Recently in Amy's Weekly Plans F10 Category

Overview

As the end of the year is rapidly approaching, our small groups are coming to a close. On Tuesday and Wednesday, our small groups will be finishing their projects and sharing with the class what they have done the past seven weeks. The children have enjoyed all of the interesting changes we made to the classroom this past week! Instead of changing the environment again, we will be incorporating a variety of new materials in order for the children to continue their active exploration. We are going to focus on making lines using different art media throughout the week. Wire, pipe cleaners, and paint are some of the materials that the children will be able to use to make lines. The children have been spending a lot of time on the playground. The water group began digging a "river" by the shed, and all of the children have enjoyed helping them by adding a system of rivers and lakes. This coming week we are going to take advantage of the nice weather by going for a "sensory walk" as a class. This will give the children an opportunity to focus on using all of their senses to experience the springtime changes.

Expressive Arts 

-Materials: Projector, overhead sheets, overhead markers, wire, pipe cleaners, collage materials, paint, thick and thin paint brushes, crayons, colored pencils, musical instruments (rhythm sticks, shaker eggs, tambourines, etc.) 

-Rationale: As we continue to talk about lines, we will provide different art materials in order for the children to express their ideas through different media. To provide more opportunities to use the projector, we will be providing blank overhead sheets for the children to express their ideas and see how their artwork changes when put it onto the projector. To support musical expression we will encourage the children to listen for rhythmic beats and create their own sounds. 

-Skills: Using a variety of materials, fine motor skills, and participation/creation in art and musical experiences, symbolic representation.

Sensory

-Materials: glurch, rocks, markers, straws
-Rationale: Many of the children have been drawn to the glurch, so we will enhance their experience by adding different materials throughout the week for further experimentation.
-Skills: Observation, prediction, ideas, sensory input, representation, physical properties

Science

-Materials: Insect terrarium, chick eggs, tadpoles, fish, mealworms, cockroaches,
-Rationale: The insect group put together an insect terrarium that will be on display in the science area. This will give the children an opportunity to observe the insects, as well as have a place to put future insects they find. The children will continue to add depth to their understanding of the life cycle through examination and care of the insects, tadpoles, and plants.
-Skills: Observation, prediction, comparisons, expressing ideas, using past experiences/knowledge of the natural world

Dramatic Play

-Materials: symbolic spider cave, cardboard tubes, tape, scissors, fabric for dressing up, stuffed animals, plastic animals
-Rationale: As the children continue to learn more about different kinds of bugs we decided to support their exploration by transforming the cave into a spider web. By providing other insects, yarn, chunks of wood, and sticks the children can make additions to the "web" during their dramatic play. The children have been using their previous knowledge and applying it to the symbolic spider cave. They have been tying up fake insects in the web, just like spiders. We will continue to provide materials for the children to use the cave in a creative way.
-Skills: creative expression, sharing ideas, social problem solving, communication, symbolic representation

Math and Manipulatives

-Materials: tacks, yarn, tack board, puzzles, graphs, charts, rulers, games with rules, musical instruments

-Rationale: The children have enjoyed using different materials to represent spider webs. In order to provide an opportunity to practice spatial sense and geometry skills, the children will make their own spider webs with tack board and yarn. We will also continue to observe the weather, and examine the changes we have seen over the past couple weeks. The children will also develop the ability to create and recognize patterns using musical instruments.
-Skills: Geometry, spatial sense, patterns, problem solving, working with peers, fine motor skills, synthesizing, connecting mathematical concepts with real life experiences

Language and Literacy
-Materials: Chalkboard, Boggle letters, envelopes, paper, pencils, chalk, writing worksheets, spider books, fiction and non-fiction books

-Rationale: As some of the children are transitioning to kindergarten next year, we decided to set up the writing center with a kindergarten feel. We will encourage combining letter sounds by using Boggle letters to form words. We will be providing "academic" worksheets for the children to use. We will also be providing questions on the chalkboard in order to give the children an opportunity to write more focused information on the board. All of the materials will give the children the ability to either symbolically represent school, or practice their academic skills.
-Skills: Letter recognition, engage in purposeful writing, creative expression, and communication through writing.

