Happy Monday!

*Just a reminder as it is suddenly beginning to feel more seasonally fall, we go outside for an hour to an hour and a half every morning, so please send a jacket or sweatshirt if the morning temp is on the chilly side. 

We kicked off a new week and for our PREK1 sign in, we started talking about comparison words such as least and most. Children had to look at three different groupings of stars and determine which group had the most stars. Katherine talked it out by saying, “Well this group right here has only one star. This group has one-two-three stars. This group has one-two-three-four-five stars…this one has the most!”.

K.NS.9: Use correctly the words for comparison, including: one and many; none, some and all; more and less; most and least; and equal to, more than and less than.

We love reading books in different genres in our classroom. This week, we’ll focus on the different genres and specifics that set each genre apart. Today, we read, ‘Alexander and the Wind Up Mouse’. Before we started reading it, I talked about what the ‘fiction’ genre is and what we look for in books to determine whether they are fiction or not. Very quickly into the story, we were able to identify the book as fiction because as PREK1 kiddos shared, “Real mice can’t talk!”.

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

We explored some sorting activities this morning at the round table and in the sensory bin.  At the round table we had four trays set up with different things to sort by color.  The sensory bin contained magnetic wands and different colored magnetic chips, encouraging friends to sort the chips into jars using magnetism.

Arthur and Ryan have acquired quite a following with their daily cricket hunt in the garden.  Everyone has become very interested in watching them and trying to catch crickets themselves.  Arthur has enjoyed showing off his crickets and sharing his cricket hunting strategies…

PREK2:  Our MACK curriculum this week focuses on teaching children to manage strong emotions constructively.  Today during group we read some calming breath exercises from the book “Breathe With Me”.  We read that we could try belly breathing or balloon breath when we are trying to calm our bodies for rest or bedtime and when saying goodbye to Mommies and Daddies.  After the story, we practiced the sorting skills we have been working on today.  We each came up to the board and chose a paper square to sort by color.

Breakfast– Whole wheat toast with peanut butter and banana.

Lunch– Whole wheat pasta with black beans, fresh watermelon/banana, and fresh broccoli/green beans.

PM snack– Whole milk yogurt with graham crackers.

Wee Sprout– Fresh green beans/broccoli.

Have a lovely night!

-Wee Friends Teachers

Link to pictures: 2024-09-23

Happy Friday!

This morning a friend requested dancing with bean bags.  The songs we danced to were: Beanie Bag Dance and Bean Bag Boogie by Greg and Steve, and Bean Bag Bop by Jack Hartmann.

We then worked on our stacking skills with our shape stackers, stacking our shapes together on the pole.  We also worked stacking our stacking bowls together by size.

We then headed into the kitchen to paint with animals.  We used the hooves of the animals to walk around our papers to create different prints and used a variety of colors.

We then headed outside.  We tossed and kicked a ball, rode and pushed bikes up and down the hill and rode the teeter totters.

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

Lunch:  Ham lunch meat on whole grain wheat bread, fresh apple slices and orange mini sweet peppers.

Afternoon Snack:  Goldfish crackers and mozzarella cheese stick.

Wee Sprouts:  Mini cucumbers.

Have a wonderful weekend!

WWF Teachers

Link to pictures: 2024-09-20

Happy Friday!

To wrap up our week with PREK1 sign in, we used one of our favorite books to help demonstrate the connections we’ve made to the illustrations in stories and the words written by the author.

We used a short story from a ‘Frog and Toad’ book titled, ‘A Swim’. There were five excerpts from the story. I read each child one notecard and they had to look at the pile of illustrations to see which illustration matched the words I read to them.

Later on in group, we read the exact same story to see what exactly took place in the story between Frog and Toad!

K.RL.4.1: Describe the relationship between illustrations and the story in which they appear.

Our MACK curriculum is crucial to our Wee Friends philosophy on how to treat ourselves and others. It’s something we’ve always done but several years back, Tami created our MACK curriculum which is a 12 week cycle with 5 main areas that focus on social emotional learning goals. This weeks MACK focus was about learning to recognize and name emotions in ourselves and others.

This morning we offered a “playdough emotions” activity.  Friends were invited to explore how emotions look by recreating them in blank faces using balls of colored play dough.  We tried making several different emotions with our face.  The kids were amazingly in tune with facial expressions and being able to reproduce them.  They added extra details beyond what we expected like tears on a sad face, red cheeks or teeth showing on an angry face, and expressive eye brows!  We have some very emotionally aware children!

Happy                               Scared                                Sad                                 Angry

We hope you enjoy some more pictures from our day!

Breakfast– Brown rice cakes with cream cheese and banana.

Lunch– Peanut butter on whole wheat bread, fresh watermelon, and fresh snap peas/cucumber.

PM snack– Goldfish and string cheese.

Wee Sprout– Fresh snap peas/cucumber.

Have a wonderful weekend!

-Wee Friends Teachers

Link to pictures: 2024-09-20

Good Afternoon!

