we’ve got a little channel over there.

a place for you to see us in action…with sound…hoping you can feel the love.

we’ve got a couple of kids with food allergies this year.  one way to help ensure that they eat the food that is safe for them and to take the focus off of their food differences at snack time is to add names to our snack spots.

when preschoolers are off washing hands and filling their own water cups, a teacher writes names on the paper napkins!

this has proved a tricky way of figuring out where to eat snack…it turns out that when we write on paper napkins, the letters can get a little bumpy…and don’t look like they usually do!

: )

by the way, the snacks this year have been wonderful.  families have the option of signing up to bring fruit or vegetables.  bringing extra things (crackers, cookies, pretzels, etc) is optional.  while it is completely wonderful and adequate for families to simply drop off a bunch of bananas or a few cans of green beans, we’ve been relishing the joy of some pretty creative foods.

thank you, thank you, thank you!

 

i remember years ago reading about how many children don’t know the traditional nursery rhymes. believe me, some make me cringe…either for what they say or what they mean or what the are rooted in. but there is a place and a way to incorporate these “way back when” things into life now.

and “patty-cake, patty-cake” was one of them. the roots of this rhyme give me pause too, so i offer that. during b week we had babies and bears in the room. i suggested this might be a poem that some of them knew from when they were a baby.

we acted it out with a doll (while modeling basic baby safety-no strong arm pulling, no hard hand clapping, etc) and there were reports that some children went home to their infant siblings and tried it too….and it worked! (they smiled).

in preparation for our bear hunt we painted a few big pieces of paper-with our hands-and then snuck over to make a couple of handprints on a paper with the poem printed on it.

then in a moment of spontaneity i drew a “B” on children’s hands if they desired. that way when we “marked it with a B,” we could trace the B! that was my favorite. since it was a dry erase marker, it was gone during snack time handwashing. this is another time when i tell the children that this is a “special preschool thing”–not a “do it again at home thing.”

and oh, joy, when a real baby came for show and tell. yeehaw!!!

horrible quality of video…but a glimpse of the somewhat risky, messy and fabulous play going on…

and then there was the mud play today…

we’re taking advantage of this warm weather!

oh, this was a good one.  we read our very familiar, we’re going on a bear hunt (several times!).

we brainstormed what we thought were realistic colors of real live bears.  we acted our eating behaviors of real bears (fishing for salmon, pulling berries off bushes, eating honey from a hole…).

we brought bears and babies for show and tell (then graphed the results)…bears ruled!

there were so many bears that we had to add on to the graph!

we used leftover brown paint to cover big pieces of paper, let it dry, added brown scribbles, and turned it into a bear!

we started the day with a wild run around the room with mr rob bear chasing us.

but, oh, the greatest fun {i had, anyway} was our very own bear hunt.  there was not a bit of mystery about it.  every step was explained ahead of time.  the children knew mr rob or mr matt would be holding the big paper bear we made.  they knew he’d be hiding behind the shed.  they knew i would go first.  they knew we’d chant “we’re going on a bear hunt…” over and over. they knew he would growl like a bear.  they knew he would chase us down the hill.  they knew he wouldn’t catch us or even touch us.  they knew that i would scream.  they knew that the bench at the bottom of the hill was our “house.”  they knew they could wait on the bench the whole time and watch. they knew we would pretend to lock the door.  they knew the bear would walk away.  and they knew we’d do it all over again.

but i’ll tell you, even knowing all that doesn’t take away the excitement!  and the fear!  the “safe scared” feeling!

run, children, run!  a bear is chasing us!  run!

man, i can still feel the rush.

now big bear is hung up our elevator to bid us farewell every day.  some like to think big bear just wanted a hug.