Blocks
-Materials: Wooden cars, unit blocks, hollow blocks, insects, stuffed animals, plastic toy animals
-Rationale: Adding cars to the unit block area will give the children an opportunity to explore different play themes, such as race tracks or streets. The stuffed animals and plastic animals are available to support and encourage the children's continuous interest in animal houses. As we provide different kinds of animals, we hope to support different kinds of house structures and play themes.
-Skills: Fine motor, large motor skills, creative expression, group problem solving, symbolic representation.

Large Motor 
Gym

-Materials: Rolling hill, slide, a frame ladder, donut hole, climbing ladders, hop-scotch, monkey bars

-Rationale: We encourage the children to think of new and creative ways to experiment with the equipment and challenge their physical abilities through play and other large motor games. 
-Skills: Upper body strength, balance and coordination, rolling, jumping and landing, throwing skills, target practice, and spatial and body awareness, and turn-taking 


Playground

-Materials: Boats, water, shovels, tricycles, water, blocks, buckets, kites, traffic signs

-Rationale: The children are enjoying digging and making the river on the playground. With the water group making boats to float, we are encouraging the other children to use materials in order to make their own boats to float down the river. This will give them an opportunity to express their ideas and problem solve if something happens to their boat (it gets stuck, it doesn't float, etc.) We also encourage the children to use different materials and props in order to support new and inventive forms of play or themes on the playground.
-Skills: Large motor skills, fine motor skills, communication, cooperation, coordination, endurance, problem solving skills.

Snack
Monday - Sunbutter sandwiches
Tuesday - Rice cakes & apples
Wednesday - Bananas & Graham crackers
Thursday - Animal crackers & oranges
Friday- Pumpkin muffins

Overview
During the last week the children had an opportunity to get to know the chicken life cycle. They are waiting with eager eyes for the 29th of May as this is when the chicks will start to hatch! Now that the butterflies have emerged, the children have been carefully observing their flying patterns. Our next step will be to release them to their new homes outside. Since Frances' visit last Monday the children have been learning more about self-expression through musical instruments. We will continue developing musical expression using different kinds of instruments, music, and dancing activities. We will continue to encourage painting activities by moving away from the easels and back to the table to continue with symmetry, shapes, and color. Another exciting addition to our classroom is the glurch! This substance consists of glue and liquid starch that slimes through the children's fingers allowing them to bend, shape, and stretch the glurch in any way they can imagine.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: paint, thick and thin paint brushes, crayons, colored pencils, musical instruments (rhythm sticks, shaker eggs, tambourines, etc.)
-Rationale: As the children continue using lines we will provide different objects for inspiration that incorporate a variety colors and shapes. To support musical expression we will encourage the children to listen for rhythmic beats and create their own sounds.
-Skills: Using a variety of materials, fine motor skills, and participation/creation in art and musical experiences, symbolic representation.

Sensory
-Materials: glurch
-Rationale: The children have had previous experiences with molding materials like clay, and play-dough. This new substance will provide the children with an opportunity to experiment with a new consistency.
-Skills: Observation, prediction, ideas, sensory input, representation, physical properties

Science
-Materials: chick eggs, butterflies, tadpoles, fish, mealworms, cockroaches, crickets
-Rationale: The children will continue to add depth to their understanding of the life cycle through examination and care of the insects, tadpoles, and plants. As the children make observations they begin to compare and predict future changes in new additions such as, our new chick eggs. We will emphasize care and respect and encourage the children to think about the needs of the living things in our classroom.
-Skills: Observation, prediction, comparisons, expressing ideas, using past experiences/knowledge of the natural world

