Weather – Thunderstorms, Tornados, Rainbows, and even snow…

I could not have asked for a better week to have a weather theme weather wise.  Thank goodness we didn’t get any tornados but we did get just about everything else… Clouds, Sun, Rain, Fog, Storms, and even some snow!  Only in Missouri, right!  We finished our week talking about Thunderstorms and Tornados, and of course the snow that Mother Nature gave us this morning.  We practiced writing our letter I and we drew a weather picture.  We did a sensory activity using the colors of the rainbow, droppers, and shaving cream.  I posted pictures on Facebook of our sensory activity.  Don’t forget next week is a short week and then we will be closed for Spring Break.  If your child will be here Wednesday they need to bring in a dozen plastic filled eggs for our egg hunt!  Have a wonderful weekend!

Weather – Sun

On Thursday, we learned about the sun.  We talked about how the sun controls our weather, and we learned that the sun is a giant ball of hot gas!  We sang Oh Mr. Sun http://kids.niehs.nih.gov/games/songs/childrens/ohmrsun.htm and played musical chairs. We made sun art with a paper plate, and yellow and orange art materials.  We loved the sunny warm weather we had yesterday afternoon!  We spent the whole afternoon on the playground!  We also re-arranged our playground to fit in all of our new equipment!  I love our playground!  Thank You Big Emilea, Miss Vicki, Miss Wendy, Billy and all of the prek kiddos for all of your hard work yesterday!

REMINDER: Wednesday from 10:45-11:30 We will have our Easter Party.  Everyone is invited to come.  Every child needs a dozen filled plastic eggs for our egg hunt.  One of our moms brought in a craft if anyone else would like to be in charge of a craft or game let me know.  PLA will be closed Thursday 4/2 –  Monday 4/6 for Spring Break. We will reopen on Tuesday 4/7.

Weather – Rain

Today we learned about rain.  We read The Rain Came Down by David Shannon.  We have also been reading and looking at our Weather Science series books that have been in our Science Center this month.  We made umbrellas out of big coffee filters, we used markers to color it and then sprayed it with a water bottle to make a cool tie-dye effect. We used cotton ball clouds to transfer rain water from one bowl to another.  This afternoon we filled a cup with water and put a shaving cream cloud on top.  Next we dripped blue watercolor onto the cloud until the color started making it rain into the cup.  Just like when a cloud gets full of water droplets and it rains!  After we did it as a group we let them experiment with their own cup and a dropper.  Thanks Miss Wendy for playing with us today!

REMINDER – Easter Party Wednesday April 1st 10:45-11:30 every child that will be here needs to bring a dozen plastic filled eggs for our egg hunt. Spring Break April 2nd – April 6th PLA will be closed.  We will reopen Tuesday April 7th.

Weather – Wind

Our weather subject for today, was wind!  We read The Wind Blew by Pat Hutchins.  We had a race using our wind and a big pom pom… check facebook for race photos!  www.facebook.com/plaacademy  We used watered down paint, droppers, and a straw to make wind art!

Kimber came in for a visit… R’s new lab puppy!

Weather

This week our theme is Weather.  Yesterday, we talked about the 4 seasons and what the weather is like during each season. We made a chart to see which season our class likes the best – Summer and Autumn tied with 5, Spring has 4 and Winter has 2.  We learned about clouds, we talked about the different types and what kind of weather each one would likely bring.  We read It Looked Like Spilt Milk by Charles G. Shaw.  This is a great cloud book and the children can help read it.  It is about all of the things clouds can look like.  We were lucky to have some clouds to look at on the playground yesterday too!!  At table time we made cloud art with blue construction paper, cotton balls, glue, and white paint.

Trash Truck!! :o)

Families are always welcome to hang out!

Weather Chalk Art

Weather Chalk Art

Clouds for Cloud Day!!

Sorting Weather Pictures

Duck Duck…

Goose!!

Early Morning Watercolor

Early Morning Watercolor

Happy First Day of Spring

We practiced writing the letter A on the white board. We painted with q – tips on black construction paper… we called it flowers in the dark! Have a wonderful weekend!

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Peeps Play Dough

What says spring more than those little sugar coated marshmallows… Peeps!  Thank you to Miss Tawni, one of our moms, for finding this recipe and buying all of the ingredients for us to make it at preschool!  It was so much fun!  Here is the link if you would like to try this at home… http://kidsactivitiesblog.com/51416/candy-play-dough.  Even though this is 100% edible, I don’t think I would share that secret with your child.  They are bringing the batch that they made home with them today.

Spring

Now that the excitement of the leprechaun and St. Patrick’s Day is over, it is time to get back to normal around here!  Our theme for the rest of the week is Spring!  I think we are all ready for winter to be over, at least I know that I am!  We read The Tiny Seed, by Eric Carle.  We talked about the three most important things seeds need to grow… dirt or soil, water, and sunlight.  For table time we created flower art using plastic forks.  http://www.kidsplaybox.com/spring-art-tulip-painting/

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

That sneaky little leprechaun escaped our traps again this year.  He also left a huge mess, and played a few tricks on us!  He left big rocks on our playground that were half painted gold.  He also left notes under the rocks that led us to a special treat.  We didn’t get his gold, but we did get a treasure!  We made 3D Rainbow Art at table time.  Thanks to one of my favorite blogs for the 10 second rule we were able to keep our paper strips in place.  http://www.teachpreschool.org/2012/03/paper-rainbows-and-the-ten-second-rule/  Plus, hearing them count over and over again at art time was a great thing too!  Many of them decided 10 seconds wasn’t long enough so we had many that counted to 20 over and over again :o) We had a special breakfast of Lucky Charms and lunch was corned beef and cabbage!

Where is that leprechaun?

Checking our traps

We found the treasure!

Our Treasure!

Our Class Pet – Disney

The children got to meet their new class guinea pig this morning.  It was love at first sight!  After all of the children suggested names we agreed on the final two… Linny and Disney.  We then took a final vote and Disney was the unanimous winner!  Classroom pets can bring a lot to a classroom!  Here is a wonderful article I found on the benefits of classroom animals  http://www.petsintheclassroom.org/teachers/benefits-of-classroom-animals/

Our letter of the week is A.  We did our A song, learned how to make A in sign language, and talked about words that begin with the letter A.  We put the finishing touches on our Leprechaun Traps.  We will lay them out this afternoon and hope we can catch him tonight!  Miss Coli, from the library, came in to read and share a felt board story with us. We enjoyed another beautiful day on the playground and welcomed a new friend today!

A in Sign Language

A in Sign Language