For PREK1 sign in, we continued to dive into shapes and today, we sorted them based on size! Each child came up to the board where they chose a card from the bottom. They categorized their shape as ‘little’ or ‘big’.

K.G.2: Compare shapes using informal language to describe their similarities, differences, and parts (e.g., number of sides, length of sides, and vertices).

Later on in PREK1 group, we read, ‘When Sophie Gets Angry..Really Really Angry’ which is from our MACK collection.

Yesterday, children worked on constructing a new shape out of multiple smaller shapes when given an image to follow. Today, children were given a card with a new shape to create but only were given the shapes to use, not the actual instructions. They had to take the shapes and create their new shape by themselves (which is much more challenging!).

K.G.4: Compose simple geometric shapes to form larger shapes (e.g., create a rectangle composed of two triangles).

This morning we offered a shape hunt in the classroom to another group of Wee Friends.  This time we searched for circles.  A group of four scavenged for circles checking every area of the classroom.  After they gathered a basket full of circle shapes they used paint to add a circle layer to our shape process painting!

For our welcome activity this morning, we offered three-dimensional shape trays.  We talked about how shapes like squares, triangles and circles can become three- dimensional shapes like cylinders, cones, pyramids, cubes and spheres.  It was fun to see what we could build with our three dimensional- shapes

PREK2:  Today during group we read the story “Glad Monster Sad Monster”.  We talked about each emotion in the story and decided whether it felt good or difficult when we felt that emotion.  We talked about things we could do when we were feeling an emotion that felt hard for us. 

Breakfast– Puffins cereal with banana.

Lunch– Brown rice with shredded turkey, fresh cantaloupe/pears, and fresh pepper/cucumber.

PM snack– Trail mix with sunflower/pumpkin seeds, raisins and granola.

Wee Sprout– Fresh pepper/cucumber.

Have a wonderful night!

-Wee Friends Teachers

Link to pictures: 2024-09-19

Good afternoon!

We danced with rhythm sticks this morning. We marched around the front circle while listening to “Ants Go Marching.” Then we sat together and followed along to “Tap Your Sticks.”

We then made our way to the kitchen with Miss Bekah to engage with puzzles. We all worked on completing 3 or 4 piece puzzles.

We went outside and drew with chalk on the chalkboard, rode teeter-totters or peeked through the gaps of the log house at a teacher.

Breakfast: Whole grain Kix cereal with fresh tangerines.

Lunch: Whole grain brown rice with red beans, pear slices and mini cucumbers.

Afternoon Snack: Whole grain Wheat Thins crackers with peanut butter.

Wee Sprout: Red bell pepper.

Have an amazing evening!

WWF Teachers

Link to pictures: 2024-09-19

Good Afternoon!

This morning we listened to two songs, Walk Around the Circle and Listen and Move by Greg and Steve.  We walked around the circle acting out the motions the songs directed us to do.

We then engaged with the Roll and Race! Activity Ramps.  We drove our cars  down them to watch how they moved down the ramp on each of the textured paths.

We then headed into the kitchen to make paintings with our Dab and Dot markers.  We made single dots or clustered them together or drew continuous lines together to create our colorful drawings.

We then headed outside to enjoy some fresh air and sunshine and to engage in our favorite activities.  Today several friends worked on their balancing skills while walking across the balance beam.

Breakfast:  Oatmeal with cinnamon/sugar mixture and fresh apple slices.

Lunch:  Farm fresh scrambled eggs, fresh green bell pepper slices, bananas and whole grain wheat English muffins with butter.

Afternoon Snack:  Blue corn tortilla chips/whole grain wheat Ritz crackers (child’s choice), guacamole and fresh pineapple slices.

Wee Sprouts:  Mini cucumbers.

Have a wonderful evening!

WWF Teachers

Link to pictures: 2024-09-18

Good Afternoon!

We kicked off our day in PREK1 with a sign in board focused on shapes, specifically creating new shapes! Children came to the board to sign in and were asked to sign in under the shape that was made when two triangle were put together.

K.G.4: Compose simple geometric shapes to form larger shapes (e.g., create a rectangle composed of two triangles).

Later on in PREK1 group, we read, ‘How the Elephant Got It’s Trunk’ which we later used to fill in our chart with the author and illustrators names.

Each child was given a magnatile shape card that had an image on it. Each card had a picture of a shape made up of other shapes. For example, Katherine had to find three small triangles to make a large trapezoid. Everyone was so proud after making their shape that they asked if they could hold it up for everyone to see..which was not so easy with magnatiles but we did it!

K.G.4: Compose simple geometric shapes to form larger shapes (e.g., create a rectangle composed of two triangles).

Our MACK focus this week is:

Children will learn to recognize and name emotions in themselves and others.

The sensory bin was transformed into an activity using one of our favorite MACK books: The Color Monster!

We added puff balls of all different colors, tongs, and jars with lids. Children flipped through the pages and identified different feelings and emotions while displaying that understanding by collecting specific colored puff balls—what a fun and engaging way to talk about emotions!

