups with whole wheat bread, mixed veggies and banana.

Snack: Pretzels and Mozzarella string cheese.

Have a wonderful weekend.

Marty

LINK TO PICTURES: https://1drv.ms/u/s!AtTCDmdhjIulj6pfMuA-5OwZxtxkXA?e=tTcTtX

Happy Friday!

Our day started with a food exploration! Miss Kim brought in a variety of new foods for children to test including, lime, kale, pocky sticks, and olives. There were a few friends who enjoyed the limes but most of us displayed a very sour face afterwards!

A few friends showed interest in the movement of our fish today which prompted a drawing session where children had the opportunity to sit down in front of the fish tank and draw what they saw using pastels. A wide range of friends chose to come and draw. Some friends noted the big trees in the fish tank while others noticed smaller details.

Franklin asked to play ‘Go Fish’ this morning which lead to several rounds with various friends jumping into each round. This week, we’ve been talking about the terms ‘more’ and ‘less’. Even in the game of ‘Go Fish’, children identified who ended up with the most matches. The last round that we played, myself and Franklin had five total matches. Another child excitedly said, “Hey! You have equal matches!”

After we played ‘Go Fish’, the dinosaur match game was requested. Penny and another peer explored mixing the dinosaur parts to see what the new dinosaur name would be! Penny worked with letters and letter sounds as she created new dinosaur names.

Breakfast– Brown rice cakes with peanut butter and fresh pears.

Lunch– Ham and cream cheese roll-ups, whole wheat tortilla, fresh pineapple/pears, and fresh snap peas.

PM snack– String cheese and goldfish.

Wee Sprout– Fresh pepper/cucumber.

Have a fantastic weekend!

-Mindy

Link to pictures: WF 2/7

Good Afternoon!

In K/PREK1, we’ve been talking about different text genres. We’ve highlighted fiction, fairytale, and poetry so today, we read a non-fiction story that focused on the life cycle of horses. A few fun facts that we learned:

• When a horse is born, it’s called a foal. It weighs around 100 pounds at birth and by the age of one, horses (or yearlings) weigh 700 pounds!
• The tallest horses are about 7 feet tall.
• Horses are herbivores and only eat grass, plants, and vegetables/fruits.

K.RL.3.1: Recognize familiar narrative text genres (e.g., fiction, nonfiction, fairytales, poems).

In PREK2, children focused on the equal sign and what that means. Each child was given a number and they had to use manipulatives to come up with the number that was equal.

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“I never pretend to know what kids will learn on any given day and, honestly, any teacher who does is either deluded or blowing smoke. No one can possibly know what another person is going to learn. You can hope. You can plan. You can lecture yourself blue. You can even, if you’re especially clever, trick someone into learning something, but the idea that one person can “teach” something to another, except under narrow circumstances, is one of the great educational myths.”

While I was searching through Teacher Tom’s blog this afternoon, this specific blog caught my eye. The notion that children can be taught something at any given time is interesting. Children learn from one another every single day and most of the time, children have to be ready to soak in facts or new skills but it’s no something that can be forced at this age.

“And still, despite my utter lack of “teaching,” the kids who come to our school are learning. How do I know? I watch them. I listen to them. I remember when they didn’t know and then I hear them saying and see them doing things that demonstrate that now they do. And even though I’m not teaching them, they mostly learn exactly what I want them to know.”

http://teachertomsblog.blogspot.com/2020/01/not-teaching.html

Breakfast– Kix and fresh pears.

Lunch– Brown rice with shredded beef, fresh pineapple/apple, and fresh pepper/cucumber.

PM snack– A variety of whole wheat crackers and peanuts.

Wee Sprout– Fresh cucumber/pepper.

Have a wonderful evening.

-Mindy

Link to pictures: WF 2/6

Happy Snowy Thursday! Today is HAPPY FACE DAY @ WWF.

Nesta thought she would stop by to say how happy she is about all the beautiful snow.

What a happy face… that we always LOVE to see on our friends faces.

Rowan is showing us her happy face about the wonderful creations she is making with her magma-tiles.

Breakfast: Whole grain Chex cereal and oranges.

