Updates from our Sprouts!
Update from our 2′s!
These past two weeks our main focus has been to establish a classroom routine and learn our classroom rules. While we are flexible, we follow essentially the same routine everyday. We discuss our “Daily Schedule” each day at circle time and we use a visual schedule with pictures to represent each activity posted on our felt board to keep track of our morning. In addition to the schedule, we discuss our classroom rules (also using pictures posted on our felt board) at circle time. Our rules are “listen,” “share with our friends,” “clean up our mess,” and “keep hands and bodies to ourselves.”
We have also been figuring out all the different stations and options in the classroom. In general, during each class the children are invited to explore both the consistent areas of the room (the book corner, blocks/building, the play kitchen/dress-up, cars etc.) and stations that rotate according to the children’s interest (such the touch table, the science table and art choices). The children are able to move back and forth between their choices. And boy do they move! As they become accustomed to the choices they will focus more on specific activities of interest, however since it’s all still so new they are busy, busy, busy!
These past two weeks we have alternated between bottle corks and “noodles” (essentially biodegradable packaging peanuts) in the touch table. The children can scoop and dump them with various sized bowls and cups. The children have used stampers/stamp pads and dot markers for art choices over the past two weeks. The kiddos also showed a lot of interest in labeling the colors and the shapes of our big buttons we set out on the table! Everyone in the class spent at least some time sifting through the shapes and chatting with their friends (and me!) about the different shapes and colors they were finding. I was very impressed with how focused they were! Read entire newsletter from our 2′s here!
What have our 3′s been up to?
Wow, what a busy couple of weeks we have had in the 3’s classroom. The children have been working hard on learning the routine and our classroom rules. They have been doing great at circle time and have been really focused on their jobs (each child has one job a week). As you will notice from the pictures we are learning to clean our classroom and take care of our toys.
We had a special visitor today. Jen from the SW Watershed Resource Center came to tell us about our new worm compost bin. She shared with us that worms need many of the same things to live healthy lives that we need, a warm house, a little water, food (but only fruits and vegetables) and clean air. At snack time some of us gave the worms our banana peels and strawberries. We can’t wait to see what will happen next.
Last week we focused on the letter A. Ask your child what sound A makes. We explored apples. On Friday we made individual apple pies. Everyone did a great job cutting the apples and making their own crust. We look forward to more cooking projects.
We have started our monkey journal. The class has named our monkey Friday. Friday spent his first weekend with Sophie and it was a success, as Sophie says, “when it’s Christmas I hope Santa will bring me a Friday.” We hope that everyone will love spending a weekend with Friday as much as Sophie did. Thanks Sophie for taking such good care of Friday. Read the entire Oct newsletter from our 3′s here!
For November we will be focusing on family, friends and what we are thankful for, as well as continuing to explore fall and all of its wonder. Weather permitting I’m hoping to walk through the park in the next few weeks as the trees are so beautiful right now. We will be working on the letters C and T. To begin, we will be having a Can Food Drive. All of the donations will be given to the neighborhood house. Not only will we be giving to those in need but the Can Food Drivewill also prove to be a great opportunity for our class to practice pre- math skills by counting, sorting and graphing. Oliver really wants the class to count to 100 so that will be our goal! We will count our cans daily as they come in. There will be a basket by the sign in sheet if you choose to donate starting November 7th- 18th. Read entire November newsletter here!
News from our 4 year old Sprouts!
What a fun first week at Sprout 4’s! We teachers are working hard to provide your children with the most caring, fun filled learning experiences & environment possible! Gabriel Park (Sprout’s Nature-classroom) has a lot to offer! Here are a few pictures highlighting the first week of Sprout adventures: apple harvesting and animal rolls down the hill! Everyone should be so proud! What great listeners, partners, hikers and helpers! Read the entire 9/27 newsletter here!
Letter B–BUG hunt and books appeared to be a hit! Our special Guest Jamie (Ronan’s mom) and their Madagascar Hissing Cockroaches really made us giggle. Every week we feature a song of the week and this week: “Five little lady bugs sitting in a tree” was a favorite! Sprout Garden Song is: “We’re off to see the garden, we’re off to we garden, hi ho the merry o, we’re off the see the garden. First, we pull the weeds…then we plant our seed… then we water our seed… then we pick our veggies, munch, munch, munch.”
For our nature explorations, we now have our very own NATURE Baskets. Big thanks to families for encouraging the RRRR: Rethink, Remake, Reuse and Recycle and bringing in milk jugs! Bi-weekly, we will be making re-usable crafts, so, keep it up please! Read the entire newsletter here!
These last few weeks we have begun to see our Sprouts form fast friendships. During class we talk about ways we can be friends with everyone, celebrating our similarities and enjoying our differences. We practice taking turns, partnering and sitting next to others during art, circle, walks and games. Encouraging Sprouts to explore new experiences and have an adventurous day is one of our many aims!
Making recycled crafts and caring for our earth are two big themes you will see repeating throughout the year. We practice recycling again and again on a daily basis. It is always helpful to have SWCC Watershed Center Coordinator Jen Seaman’s come visit and give us lessons on how to take care of our Sprout worms and what they like to eat! Big thanks to Jen! The children seem more and more captivated by our very own worm composter! Our everyday practice of preparing the food scraps and caring for our earth worm friends, seem to have made a big impression. Read the entire 10/24 newsletter here!
