Starting this week, Paulina will be joining the Wee Friends teachers on Monday and Thursday mornings. What began as a spanish lesson last week continued today with a large group of friends. Paulina describes: “This project really began reading Eric Carle’s Brown Bear Brown Bear, What Do You See? and Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear? in Spanish. Because it is repetitive and the children know it well, the targeted vocabulary was full of images and inspiration for the kids. We sang the books (in Spanish) and talked about animals and colors. Using paper, pencils, crayons, markers and twisties we created material that would help us explore and remember our new Spanish words.”

The plexiglass from our ball pit has reached its end! Melinda supervised a group of older friends as they used screwdrivers to safely unscrew and remove the broken pieces.

 

In the last few days as we’ve explored bear natures, our abacus has become a berry bush. This morning, after listening to our musical bear track, a couple friends found the abacus and began eating berries! We then counted berries and discussed what types of berries they were (by color!) We ate our fill and moved on to find fish!

 

 

 

The potatoes are ready! Friends dug up several potatoes and we roasted them for lunch!

We also served melted ham and cheese on whole wheat tortillas and clementines.

For snack we will serve blueberry/mango smoothies and honor each of our friends whose last day at WF is Friday!

Have a great day!

Another week filled with exploring….creating….talking….singing….playing….learning….

Wee Friends has lots to celebrate this time of the year! Friends are returning from vacation with great stories to share, new friends have joined both classrooms and the weather has cooled! It’s also the time we have to say goodbye to several friends who are moving on to new schools. On Monday Isaac will bring a special snack and we will celebrate with our friends as they start their last week at Wee Friends!

Enjoy your family time this weekend!

 

 

 

 

 

Today, initiated by Taylor, the children did another group “sticky” study. The children gathered at different times throughout the morning at one giant piece of paper and used a variety of sticky mediums on the paper. Ironically, Tami had a really difficult time getting the “sticky” study picture to stay stuck to the wall! However, it did finally get adhered to the wall in the science room so you may want “stick” around for a few minutes and take a look at pickup tonight.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We all sing with the same voice
The same song, the same voice
We all sing with the same voice
And we sing in harmony

We introduced a WeeWee favorite book with song CD this morning called, We All Sing with the Same Voice. It is a beautiful song about diversity. The children liked it so much that I will be purchasing a copy for our classroom since WWF uses their copy everyday.

 

Outside the children spent some time picking (and sampling) more vegetables that they were harvesting from our garden. Several children also husked some corn for the WF lunch.

For lunch we had parmesan rice, corn on the cob and cantaloupe.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We’ll go walking through the park…

We’ll keep on walking ’til it gets dark!

We’ll see the leaves on the trees

And catch the bugs in the breeze,

When we’re walking through the park!

Today we had a picnic at Nuner Elementary! We gathered a big bag of food (pb on whole wheat buns, pea pods/cucumbers and raisins) three wagons full of kids, walking buddies, four teachers and went walking….

We stopped and ate lunch on the soccer field, played red light/green light and then made our way to the playground.

Our walking friends did an excellent job safely crossing the streets and holding onto their walking buddy!

 

Before we left on our walk, many friends continued catching fish with their hands and in their nets. Melinda bought several new fish for today because we had to say goodbye to most of our fish from yesterday.

 

 

Our bear exploration continued today with a sensory experiment: in bowls, we put several foods we thought bears might eat. We closed our eyes and using three senses: smell, touch and taste, we guessed which food we were holding.

Paulina, who spent the morning teaching Wee Friends, recorded words from our sensory experiment in Spanish. She then moved friends to hopscotch for a Spanish lesson! Miel and Oso are two words we learned.

 

 

 

 

Owen and Nate share their Family Tree leaves with friends today! We learned that they have LOTS of cousins in New York and New Jersey and that their Grandpa has a very unique name!!!!!

 

 

 

 

 

Enjoy the day!

