Week Six: October 8-12, 2012

Have you ever had a week where you thought you had everything planned out and then nothing goes as planned? YUP! That was our week six! It was a great week, BUT Miss Hopkins was very busy trying to finish up the Preschool REACH assessment, AND our class started book check out with our 4th grade librarians! As you can imagine this was very exciting for the preschoolers in room 121.

Fourth graders in Ms. Sweeney’s class volunteer their time to come down every Tuesday and Thursday to help the children check out books to take home. Each child is allowed to take home two books of their choice. When they are finished reading BOTH books, they are to return the books back in the library check out bag. Once the books are returned back in, your child is able to check out two new books the next time our librarians come to visit. Please make sure you do not throw out your child’s “Book Check Out Bag”! (It’s a large gallon Ziploc bag if you do). 

Week six included our continued study on height, measurement, compare/contrast, and we added SKIN coloring to the mix! This brought on a new awareness with each other and themselves that many of the children had not thought about before. We mixed red, yellow, white, black, and brown paints to create just the right skin color for each child in our class. They painted their skin color onto their person that they had traced, and cut out with Mrs. Espino! It was a huge math, science, art, and fine-motor skills project all in one!!!

We continued learning about measurement last week with using our height to compare and contrast objects in the room and with each other. In small groups, students illustrated (and some wrote down) what they were taller than and shorter than in our school. The children had a lot of fun exploring and being mathematicians. 

In language and literacy we have begun to focus on the proper formations of the letters in our names. Week six focused on the first letter in our first name. Each student had to find that letter on our word wall where they placed their name under that letter. Then, using their fingers they traced over the first letter of their name that had been written by Miss Hopkins. Afterwards, students used glue and black beans to create and form that first letter of their name again. This activity helped strengthen their fine-motor coordination skills, along with demonstrating their knowledge of the alphabet, print and its uses, and emergent writing skills.

As you can tell, we are busy learners in room 121. If you haven’t already filled out your parent volunteer forms from the main office, please do so by the end of this week. We really would like to start our volunteer calendar, but we do not have enough parents who have turned theirs in yet. If you need a copy, you may obtain one from the main office. Have a wonderful week!