Dramatic Play
-Materials: symbolic spider cave, camping materials, cardboard tubes, tape, scissors, fabric for dressing up, stuffed animals, plastic animals
-Rationale: As the children learn more about different kinds of bugs we decided to support their exploration by transforming the cave into a spider web. By providing other insects, yarn, chunks of wood, and sticks the children can make additions to the "web" during their dramatic play.
-Skills: creative expression, sharing ideas, social problem solving, communication, symbolic representation

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: puzzles, graphing, charting, measurements, games with rules, musical instruments
-Rationale: As the weather continues to get warmer the children will have a chance to notice trends in the temperature using the weather calendar. The children will also develop the ability to create and recognize patterns using musical instruments.
-Skills: Patterns, problem solving, working with peers, fine motor skills, synthesizing, connecting mathematical concepts with real life experiences

Language and Literacy
-Materials: Boggle letters, envelopes, paper, pencils, chalkboard, chalk, writing worksheets, spider books, fiction and non-fiction books
-Rationale: As some of the children are transitioning to kindergarten next year, we decided to set up the writing center with a kindergarten feel. We will encourage combining letter sounds by using Boggle letters to form words.
-Skills: Letter recognition, engage in purposeful writing, creative expression, and communication through writing.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, hollow blocks, insects, stuffed animals, plastic toy animals,
-Rationale: The stuffed animals and plastic animals are available to support and encourage the children's continuous interest in animal houses. As we provide different kinds of animals we hope to support different kinds of house structures and play themes.
-Skills: Fine motor, large motor skills, creative expression, group problem solving, symbolic representation.

Large Motor
Gym
-Materials: Rolling hill, slide, a frame ladder, donut hole, climbing ladders, hop-scotch, monkey bars
-Rationale: We encourage the children to think of new and creative ways to experiment with the equipment and challenge their physical abilities through play and other large motor games.
-Skills: Upper body strength, balance and coordination, rolling, jumping and landing, throwing skills, target practice, and spatial and body awareness, and turn-taking
Playground
-Materials: tricycles, shovels, water, blocks, buckets, kites, traffic signs
-Rationale: We encourage the children to use different materials and props in order to support new and inventive forms of play or themes on the playground.
-Skills: Large motor skills, fine motor skills, communication, cooperation, coordination, endurance, problem solving skills.

Snack
Monday -Edamame & crackers
Tuesday - Graham crackers & milk
Wednesday - Pretzels & celery
Thursday - Oranges & rice cakes
Friday- Cereal & milk

Overview:
This week we added chick eggs as another way for the children to observe life cycles. The children are growing more familiar with the term "life-cycle" as they have had a wide variety of experiences observing the cycles of seasons, insects, water, and plants. As the children observe, and care for the new eggs and baby chicks, they will be encouraged to apply their past knowledge of life cycles to predict future changes. Another recent addition that has captivated the children is the butterfly larvae. Last week the children had the opportunity to observe the caterpillars form chrysalises and begin their transformation into butterflies- stay tuned! The children have been very motivated to paint so we will continue our work using lines to represent ideas. Additionally we will provide clay as an alternative artistic medium for representation.

Expressive Art Area:
Materials: Table easels, floor easel, paint, thin and thick paint brushes markers, crayons, colored pencils, stencils, construction paper, scissors, and glue sticks.
Rationale: As the children gain confidence in making lines and filling them with color, we will add materials such as flowers and plants for inspiration.
Skills: Creative expression, representational abilities, fine motor skills

Sensory Area:
Materials: Clay
Rationale: The children have had previous experience using clay for creative expression and we will be using it again to foster the development of their knowledge about insects. As the children practice sculpting the clay to look like insects they know about, we will encourage them to pay attention to the parts and details of the insects.
Skills: Creative expression, self-expression, sensory exploration, discovery of physical properties, symbolic play

