Do you hear what I hear ?

The kids enjoyed playing with some marionettes I picked up yesterday.

I love looking around the room and seeing what kids have learned. See Andreas sorting skills ?

Emeri playing with the puppets.

The frames are filling up with art !

We had our first fire drill today.

Since we were learning about " hearing " today Kimbers mom brought his deaf dog by to visit. It was really interesting to hear how they take care of him . Kimber has learned some sign language to " talk " to Jasper. Thanks Stacy for sharing !

These little boxes are sound boxes. The children can shake them and match the ones that sound the same. You can see the little dot on the bottom of one of them , that is so they can self check to see if they are right. Problem was- some of my talented children decided just to match using the dots instead of their ears.

We played a game. Each of the children were given a little card with a picture on it. They made the sound that the object / animal on their card makes and the other children use their ears to guess what it is. FUN GAME!

Mrs. Brenda came to teach us some sign language today. Thanks Mrs. Brenda.

Scarlett used the beads in the art center to make a beautiful necklace.

Enjoy the video I took of Mrs. Brenda today .

Friday Flicks and a fox

Today we wrapped up a unit on " Animals that Live in the Woods." It was SUCH a pretty day we were temped play outside all day. The kids didnt even need jackets on ! Randy snapped a few pictures of outside play .

In small groups today we played the Fox and Football game. We talked about the F sound and how when we say it we bite our lip. The kids had cards and we decided which picture cards started with the sound F. Overall they did really well , even the younger kiddos!

And here's your Friday Flick !

We do other languages !

Bears on boats

Orrin working on some art .

For small group today we played with our counting bears. I had a block and I said, " This is my boat. I am going to take 4 bears for a boat ride." I then counted the bears one by one and put them on the boat. I drove the boat around the table and told a little story . " My bears are going to drive across the lake and have a picnic on the other side. They will have bread and honey . Bears like honey. " When I finished each child took a turn to load their boat and take a boat ride and tell a story. We had bears go to fun city and some ate pizza. This activity not only was a math activity but a language activity. After all our bears took a ride we lined up the boats and discussed which boat had the most and which had the least amount of bears on it. Don't assume that kids cant handle big description words - they can. That is how we expand their language. We were also able to use words like more, less and equal.

During circle time today we read a book called " I Dont Care". It is about a little bear that everyone keeps telling him " winter is coming , you need to get ready" but each time he answered " I dont care.." Of course at the end of the book he falls asleep because that is what bears do when it turns cold. This enabled us to talk about hibernation.

We also looked at a picture of a little girl with a fake arm. Somehow she had lost her arm. We show these pictures atleast weekly and talk about them. We talk about how people with disabilities might feel and how we should act around them. We talk about what things might be nice to say and what things would not be nice.

Instead of having our teddy bear picnic on Friday we are doing it on Thursday. We are having visitors on Friday and the day would be too hectic.

Bears and Birthdays

Today has been a slow day. Several of our friends are not here . Today we celebrated Martin Luther Kings birthday by talking about friendship and " getting along." In our group we do a pretty good job of that but it never hurts revisiting something so important.

We also started a unit on bears. The picture below ( which is SO flattering.. ) is me singing the song " Brown Bear Brown Bear " with the kids and using the storytelling props. The kids LOVE music already but sticking a hands on activity in there they dont even notice that we are learning !

Today was a teacher " YAY! " moment for me. Being in a classroom with different ages and abilities it is important to meet each child where they are and help and challenge. The kids love the furbies I took out last week so I am letting them hang out a little while longer. One of the children had taken them out and sorted them by color. " I love that!" I told the child. " Can you think of another way to sort them?" The child thought for a while . I asked him to look for things that were alike and different with the furbies. He replied " Hair!" I said " Yes, you can sort them by hair color!" He said or I can sort them by long hair or short hair. Well, yes you are right. I left the room and came back. He said look. Instead of having two distinct groups he had all the furbies in a line. He had lined them up from the shortest hair to the longest hair ! Wooo WHOO!! Way to go !