Last Week's Learning! December 1st - 5th

LAST WEEK’s Highlights

Preschoolers returned from Thanksgiving break full of excitement for the Holiday Season.  Over break we were greeted with chilly temperatures and a blanket of snow as Jack Frost made his way to Richmond, Vermont.  December has finally reached us, and with that, so has the countdown for the beginning of Winter, December 21st!

METEOROLOGIST’S use SNOW GAUGES and one foot rulers and yard sticks to measure how much snow has fallen in our preschool classroom thus far!  

Mathematicians count, sort and create TRANSPARENT ICICLES using flower, sphere and and tri-beads. Scholars also notice that tri- beads  resemble the letter “T”, “Y”, fans, spokes on a car, an anchor and a triangle! Below Ethan uses “ceiling fan”beads and  “old black fan” beads to create a pattern on his icicle!  

Scholars create snow and ice sculptures using “SNOW-DOUGH”!

Ben re-enacts the Snowman song with his ICE-BLUE playdough. First there was a snowman who stood nice and tall - but then he started melting and melting and melting - and then there was a puddle and no snowman at all!

Ophelia and Henry work together as a team to construct an ice castle sculpture! Scholars use their imaginations to invent many different winter creations using “snow-dough.”

FIND the RHYME GAME

PA (Phonological awareness) is a broad term that includes the awareness of words, rhymes and syllables. Over the past several months your child has participated in numerous PA activities that promote foundational literacy skills and prepares them for future formal reading.

Throughout the month of December we will focus on several RHYME skills that include;

RECOGNITION: Involves the ability to recognize that two words rhyme (sound the same).

“Does catch rhyme with pitch?”

“Which of the following words rhyme… catch, patch, rich?”

COMPLETING: Involves the ability to complete or predict a rhyme word in a sentence.

“Jack and Jill went up the _____ (hill).”   

PRODUCTION: Involves producing a rhyme without any clues.

“What rhymes with blue?”  

Today we read BEAR SNORES ON by Karma Wilson. In this rhythmic story BEAR wakes up from a long winter nap (HIBERNATION) and is greeted by many forest friends. After reading and discussing the book scholars played a literacy game, FIND the ANIMAL RHYME!

Attached are pictures of the animal characters found in the FICTION book, BEAR SNORES ON. Please assist your child by cutting out the animal pictures to create nine animal cards. After cards are cut, place the animal cards facing up on a flat surface. Parents can sing the following chant to the melody of “Here we go around the Mulberry Bush”:

“I know an animal that rhymes with (adult substitutes the initial sound, e.g., pair), rhymes with pair, rhymes with pair. I know an animal that rhymes with p air and the animal is a___________ (child finds the animal card BEAR and says BEAR!” Continue playing until all the cards have been identified! *Rhyme words can be silly words… (Mopher rhymes with gopher!:)

Enjoy the GIFT OF TIME while playing this literacy game with your child!

Next week PRESCHOOL DISCOVERIES

December 8-12

NEW VOCABULARY

Rhombus

Rhombus Collages

Using cut straws and Contact Paper Boards to  

Count, Sort and Create RHOMBUS Patterns

How many sides does a rhombus have?

What is your favorite shape?

Circle, Square, Triangle, Rectangle or Rhombus?

BENNY’S PENNIES

Writing and Illustrating a

PRESCHOOL CLASS BOOK!

If you had five shiny pennies what would you buy?

WINTER PAPER CHAINS

Predicting and Creating Patterns with Printed Paper and Watercolor Paper

Mitten Song

THUMBS IN THE THUMB PLACE FINGERS ALL TOGETHER,

THIS IS THE SONG WE SING IN MITTEN WEATHER,

BUNDLE UP YOUR FINGERS AND BUNDLE UP YOUR TOES,

AND DON’T FORGET TO WRAP A WARM SCARF AROUND YOUR NOSE!

To assist us with a special culinary holiday activity we are asking each scholar to donate 1,2, or 3 oranges! Please send oranges to school prior to Thursday, December 11! Thank you in advance for your donation!:)

New Vocabulary! November 24th

“Out of the mouths of babes” "comes truth or wisdom", is an expression one could hear echoed in the RES preschool classroom last week as scholars defined new vocabulary. Preschoolers certainly showed adult wisdom and understanding as they reflected on learning experiences which lead them to true understanding of the concepts!  

One foundational literacy goal is to introduce numerous new words throughout the preschool year followed by meaningful, hands-on activities to support future reading success! Below is the list of the new vocabulary words that were introduced to students and their definitions:

Evaporate:

 

• It means water goes into the clouds.
• It goes up to the sky and the clouds get really, really heavy and then the raindrops come down.
• Water goes up to sky into the clouds.
• It goes up in the sky in the clouds.
• Floats up to the air.
• Water disappears.
• Water goes up into the sky clouds get heavy and it rains.
• When you paint at the easel and the next day when you come back it is all dry.
• When the water goes up into the sky and when the clouds get heavy it rains.
• When it rains it goes back up.
• Rain comes down from the clouds, when it dries it goes home – back in the clouds.

Habitat:

  

• Something that is an animal’s home.
• Animals live in it. So there are animals that live in the woods that is their habitat, birds live in nests and squirrels live in trees.
• Fish lives in it.
• Animals live in habitats.
• Where something lives.
• Where pets live.
• Animal is like a habitat it is where animals live.
• Where a butterfly hatches.
• Umm, a habitat is like a cocoon.  

Blossom:

• Something that grows in your garden it is a big flower. Blossoms are flowers.
• Something you plant.
• A flower
• Like a sunflower blossom.
• A flower growing.
• A sunflower that grows.
• When flowers pop up

Pattern:

              

• White, green, white, green
• Yellow, orange, yellow, orange
• It is two colors red, orange, red, orange
• Green, yellow, green, yellow
• Girl, boy, girl, boy
• It’s like when you put a bead on there and another bead on there.
• Red, green, red, green
• Colors that change (pink red pink red).
• Something that repeats itself over and over again.

Transparent:

• A jewel
• It’s like a glass and water is transparent.
• Something clear
• You can see through it.
• A clear bag
• Something like a bag or maybe some jewels something that is clear
• It’s like our cups - you can see through it.

Symmetrical:

    

• You do one side and you do the other.
• The same on both sides.
• If you make a circle and you only put dots one side it makes dots on the other side.
• Something is dry on one side and something is wet on the other side.
• The butterflies.

Sphere:

• Something that is round like a fruit or a ball for a dog they love balls.
• Something that rolls.
• A circle
• A shape
• It’s a ball that is big.
• Its round like an orange.
• Round and it rolls around and around.
• A circle that rolls away.
• It’s something round and rolls like a ball.

Disk:

• Something that doesn’t roll
• A flat circle
• It's round but flat.
• A round thing
• Something that is flat like a circle except it is flat
• It’s like a flat pancake
• Something that is really flat like a Frisbee or a picture
• Something that is round and flat