Science Area:
Materials: Incubator with chicken eggs, mealworms, mounted insects, caterpillars, magnifying glasses, insect puzzles
Rationale: The children are continually learning about different life cycles of plants, insects, and now chickens. As we engage in conversation with the children about the chicks we will encourage them to use their past experiences with animal life cycles in order to make predictions about the transformations to come. In addition, the class will benefit from having another animal in the classroom to learn to care for.
Skills: Observation, problem solving, critical thinking, comparisons, making predictions, knowledge of the natural world, expressing ideas, symmetry, and matching

Language and Literacy
Materials: Letter stickers, pencils, envelops, mailboxes, books on tape, alphabet, plant and insect parts with names.
Rationale: Adding the letter stickers to the writing center will allow the children to enhance letter recognition as well as begin combining letters and letter sounds to create words.
Skills: Letter recognition, engage in writing using letter stickers and alphabet stencils, creative expression, and communication through writing/ using stickers/ and dictation.

Math and Manipulatives
Materials: Puzzles, light bight, mosaic buttons, graphing, charting, measurement, games with rules
Rationale: The light bright provides an opportunity for the children to create patterns and symmetrical images as they arrange the pegs. The children are learning to use a bar graph as a way to record the weather. At the end of the week they count the number of days that were sunny, cloudy, rainy, or windy before adding them to the graph.
Skills: One-to-one correspondence, patterns, problem solving, working with peers, fine motor skills reasoning, and logical thinking, connect mathematical concepts with real life relationships, analyzing and synthesizing, searching and scanning

Block Area:
Materials: Insects, bugs, life-like vines
Rationale: The children are still fascinated by insects and continue to incorporate them into their dramatic play with the unit blocks. Since the children have been learning so much about insects, they are able to incorporate that knowledge into their play and extend the details of their storyline.
Skills: Creative expression, group problem solving, expressing ideas, sharing, construction skills, role play, large motor, collaboration, symbolic representation

Dramatic Play:
Materials: Supplies for camping, flowers, fabric for dressing up, hollow blocks
Rationale: The children have been provided with tubes, tape, scissors and other materials in order to create the materials they need to support their dramatic play. The goal of providing ambiguous materials is to encourage creative thinking and to develop their level/theme of play by changing their props. As we observed the children in the last week develop play around cocoons, camping, and battleships our props can be used in ways that work in all areas of interest for the children. The teachers will be available to support/guide the children to work together, generate ideas, and facilitate play themes if needed.
Skills: Creative expression, sharing ideas, social problem solving, self-expression, social skills, communication, role play, symbolic representation

Large Motor:
Materials: Obstacle course that includes various surfaces to walk across, bumpy slide, cushioned incline, hurdles, stairs, balls to throw at a target of into a basket, painted hopscotch track, monkey bars, climbing wall
Rationale: The obstacle course is set up to support all large muscle groups and to improve their endurance and agility. During gym time the children also participate in large motor games facilitated by a teacher to support a desired skill and following directions.
Skills: Upper body strength, balance and coordination, rolling, jumping and landing, throwing skills, target practice, spatial and body awareness, hand-eye coordination, and turn taking

Playground:
Materials: Trikes, hollow blocks, buckets, shovels, chalk, road signs
Rationale: We encourage the children to work together to express their creative ideas as we try to provide as many materials for them to explore and interact together. Children are able to explore and think of creative ways to build with the hollow blocks using shovels and buckets. They are making roads with the chalk and road signs to help direct the flow of the trike traffic.
Skills: Large motor skills, fine motor skills, coordination and endurance, creative expression, exploring the natural world

Snack:
Monday - Graham crackers & orange slices
Tuesday - Pretzels & apples
Wednesday - Popcorn
Thursday - Rice cakes
Friday- Celery & pretzels

Overview:

Over the past two weeks each child has been caring for his/her own seedling and many plants are growing and thriving. The children enjoy tracking growth and change in their plant as well as comparing theirs to the plants of others. The children are also bringing in insect specimens to investigate with magnifiers. They are amazed by the details they can see after enlarging the tiny bugs. Paint has been added to the easel to allow the children to continue their work with lines using a new artistic medium. The light projector in the cave will provide an opportunity for them to transfer some of their previous line drawings onto easel size paper before filling them in with paint. To foster school community and build stronger relationships with the children in Ross' class, we will begin having open classrooms each Friday. In addition to social benefits, the children can continue their engagement with materials related to plants and insects as Ross' class is exploring similar topics.

