Today we welcome three new children to Wee Friends: Jackson, Maxwell and Addison!

Brothers Jackson and Maxwell spent the day exploring all of the interesting materials we have at Wee Friends: the magnetic building balls/blocks, the sandbox and their favorite area so far, the workbench!

Addison also enjoyed the day getting to know friends through play, completing puzzles and drawing a calendar.

Welcome Jackson, Max and Addi! We are so happy to have you here and can’t wait to get to know you each more.

In another exciting note, today was the first day of kindergarten for our kindergarten students, Elizabeth and Elliott!

We are so excited to have these two friends as leaders in our classroom!

This morning friends met on the music rug to introduce our new friends to our daily routine. Friends eagerly shared everything that we do, from signing in and playing to taking a nap and eating snack.

Jackson and Maxwell also shared some pictures of their family with the class!

It’s been a great Monday here at Wee Friends! –Jessica

Wee Sprouts: Carrots. Breakfast: Toasted whole wheat bagel with peanut butter and fresh plums. Lunch: Whole wheat pasta with chicken, mixed vegetables and fresh plums/oranges. Snack: Organic whole milk yogurt and fresh pears.

Kindergarten: Today we designed covers for our new math and literacy binders, adding our names and paper so we can start using them tomorrow. We also began creating a countdown to our birthdays! We made a grid using a ruler and then started adding numbers. 

The plum tree in the backyard continues to be a source of fascination for the Wee Friends. It seems like the minute we go outside, someone is asking, “can we pick plums?!”

There has been so much picking lately that the lowest branches are now empty. Today we solved that problem by getting out the ladder! Friends lined up eagerly for a turn to climb up. 

With a teacher’s supervision friends climbed up the steps and reached for the ripe plums.

Many friends experienced a great sense of accomplishment as they climbed up the ladder independently.

The plums are so abundant a squirrel friend came to enjoy them as well:

Smile! Have a great weekend. –Jessica

Wee Sprouts: Carrots. Breakfast: Brown rice cakes with cream cheese and grapes. Lunch: Whole wheat flat bread with hummus, fresh cauliflower and bananas. Snack: Mozzarella string cheese with fresh pears and bananas.

Rosemary and David had a great time outside this morning!

David admired Rosemary’s art skills.

They played on the slide and with the bark on the ground.

And then they said a quick hello at the Wee Friends’ door.

Anna and Ruby got to go on a walk around the neighborhood!

They found a flower and Anna checked it out by using her smell and taste senses. Ruby gave it a poke.

Breakfast was Whole Grain Cheerios and bananas. Lunch consisted of whole grain brown rice with cheese, bananas, and mixed vegetables. Afternoon snack was wheat crackers and cheese.

Have a great night!

Amanda

Hello!

For those of you who may be interested, I wanted to share a personal announcement: an article I wrote has been published as the opening chapter in a new book entitled Teach For America Counter-Narratives: Alumni Speak Up and Speak Out (Peter Lang, 2015).

My chapter, “The TFA Bait and Switch: From ‘You’ll Be Making a Difference’ to ‘You’re Making Excuses'” details my experience with TFA after graduating from the University of Notre Dame in 2013. It highlights the specific ways in which TFA knowingly and strategically baits young, idealistic college graduates into joining their organization, telling them they can improve students’ lives but then not providing the support or structure to make that difference a reality.

If you’d like to read about my story, a large excerpt from my chapter can be found here: http://www.alternet.org/education/teach-america-bait-and-switch-youll-be-making-difference-youre-making-excuses

The book is also available on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Teach-America-Counter-Narratives-Critical-Thinking/dp/1433128764/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1440100153&sr=8-1&keywords=teach+for+america+counter+narratives

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask! I’d love to talk about my experience and how it has impacted my work now.  I am very thankful that I have now found a place like Wee Friends in which I have the freedom to teach children in a caring, compassionate and effective way.

–Jessica

Today we had another long-time Wee Friend graduate! Sloane will be heading off to Kindergarten starting tomorrow. We will so miss her smiling face and eagerness to help out in the classroom.

Sloane has been at Wee Friends for many years and it’s been a pleasure to watch her grow!

Best of luck in Kindergarten Sloane! Your new teacher and classmates are lucky to have you.

The mild weather today has made for wonderful outside time! We had a blast watching workers put up new telephone lines, riding the teeter-totters and running all over the yard: 

As the plums on our plum tree continue to ripen, friends gather to pick them. After collecting a whole bunch, we get to enjoy the fruit!