PREK2: During group today we read the story “A World of Pausabilities”.  The book introduces the idea of Pausing in order recenter, notice our bodies and what is around them, and feel calm again.  We talked about the word pause and practicing the act of pausing.  Later when we came up to the board we identified a large shape.  If we were able, we identified the smaller shapes it was made of.

Breakfast– Overnight oatmeal with cinnamon and fresh strawberries.

Lunch– Farm fresh scrambled eggs with whole wheat bread, fresh pineapple/banana, and fresh cucumber/cherry tomatoes/pepper.

PM snack– Air popped popcorn with butter and raisins.

Wee Sprout– Fresh pepper/cucumber.

Have a wonderful night.

-Wee Friends Teachers

Link to pictures: 2024-09-18

Good Afternoon!

This morning, we went down the Habi-trail slide with our friends, looked through the color pyramid squares and sat in the BounceBlocks.

Eleanor worked on putting on a dress-up scarf on her body and asked for “Let It Go.” She twirled along to the song with her scarf.

Our friends made their way to the kitchen for a sensory experience with playdough. We explored it with our hands and fingers before Miss Bekah gave everyone tools. We used cookie cutters and pattern hammers and rolling pins to engage with the playdough.

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We then headed outside to enjoy the beautiful morning weather. We rode teeter totters with our friends, rode bikes down the hill, used a balance beam plank as a ramp for our trucks, climbed the log house and walked around with buckets full of leaves that have fallen from our tree.

Breakfast:  Corn Chex/Puffins cereal and bananas.

Lunch: Whole grain wheat flatbread with refried beans and shredded Colby Jack cheese, chicken avocado salad,  fresh apple and cucumber slices.

Afternoon Snack: Whole grain wheat bagel with cream cheese and fresh tangerines.

Wee Sprouts:  Red bell peppers.

Have a wonderful evening!

WWF Teachers

Link to pictures: 2024-09-17

Good Afternoon!

Yesterday, we introduced the terms ‘author’ and ‘illustrator’ so today, we dove into illustrations and how the authors words need to match the illustrators illustrations.

Each PREK1 friend came up to the board and I read them a page from the book ‘Peck, Peck, Peck’. They looked at several different illustrations from the book to see which illustration matched the words. They chose the illustration and taped it next to authors words!

K.RL.4.1: Describe the relationship between illustrations and the story in which they appear.

In PREK1 group, we decided to read the book from sign in earlier in the day called, ‘Peck, Peck, Peck’. We completed our chart for the day by adding the title of the story we read along with the author and illustrator who turned out to be the same person!

K.RL.3.2: Define the role of the author and illustrator of a story in a telling the story.

A group of our older kids were up for a shape hunt in the classroom this morning.  They worked as a team to search for squares and rectangles.  They found the shapes they were looking for in the magnetic tiles and the bristle blocks.  After the group gathered their shapes they dipped them in paint and printed them on a large piece of cardboard.  We will add more shapes through out the week.

Spontaneous kid spelling was happening in the in the art center this morning!  A pair of friends made a lists on their drawings sounding out words, listening for the sounds they heard.  The list described things that were in the drawings like cat, dog, grass, horse, hay and pompom…

PREK2: During group we read the story “The Color Monster”.  We talked about each emotion the monster felt during the story.  At the end we came up to the board to pick the color we felt that day.

Breakfast– Kix and fresh strawberries.

Lunch– Homemade chicken avocado on whole wheat bread, fresh cantaloupe/banana, and fresh cucumber/cherry tomatoes/carrots.

PM snack– Whole wheat bagel with peanut butter.

Wee Sprout– Fresh cucumber/pepper.

Have a lovely night.

-Wee Friends Teachers

Link to pictures: 2024-09-17

Good Afternoon!

This morning our friends engaged with the Mix or Match magnetic animals.  They were busy building the animal the way it is supposed to look or mixing it up and making it look unique to them.

We then danced to the Beanie Bag Dance by Greg and Steve with the bean bags.

Our friend Charlotte then requested to use our rhythm sticks to march and tap our sticks to Ants Go Marching.

We then headed into the kitchen to engage with dominos and pom-pom loose parts.  We worked our fine motor skills to pick up the pom-poms with our tongs, explored the soft texture of the pom-poms in our hands, observed the dots on the dominos and pretended they were a telephone and held it up to our ear.

We then headed outside to enjoy the weather and our favorite activities.  A friend also explored the leaf’s texture of the Hosta plant with her fingers.

Breakfast:  Whole grain wheat bread toasted with butter and cinnamon/sugar mixture and fresh apple slices.

Lunch:  Whole grain wheat penne pasta with red beans, fresh cantaloupe and red bell pepper slices.

Afternoon Snack:  Whole milk yogurt and fresh strawberries.

Wee Sprouts:  Cucumbers.

Have a terrific evening!

WWF Teachers

Link to pictures: 2024-09-16