Expressive Art Area

Materials: colored and black paint with thin brushes at the easels, markers, crayons, colored pencils, stencils, tape, glue, and paper

Rationale: By adding in the easels and paint the children will be able to expand their current knowledge and practice with lines. Gradually (by mid-week) the children will be introduced to filling in the spaces between lines with color.
Skills: creative expression, fine motor skills, showing emotions or expressions through creative drawings or work, and responding to others or their own art work.

Sensory Area

Materials: planted seeds, water pipettes, dirt, journals

Rationale: The children are encouraged to assess the moisture level of the dirt before adding new water. By engaging their senses they become more keen observers of the needs of their plants. The children will also have an opportunity to compare and assess growing plants in order to make decisions about what each plant needs to ensure optimal growth.
Skills: sensory input, discovery, express wonder about the natural world, developing topical awareness and knowledge, seeking out information when needed, measurement, observation and recording skills.

Science Area
Materials: mounted insects, light table, crickets, mealworms, caterpillars, and magnifying glasses

Rationale: The children have expressed further interest in the abundance of new insects on the playground, in our classroom, and in their homes. Bringing the insects into the classroom for further investigation and observation is a great opportunity for the children to get a much closer look at the insects. As the children learn the different parts of insects and the importance of insects in our world, this part of our classroom will encourage children to learn and explore more about the insects and their life cycles.
Skills: scientific inquiry process, knowledge of the natural world, using tools for observation, collecting and recording data, comparison, classification, prediction
Math and Manipulatives

Materials: rulers, weather bar graph, Koi fish puzzles, mosaic buttons, spring bingo, bug matching game, insect sorting, and thermometers.
Rationale: We will encourage children to find symmetry in the natural world as it can be found in insects and plants. Measurement will be encouraged as a part of the data collection related to weather changes with thermometers, as well as using rulers to collect related to plant growth. The children will continue to expand their knowledge of graphing by recording and documenting the daily weather on the calendar, and then on the weather bar graph. Sorting, and matching skills will be facilitated through games and puzzles. 

Skills: ruler measurement, temperature measurement, observational recording, sorting, symmetry, matching, reasoning, logical thinking, comparisons, and making predictions.

Language & Literacy Area

Materials: new insects with names, names of insect body parts, and new plants with names. Light bright, colorful pegs, white board, and tracing materials for letter of the week (this week=W). Magnet letter board with pictures, alphabet in writing center, and drawing area. New insect, plant, and wildlife books, storybooks with tape player, 'question of the day'. 

Rationale: The signs and materials we have provided use both words and visual prompts support to early literacy in our classroom. The letter of the week will give the children an opportunity to use different materials to practice writing, and listening for the sound the letter W makes. The question of the day at morning arrival gives all children exposure to the idea that all letters in a combination represent meaning. Prompted conversation during snack time allows children to communicate emotions, ideas, and hold conversations with others. 

Skills: Begin to recognize and names letters and associate sounds with letters, use language for a variety of purposes, and engage in writing using letter-like symbols to make letters or words.

Block Area

Materials: Insects, bugs, plant life-vines. 

Rationale: The children have been showing increased interest in the role of insects in their block creations. As the children continue to build homes and incorporate the insects in their play the children will also have the opportunity to add plant life to their buildings. In this way the children can make their insect homes more realistic to the world around them. As children continue to expand their understanding of insects, they will have opportunities to add depth to their play. 