Have a wonderful day. –Jessica

Wee Sprouts: Carrots. Breakfast: Hot wheat cereal with fresh pears. Lunch: Whole grain brown rice with cheddar cheese, fresh corn-on-the-cob and oranges. Snack: In honor of Sloane’s last day we had chocolate-covered strawberries, colby jack cheese slices and lemon water!

Please note: One of the children has been diagnosed with a viral infection. The only known symptom is a fever.

Rosemary asked to play with the animal puzzles today. She made the sounds that matched the animals.

 

Then we got out some musical instruments to play with!

Breakfast was whole wheat toast with butter and grapes. Lunch consisted of farm fresh eggs, whole wheat bread, bananas, and mixed vegetables. Afternoon snack was graham crackers and raisins.

Have a good night!

Amanda

 

Wee Friends are amazing creators.

Every day we see children utilize materials in unique and surprising ways:

Today friends created several different trains out of blocks. Woooo woooo!

So many different creations.

Today was Poetry Day in large group. We talked about how poems can be presented in multiple forms. First, we read the poem The Crayon Box That Talked in book form. Next, we watched an animated version (https://vimeo.com/23111919).

 

Afterwards, friends were invited to the art table to create their own crayons. Following their interest, this morphed into also creating crayon boxes! Some friends created a whole set of crayons, starting with the primary colors.

It’s amazing to see what children create.

Have a wonderful afternoon! –Jessica

Wee Sprouts: Sweet peppers. Breakfast: Cheerios, homemade whole grain applesauce oat muffins and kiwi/pears. Lunch: Farm fresh scrambled eggs, whole wheat bread, carrots, and cantaloupe/bananas. Snack: Hummus and wheat crackers.

Hello, everyone!

The children spent this morning reading from our collection of books. Rosemary and Anna made a big pile of the ones they wanted to read.

In the afternoon, they played with the animals. Rosemary can name the animals and Anna can roar like a lion!

For breakfast, the children had Corn Chex and bananas. Lunch consisted of whole wheat tortilla with cheddar cheese, bananas, and mixed vegetables. Afternoon snack was homemade whole wheat oatmeal muffins.

Have a great evening, see you tomorrow!

Amanda

It was a ‘muffin making’ morning! Friends pitched in to make our afternoon snack: Healthy Applesauce Oat Muffins. Friends had a conversation around the island about the muffins we were about to make. We talked about the ingredients along with the steps we were going to take to get to our goal: an awesome PM snack!

We got out two bowls: one for our dry ingredients and another bowl for our wet ingredients. Children took turns pitching it. From pouring milk to measuring whole wheat flour, our friends’ contributions were extremely helpful!

A few of our older friends got the opportunity to crack an egg. This takes a lot of concentration and excellent timing: even for adults!

The last step was combining the wet and dry ingredients together. We took turns using an ice cream scoop to scoop our mixture into muffin tins.

They were a BIG hit this afternoon. Wee Friends teamwork at its finest.

Building block construction occurred this morning in the habitrail area. We worked together to create a structure where friends participated in play together.

Journaling gives children the opportunity to express what they may be thinking or feeling by putting it down on paper. Children are often extremely determined and concentration levels are high (i.e sticking out your tongue..something I know I do!)

I think overall, it was a concentration Tuesday..ending with this magnatile structure!

“Only children believe they’re capable of everything.”—Paulo Coelho

“Every child has a different learning style and pace. Each child is unique, not only capable of learning but also capable of succeeding.”—Robert John Meehan

“If a child can’t learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn.”—Ignacio Estrada

 

For breakfast, children had Kashi Blueberry Clusters and PPC kiwi. Lunch consisted of cheese tortillas, green grapes, and PPC tomatoes/carrots. PM snack was our homemade whole grain applesauce oat muffins with string cheese.

Hope everyone has a terrific evening.

-Mindy

I hope everyone had a great weekend!

We want to welcome our newest Wee Wee Friend, Brycen and his family. Brycen is going to be such an added delight to our environment.

To start our day of fun, David, Rosemary, and Anna were going up and down the classroom slide over and over again. The laughs and giggles were such a joy for all of us to hear on this Monday morning.

And then we had a dance party! We introduced a new CD that our friends just loved. Absurd Is The Bird was a fun, fast, and crazy dancing pleasure. We all had a blast!!!

Breakfast was whole wheat toast with butter and fresh peaches. Lunch consisted of whole wheat pasta with black beans, bananas, and corn. Afternoon snack was string cheese and graham crackers.

Have a good night!

Amanda