January Back to PreSchool

Back to School - January

 It's January and back to school after a -what seems long - break for Christmas and New Year's holidays.  Some of the children were here during the two weeks for childcare some of the time, others not at all (VPK was on break).  Knowing they would be excited to return to schedule, yet probably lost a little ground, we wanted to have a fun day.  We used one of our music CDs to begin with morning circle time to bring in the children for fun.  All ages join us for morning circle time and/or story time as they feel comfortable and their attention span allows.  Even the youngest (not quite 1 year) joined us for circle time and drank her bottle as she watched and joined in occasionally vocalizing or pointing.

With fun in mind, we brought out some of their favorite activities as well as the new Audubon birds purchased over Christmas, and the new or replacement musical items.  FYI - cactus rain sticks are not ok to be used as drum sticks even though the children think they are. 😬  Everyone really enjoys the Frog Rasp with it's unique ribbit like sound and different tones according to where you tap.  If you would like one they are available through Amazon.  They also have a variety of cactus rain sticks.  The Audubon Birds are made by Wild Republic but we have been purchasing them through Amazon .  They make the actual bird calls, or squirrel sound, when they are squeezed.  The Purple Martin is my favorite bird call, and they are so pretty.

Find the birds - there are 8!

We began our early morning fun with big piece floor puzzles that they could complete on their own if they were up to it, or work with friends.  They worked on these for almost an hour!  Love the big piece puzzles!  Most everyone here really enjoys puzzles at whatever stage they are at.  Whether its the peg puzzles for the one year olds, the slightly more difficult puzzles for the two year olds, or the jigsaws and more for three to five year olds.  We have a great puzzle collection and use them as transition as well as open during free play and open centers.  We will be bringing in more fairy tale and nursery rhyme puzzles this month to go along with our theme.

For VPK centers we used some of the items we were using the last of VPK so they were very familiar with them and didn't have to learn a new process or skill today.  The majority of the children accomplished these centers very easily.  It was wonderful to see!

We made our own activity cards for this one to help them understand the directions.  It worked!

For this one we modified the activity so they could focus on one word at a time.  Simplifying worked!

This picture is from last week, but playdoh was ready and available also.

This picture is from right before Christmas, but we did the same activity today.  Learning to put them in sequence from top to bottom is the hardest part!  Much of what we do is learning to follow direction or rules.

Learning to lace cranberries and cheerios.  This was fun!  The 3-5 year olds laced the cranberries and cheerios.  The two year olds simply laced cheerios as they could not get the cranberries to go on.

Infant enjoying texture and trying to pour apple scented oatmeal with red and green caps as well as measuring scoops.

 Our books for today related to being safe when out and about, and about being in cold environments and being safe.

Meals today were:
Breakfast:  Bagels, oranges, milk
Lunch:  Crockpot Chicken and Sweet Potato, Broccoli and Whole Wheat Bread.
Snack:  Spaghetti noodles, Spaghetti sauce.

Thanks for reading.  If you have any questions please send an email to:  NanasLearningPost@gmail.com