This week we are celebrating the letter T and St Patrick’s Day with Tom Tom the Leprechaun as our theme. This pretend character loves rainbows, the color green, gold and being outside in the trees. How fun that we still have a lot of green around since it is March’s Color of the Month: the playdough and tools are green, the Tub Table has green digging and sculpting tools, and all the Tiny Things. Our new Alphabet Friend is Terry who will be covered in tape this week! We have two tunnels to crawl through.
There is a pretend tornado that we can color and paint while it spins from a hook on the ceiling. To reach to the top, we moved the tables together so YES, children stood on the table today!
Our Coping Skill is Tree time. Spending time outside with trees is known to reduce feelings of stress. By looking at trees we are also using our previous Coping Skills of Exploratory orienting and Far off gaze.
During Clean Up we are listening to Irish jigs…continuing to practice stopping and freezing when the music stops.
On Tuesday we welcomed our Golden Letter friend, Theo, and started making leprechaun houses and a forest scene for some more pretend leprechauns. Read on to learn more about our day.
Conversation Starter: Party Snack Time
All week we are having a Tom Tom the Leprechaun Party during Snack Time. We are sorting and categorizing things that Tom Tom likes. Thank you, families for helping us learn via one of our favorite times of day!
Morning class: We had party napkins from Sophie, a lot of green and golden food and drink from Arthur and Julian and rainbow cupcakes from Millie! Thank you, friends!
Afternoon class: We had party napkins from Cade, green applesauce pouches from Rex, rainbow fruit loop treats from Cade, and gold covered chocolate coins from Annie. Thank you friends!
P.S. We added extra napkins and gold coin wrappers to our leprechaun houses…they will go home on each child’s last day!
Conversation Starter: Story Time
Is Tom Tom real?
No. He is a pretend leprechaun fairy who lives in the forest and loves rainbows, gold and the color green.
Your preschooler might recall the answers to these questions based on our story song cards today:
- What does Tom Tom like to play in? The dirt…there is a lot of it on the forest floor!
- What does Tom Tom love to fix? Shoes!
- What does Tom Tom like to build? Forts!
- What animal is he smaller than? A cat!
- What does Tom Tom put on first? His underwear of course! We used this verse to continue the conversation about body safety…underwear covers our “bathroom parts” and at preschool no one should touch those parts…for instance, even if a child wants Ms Kristin to help wipe in the bathroom, only the toilet paper is touching the child’s body.
Conversation Starter: Project Time
What did you make with a strawberry basket today?
A leprechaun house! Children have access to ribbon, pipe cleaners, paper, tape and other odds and ends. We will work on them every day this week!
Conversation Starter: Circle Time
Did Ms Kristin throw toys?
Yes, though it was more like a toss. We went outside today for Show and Tell where children had the opportunity to decide if their Show and Tell items were “throwable” or not. If so, Ms Kristin tossed it gently to them. If not, Ms Kristin carefully passed or rolled it to them. No items were damaged today!
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