 

It was a SWIMMING morning…

Our sensory table grabbed everyone’s attention this morning. We added 8 live goldfish for the children to catch with nets, hold, and examine. Some children were very timid at first, but everyone gained the confidence to touch or even hold the wiggly little fish. F.1.5 Use the five senses (touching, smelling, seeing, hearing, tasting) to investigate the environment and to gather information.
F.1.6 Use a variety of “scientific tools” (e.g., balance scales, magnifying glasses, measuring cups, food coloring) to investigate the environment and to gather information.
F.1.7 Use age appropriate scientific equipment (e.g., magnifying glasses, thermometer, scales) when participating in scientific experiences.
F.1.8 Engage in a scientific experiment with a peer or with small groups of children using sharing/turn taking skills.
 

Melinda draped a large sheet over our jungle gym.

Friends pretended it was a tent.

Inspired by the big sheet, other friends decided to create a bear cave in housekeeping. We found some instrumental music entitled “Grizzly Bear Cubs with their Mom after Breakfast” and created a WF Bear Family. A small group of friends hibernated in the winter, ate leaves and berries in the winter and swam and hunted for fish in the stream! We ended our experience reading We’re Going on a Bear Hunt. F.2.1 Participate freely in dramatic play activities that become more extended and complex.
F.2.2 Express self in dramatic play through story telling, puppetry, and other language development activities.

While waiting patiently for their turn to play with the REAL fish, a few friends drew pictures of fish. 

We have introduced two baskets of tracing letters: upper case and lower case. Many friends are enjoying tracing letters, particularly hunting for the letters in their name and putting them together.

F.6.2 Combine strokes and shapes to represent letters. F.6.3 Copy a vertical line.
F.6.4 Copy a horizontal line.

 

For lunch we served ham and turkey on whole wheat bread, roasted mashed sweet potato and fruit salad (strawberry/banana/mandarin oranges).

 

Enjoy your day!

 

Today we welcomed our friends Simon, Oliver, Owen and Nate back to Wee Friends! 

Sydney, Taylor and Macy created their WF Family Tree leaves and shared them with us. We learned about each of their favorite princesses from Disneyland and saw pictures of their new Uncle!

Many of our young friends have been talking about the beach! Today we explored the beach a bit with a guided improvisation of a beach visit. We started by laying on our beach towels, then feeling the silky wet sand between our toes! We dove into the water and discovered starfish! Our hands became the starfish and we wiggled and walked them and counted starfish arms.

We discovered our sensory tub had starfish! We counted the number of arms. We then moved our exploration to the art table. We drew starfish using our own fingers, and then created a stamp out of an apple’s starfish-like core.

 

For lunch we served whole wheat pasta with chicken and corn, pineapple/orange fruit salad, peas and WF garden tomatoes!

 

Have a great day!

This morning we continued the fine motor exploration started earlier in the week: beading. Fine motor activities are important for toddler/pre-schoolers because they exercise/develop the muscles in the body that will eventually support your child’s ability to write, use utensils and other small objects, use a computer, turn pages in a book and fasten clothing.

In this exploration, friends used large wooden beads and plastic stretchy string. Afterwards a few older friends created necklaces with smaller plastic beads. Other ways we support our friends developing fine motor muscles are: Play-Doh, using a paintbrush, sewing, lacing boards, scissor work, Trio Legos, Magna Tiles (other toys that require fine motor strength and dexterity) and stencils.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

While our Family Study is coming to a natural close, we hope you and your Wee Friend will still create and share a leaf with us! We are planning on keeping our tree up as everyone has enjoyed hearing family stories and seeing all the pictures. The Family Tree has become a meeting place for friends to get to know each better through the pictures and stories.

 

 

 

 

For lunch we served whole wheat penne pasta with marinara, roasted zucchini (from our garden!) and grapes.

 

 

 

Have a terrific weekend!!!!