Skills: small muscle control, geometric sense, spatial and construction skills
Dramatic Play

Materials: camping props, flowers, kitchen set with food, woodland animals and habitat materials, sunglasses, frog and bird costumes, and music.

Rationale: The children are showing continued interest in "home building," of both human and animal habitats. As the children build these homes and incorporate their spring-themed learning, they will have an opportunity to incorporate more spring materials, such as camping materials. The children have been learning a lot about the animals as they emerge and become more active during the springtime. As we continue to learn about animals, the children can use the materials in the dramatic play area to represent their understanding and engage one another in pretend play. 

Skills: Creative expression, social problem solving, self-expression, group cooperation. To sustain interaction by cooperation, helping, sharing, and expressing interest, using constructive words and strategies to resolve conflict.

Large Motor Gym

Materials: obstacle course including uneven walking surfaces, cushioned incline, rolling mountain, hurdles, stairs, bumpy walk, and wobbly bridge. Building materials are available as well as balls with a target.

Rationale: The obstacle course encourages cardio-vascular endurance as the children participate in a series of physical challenges.

Skills: dynamic balance, upper-body strength, balance/stability, jumping and landing, crawling, stepping up, core-strength, body awareness, spatial awareness, target practice, creative and cooperative building.
Playground

Materials: bug catchers, shovels, rakes, buckets, mini shovels, chalk, tricycles, kites, and side walk chalk

Rationale: The children have found lots of wonderful things outside that relate our classroom activities. The children have been interested in looking and catching bugs for the classroom. The teachers encourage children to work together, digging, swinging, and exploring creative ideas. Our goal is to provide materials that inspire investigation, motor engagement and dramatic play. 

Skills: Cardiovascular endurance, fine and large motor skills, creative expression, observation and reasoning, eye-hand coordination, exploring the environment around them with the equipment and tools available.

Snack
Monday - Pizza
Tuesday - Trail mix
Wednesday - Popcorn
Thursday - Crackers & carrots
Friday- Frozen blueberries & yogurt

Overview:
This week the children will continue their paths of discovery related to spring, plants, and insects. The children will also have an opportunity to break into their small groups with the different student teachers and focus more on plants, water, and insects in a smaller more focused setting. Graphing and daily journaling the children's observations, questions, and new ideas about the new plant life or insects in our classroom will be the biggest change throughout this next week. The children will have ample opportunities to explore the changing environments both in our classroom and around our school with their small groups to take notice of the changes taking place in the environment. We will re-introduce painting at the easels so the children can continue their work with line using a new artistic medium.

Expressive Art Area
Materials: black paint with thin brushes at the easels, markers, crayons, colored pencils, stencils, tape, glue, and paper
Rationale: To enhance the children's observation skills by encouraging them to use lines as a way to represent plant and insect specimens as well as collect data. By adding in the easels and paint the children will be able to expand their current knowledge lines. Gradually the children will be introduced to filling in the spaces between lines with color.
Skills: creative expression, fine motor skills, showing emotions or expressions through creative drawings or work, and responding to others or their own art work.

Sensory Area
Materials: planted seeds, water cans, dirt, journals
Rationale: The children will have an opportunity to watch their own plant grow before their eyes. They will also become aware of the effort needed to help a plant grow and better understand the needs of a growing seed. As time goes on the children will be able to see the end result of hard work and the beauty of growing plants.
Skills: discovery, developing topical awareness and knowledge, seeking out information when needed, observing and recording skills. The children will also have an opportunity to compare growing plants and express wonder about the natural world.

Science Area
Materials: mounted insects, light table, crickets, mealworms, caterpillars, and magnifying glasses
Rationale: The children have expressed further interest in the abundance of new insects on the playground, in our classroom and in the children's homes. This is great opportunity to expose the children to insects for a much closer look. As the children learn the different parts of insects and the importance of insects in our world this part of our classroom will encourage children to learn and explore more about the insects and their life cycles.
Skills: The children will use their senses to explore their own environment, identify physical characteristics using tools, express wonder about the natural world and ask questions. During this exploration the teachers will encourage children to seek out answers in books or other resources. Emergent writing will be applicable when the children use their journals to record their ideas and observations.

