Spring Carnival/Open House/Fundraiser

What a terrific day for our annual spring carnival/open house/fundraiser!
We raised money for tuition scholarships through our bake sale.  Thank you to all those who baked and bought!  We had a lot of yummy things to enjoy!

The kids enjoyed visiting each station at the carnival.  They had a great time making little monkey puppets.

Fishing at the fish pond was always a good catch!

 They also had fun bowling!

No doubt that the highlight was face painting!  Our face painter, Elena Lacayo, is SO incredibly talented!  We love when she comes to paint happy children's faces at the preschool!

 

Thanks for making Treasure Tree Academy so amazing!

Nursery Rhymes and Fairy Tales- "Sheep"

To finish off our unit on nursery rhymes and fairy tales, we focused on the rhymes and stories about sheep.  The children really enjoyed singing the many verses of "Mary Had a Little Lamb," "Little Bo Peep," and reviewing "Baa, Baa, Black Sheep."  We also practiced our listening skills as we counted how many times the word sheep came up in "Little Boy Blue." We introduced the "sh" blend this week as we learned about sheep and shapes.

For one of our projects this week, the children covered their own sheep with fluffy "wool" to make it look real!  They enjoyed pulling apart the "wool" to make it soft and fluffy and loved how their sheep looked when it was finished!

 

 This week we also worked a lot on numbers.  Sheep are perfect for counting, so we made a counting book full of them!  The 3's books went from 1-5 while the Pre-K kids took a couple of days and made books from 1-10!  This was a great introduction to addition as we talked about  how we could combine different amounts to get a larger amount.  They really had a great time as they glued, counted, and traced the numbers!

They were all so proud of their books!  They loved "reading" them too!

  Mother Goose brought her loyal goose Goosey with her again this week, but instead of the children getting to see the eggs Goosey laid, Mother Goose had a different surprise in store...

an umbrella full of raindrops!  What a perfect surprise with all the spring rain we've been getting lately!  The kids were so thrilled and delighted to get under the big umbrella together and to choose a raindrop with a special activity on it!

 One day a week, the kids get to choose whatever they want off the shelves during centers.  They look forward to this exciting day to get different games and toys down that they maybe haven't played with for a while.  I love seeing the children play so well together and take turns and help each other.  Preschool is such a great way to facilitate those positive social interactions.

We had some fun music times this week with practicing songs for the graduation program,

playing the children's favorite song/game of ponies galloping,

and some good ol' freeze dancing!

These children are growing up!  I can hardly believe it's almost the end of the school year!  We've learned so much and had so many wonderful experiences this year and we still have a few more weeks filled with adventure and learning to go! 

Nursery Rhymes and Fairy Tales - "Jack"

This week we enjoyed learning the nursery rhymes and fairy tales about Jack!  These were very fun for the kids to hear and say together as a class!  There are quite a few "Jack" rhymes and stories.  We covered "Jack and Jill," "Jack Be Nimble," "Jack and the Beanstalk," "Little Jack Horner," and "This is the House that Jack Built."

With "Jack and Jill," the kids got to make their own puzzle!  This was a new experience for many of them.  The Pre-K students cut out their puzzle pieces and then after putting them together as a group, they were able to fit their pieces together. 

The younger classes did a great job of carefully coloring their "Jack and Jill" puzzle picture and then...

felt SO big once they'd put their own puzzle together!

These kids enjoyed working on another "Jack and Jill" puzzle as a team!

"Jack be nimble,

Jack be quick,

Jack jump over the candlestick!"

This short, simple nursery rhyme was perfect to practice saying as they got ready to jump over the candlestick!

I love the happy expressions as the children learn and do new things!

This week we enjoyed reading the classic fairy tale "Jack and the Beanstalk."  Classic stories and rhymes are so wonderful to share together with children.  I love how they see that good wins in the end and that even though they felt nervous for Jack while he was trying to get away from the mean giant, in the end he was safe and it all worked out.  Many of the classic stories have great meaning and application for our lives too!

After reading this story, we played a math game to see who could get their "magic bean" up to the giant's castle first.  The children took turns rolling the die and counting the corresponding spaces.  We worked on one-to-one correspondence, counting, and number recognition as well as cheering for others and taking turns!

Our letter this week was "N."  We also worked on the numbers 9 and 19 with the Pre-K classes on Friday.  They all did a great job this week!  Learning through play and practice is the best way to learn!

Nursery Rhymes and Fairy Tales- "3"

April is our month to learn about Nursery Rhymes and Fairy Tales.  This week we learned about the stories and rhymes that had "3" in them: "Three Blind Mice," "Baa, Baa, Black Sheep," "Goldilocks and the Three Bears," "Rub-A-Dub Dub," and "The Three Billy Goats Gruff,".  Hands down, the overall favorite was "Three Little Kittens"!  They loved acting out this little rhyme and the Pre-K classes are getting very good at memorizing it too. 

They absolutely loved "losing" their mittens and then excitedly found them and brought them back to show the mother or father cat!

I loved how some of the kids were so expressive in their parts.  Acting out stories helps to reinforce the stories and helps develop confidence in expression as well!

When I asked the kids what kind of pie they thought little kittens might like, we got some wonderful ideas from strawberry pie to mouse pie and everything in between! : )

This week we worked on sequencing with the story "Goldilocks and the Three Bears".  Most of the children were pretty familiar with this story so it made it a good choice for this activity.  They worked on remembering the events in the story in order.  We used a lot of sequencing vocabulary like "first," "next," and "last," as well as "before" and "after".  They did a really good job with this activity.

Many of the younger children are getting quite good at using scissors! 

For our letter of the week, we learned "K."  We also played our ABC Bingo to review and reinforce all the letters.  We covered the letters with little bear manipulatives like the "Three Bears" story.

Every day as part of our gathering time at the rug, we have time set aside for the children to share whatever they would like with the teacher and the class.  Everyone has something to say!  This is a great opportunity for the children to express themselves in a group setting, to share feelings and emotions, to share things they're involved in, or share exciting things they've done, etc.  This time also gives them a chance to practice those important skills of taking turns and listening to others.

The children always look forward to music time! 

I loved catching this little moment.  She had just checked out a book from our lending library and couldn't wait to read it so she just took a few minutes during centers to quietly look through her new book!  It makes me so happy to see children enjoying books and letting their love for them grow!  Keep nurturing that love for books at home by reading to your children each day-it's so important as they are getting ready to read and even starting to read.

I love all the things going on in this little picture.  From buying and selling play food to taking care of babies. These children have built strong friendships over the school year!

Enjoying their time to draw and doodle on the big white board!  I also love seeing how well all of the children are learning to share.  The social skills that are taught, practiced, and learned in preschool are just as important as the academic preparations for kindergarten.

The children really enjoy playing with the babies we have at the preschool.  They like putting them down for a nap, feeding them, and changing their clothes.

We had a special treat this week with a REAL baby in one of our classes!  Many of the kids in this class don't have a baby at home.  It was darling how they gravitated to this happy little guy and how they adored him and were so intrigued by him!

We had a terrific week!