Lunch: Whole grain brown rice with shredded beef, cucumbers and apples.

Snack: Whole wheat Triscut crackers and pumpkin seeds.

Wee Sprouts: Peppers.

Have a wonderful night!

Marty

LINK TO PICTURES: https://1drv.ms/u/s!AtTCDmdhjIulj6l3AKjeNMLSyRPeUg?e=dXYlIw

Good Afternoon.

Please enjoy the pictures form our day!

Breakfast: Whole grain oatmeal with honey and apples.

Lunch: Farm fresh scrambled eggs with shredded cheddar cheese, whole wheat butter toast, mixed vegetables and apples.

Snack: Whole wheat Ritz crackers with cream cheese.

Wee Sprouts: Cucumbers.

Have a great night.

Marty

LINK TO PICTURES: https://1drv.ms/u/s!AtTCDmdhjIulj6kncB27k5yKU4uSMA?e=NRkFaB

Good Afternoon!

**Reminder: the ‘Pre-Conference Form’ (yellow) is due Friday. Thank you!

Enjoy the pictures from our day!

Breakfast– Whole grain oatmeal with honey and fresh pears.

Lunch– Farm fresh scrambled eggs with shredded cheese, whole wheat bread, fresh cantaloupe, and fresh cherry tomatoes.

PM snack– Air popped popcorn with butter and fresh apples.

Wee Sprout– Fresh green beans/peppers.

Have a lovely evening!

-Mindy

Link to pictures: WF 2/5

Good Afternoon!

One of our favorite things to do in K/PREK1 group is to read a variety of stories: non-fiction, fiction, poetry, and fairytales allow us to understand various aspects of story writing. Yesterday, we read a short fairytale based on the character, Cinderella. We talked about the different characters we may find in fairytales.

Today, we focused on fiction stories and what exactly fiction means. We decided that fiction = fake which plays on alliterations which Grady’s been exploring lately. After we were done discussing fiction stories, we read ‘The Clumsy Click Beetle’ which focused on the main character, a click beetle. Throughout the story, the click beetle talked to other animals which is where a friend commented, “Beetles can’t talk! That’s not real.”

K.RL.3.1: Recognize familiar narrative text genres (e.g., fiction, nonfiction, fairytales, poems).

In PREK2, they also focused on different genres on stories, specifically the difference between fiction and non-fiction.

Several areas of the environment are filled with ‘pretend’ play throughout the day. I found this Teacher Tom article that describes that, “Dramatic play is an important part of how children come to understand reality, a safe place where they can explore themes and concepts they want to better comprehend.”

http://teachertomsblog.blogspot.com/2020/01/are-they-pretending.html

Breakfast– Whole Grain Cheerios with fresh pears.

Lunch– Hummus on whole wheat tortilla/flatbread, fresh starfruit/pineapple, and fresh carrots.

PM snack– Whole wheat cinnamon raisin bagel with cream cheese and block cheese.

Wee Sprout– Fresh carrots/cherry tomatoes.

Have a wonderful night!

-Mindy

Link to pictures: WF 2/4

Good Afternoon.

Today we worked on utilizing our fine motor and hand-eye coordination skills by coloring in our journals and building with the waffle blocks.

While coloring in our journal binders a friend was making multiple marks on his paper and said, I just draw my name… my whole name!” We LOVE to see our friends get excited and expand their cognitive skills.

Breakfast: Whole grain Cheerios with oranges.

Lunch: Whole grain tortillas and hummus, sweet potatoes and apples.

Snack: Whole wheat bagels with cream cheese.

Wee Sprouts: Corn.

Have a great night!

Marty

LINK TO PICTURES:  https://1drv.ms/u/s!AtTCDmdhjIulj6dnYKQWCcu1P7Gxvw?e=mInfCE

Happy Monday!

Enjoy the pictures from our day!

Breakfast– Whole grain bagel with butter and banana.

Lunch– Whole wheat noodles with marinara and shredded cheese, fresh oranges/banana, and fresh green beans/cucumber.

PM snack– Whole milk yogurt with graham crackers.

Wee Sprout– Fresh cucumber/green beans.

Have a wonderful evening.

-Mindy

Link to pictures: WF 2/3