Green Week!

Green Week marked the third full week of school as we engaged in a variety of fun green activities.  At the art table, the children glued green collages, and printed green leaves.

At story time, we read "Green Eggs and Ham", and then made green eggs for snack on Wednesday.

Green Week also marks the point at which our color themed weeks merge with our Fall Gifts from the Earth Theme, and so this week we began talking about Fall and its Gifts.

We began our conversation as we observed the beautiful trees outside our classroom window.

The leaves are mostly green now, but soon they will change color and fall to the ground.

So in addition to green leaves, we printed leaves that were yellow, orange and red. 

We talked about our upcoming field trip to Indian Ladder Farm where we will pick apples.

We took a pretend field trip and picked pretend apples in the classroom. 

We noted that beautiful colored leaves and yummy apples are two Fall Gifts from the Earth.  In the coming weeks we will continue to focus on our "color of the week", and we will also talk about and engage in activities that emphasize and highlight additional Fall Gifts from the Earth.

The children continue to engage in gross motor, fine motor and dramatic play activities daily, and do so both independently and in small groups.

Rosalba engaged the children in a fun art activity as they reviewed and practiced the Spanish colors of the Rainbow!

We celebrated Landon's birthday on Monday with a special Art Project and Snack!  

 Happy Birthday Landon!

Looking Deeper:  Exploration and Learning through Play

This week I would like to guide you through a closer look at our "cooking" activities.

Cooking is always a favorite activity among the children. This may be true because cooking is familiar; it serves as a bridge between home and school as many of the children frequently cook with their parents.  Perhaps it is because they get to eat the yummy things they cook.  Or maybe it is because there is something magical about cooking!  It looks one way at the beginning, then you mix all this stuff together and it turns into something different and delicious at the end!  

In reality, cooking is a wonderful vehicle for teaching Science, Math and Language Arts skills to young children!  These activities call for identifying, sorting, ordering, measuring, counting, timing and observing, while at the same time providing exercise of small motor skills. 

"Hmmmm maybe I do like Green Eggs after all!"

Have a fun and restful weekend!