This morning three friends entered into an argument while playing a board game when they discovered they had been drawing too many cards at each turn. Two friends wanted to restart the game to play by the rules. The third friend (who was near winning) did NOT want to start over. Miss Laurie engaged in problem solving with these friends & realized the two differing opinions were strong and a resolution would be difficult to find. So Miss Laurie switched gears and entered into a small group discussion about being “flexible” or “stiff” in your ideas. To help them understand this vocabulary, Miss Laurie used the message board to record as the children searched around our classroom for items that were flexible and stiff.

Throughout the morning, children continued to search for items that were flexible and stiff. Even our younger children were drawn in and talked about this idea during play with items like our basket of animals .

To represent this idea in the art room, Miss Tami started a group “stiff” vs “flexible” 3D styrofoam sculpture. Every child became a part of the painting and sculpturing at different times throughout the morning. The end result of the collaboration is quite stunning and it is now hanging above the round table.

During the group art project, Miss Melinda stopped in for awhile and visited with her granddaughter Sophie (almost 2 years old). Melinda is enjoying her time this week with her family, but will be back with us tomorrow.

Outside time was delightful this morning with the cooler temperatures! Children enjoyed biking, sliding, climbing, chalking, flower collecting, and bug (a caught cicada and loose ants) examining.

For lunch we had cheese quesadillas on whole wheat tortillas, mixed fruit (pears, banana, pineapple) and fresh corn on the cob.

 

On Tuesday afternoon after a small group of children listened to Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Tami introduced a new art table option, “letter tracing squares”. The children enjoyed searching through the basket of letters to compile their name. Some children then traced & glued their name to construction paper.

Today we POPPED right through our morning. The kids used their hands to pop bubble wrap that was taped to the front room tables. They especially enjoyed climbing under the tables to pop the bubble wrap that was taped there!

In the art room, we taped bubble wrap to the table and the children used tempera paint and brushes to paint designs on the bubble wrap. They then stamped paper onto the bubble wrap to create some really cool designs.

Most of the children also chose to do some beading later in the morning. We had several necklaces and bracelets completed and there are lots of projects waiting to be finished later.

Outside we had some more bubble wrap fun. The children took turns hopping and popping!

For lunch today: cheesy rice with peas, watermelon/cantaloupe, and carrots/cucumbers (from our garden!).

Have a great day!

Tami

Today was a busy morning with our small crew of children! (We still have several families out on vacation.) Melinda is off today to be at the hospital with her pregnant daughter, Amy. We are excited for Mel to welcome a new grand-daughter into her family!!!

Yonatan and Kai both brought in their family leaves to share with friends. It was a lovely time looking at pictures and learning more about their families. Thanks for staying Atalia and Crystal to share this with us!

Sewing remains a popular choice with several of our friends. The older children continue to sew projects on material. Since several of our younger children have expressed an interest in sewing, we worked with them on sewing with blunt needles on paper. We saw a lot of concentration as they worked their needles through the paper and excitement as their thread designs took shape.

Has anyone noticed all the A’s in our classroom? At one point, Arleigh, Addi, Alma, Ada, & Alexandra were all working with the number pegs together. It was a bit of a tongue twister to help the girls! We miss our other “A”, Annie, who is out on vacation, but are concerned about adding to the already difficult time we are having getting the right name out:)

Later in the morning several friends took turns cooperatively creating their own music at the piano. They played, sang, and pretended to read the piano music. Later, Tami played some relaxing instrumental music and led a large group of children in yoga. They enjoyed the variety of stretches and used their leaf mats to help them find the correct positions. We followed this time with creative movement to some Charleston style music.

We did go outside today, but stayed cool by adding water play to the sandbox and by using the water table. Tomorrow the forecast promises a cool down…

Today for lunch we had: chicken/apple salad on whole wheat buns, fresh sweet pea pods, and bananas. For snack Kai brought in a special birthday treat of frozen yogurt and frozen blueberries.