Math and Manipulatives
Materials: Koi fish puzzles, sunken garden symmetry, mosaic buttons, spring bingo, bug matching game, insect sorting, thermometers, and rulers.
Rationale: We will encourage children to find symmetry in the natural world as it can be found in insects and plants. Measurement is encouraged as part of the data collection related to weather changes and plant growth. Sorting, and matching skills will be facilitated through games and puzzles.
Skills: sorting, symmetry, matching, measurement, reasoning, logical thinking, comparisons, and making predictions.

Language & Literacy Area
Materials: magnet letter board with pictures, alphabet in writing center, new seeds with names, insects with names and drawing area. New insect, plant, and wildlife books, and story books with tape player, 'question of the day'.
Rationale: The signs and materials we have provided use both words and visual prompts support to early literacy in our classroom. The question of the day at morning arrival gives all children exposure to the idea that all letters in a combination represent meaning. Prompted conversation during snack time allows children to communicate emotions, ideas, and hold conversations with others.
Skills: Begin to recognize and names letters and associate sounds with letters, use language for a variety of purposes, and engage in writing using letter-like symbols to make letters or words.

Block Area
Materials: Insects, bugs, plant life- vines.
Rationale: The children have been showing increased interest in the role of insects in their block creations. As the children continue to build homes and incorporate the insects in their play the children will also have the opportunity to add plant life to their buildings. In this way the children can make their insect homes more realistic to the world around them. As children continue to expand their understanding of insects, they will have opportunities to add depth to their play.
Skills: small muscle control, geometric sense, spatial and construction skills

Dramatic Play
Materials: Flowers, kitchen set with food, woodland animals and habitat materials, sunglasses, frog and bird costumes, and music.
Rationale: The children have been learning a lot about the animals as they emerge and become more active during the springtime. As we continue to learn about animals, the children can use the materials in the dramatic play area to represent their understanding and engage one another in pretend play.
Skills: Creative expression, social problem solving, self-expression, group cooperation. To sustain interaction by cooperation, helping, sharing, and expressing interest, using constructive words and strategies to resolve conflict.

Large Motor Gym
Materials: obstacle course including uneven walking surfaces, cushioned incline, rolling mountain, hurdles, stairs, bumpy walk, and wobbly bridge. Building materials are available as well as balls with a target.
Rationale: The obstacle course encourages cardio-vascular endurance as the children participate in a series of physical challenges.
Skills: dynamic balance, upper-body strength, balance/stability, jumping and landing, crawling, stepping up, core-strength, body awareness, spatial awareness, target practice, creative and cooperative building.

Playground
Materials: Shovels, rakes, buckets, mini shovels, chalk, tricycles, kites, and side walk chalk
Rationale: The children have found lots of wonderful things outside that relate our classroom activities. The teachers encourage children to work together, digging, swinging, making ice cream and exploring other creative ideas. Our goal is to provide materials that inspire investigation, motor engagement and dramatic play.
Skills: Cardiovascular endurance, fine and large motor skills, creative expression, observation and reasoning, eye-hand coordination, exploring the environment around them with the equipment and tools available.

Snack
Monday - Pizza
Tuesday - Popcorn & milk
Wednesday - Rice cakes & craisins
Thursday - Crackers & fruit
Friday- Animal crackers & milk

Overview:
This week we will continue to develop the curriculum topics planned for the spring. The children have been very interested in tracking the weather, finding insects and examining and sorting seeds. The children are encouraged to use all of their senses as well as thermometers to gather information about the weather before recording information on a calendar and simple graph. We will continue to search for insects and introduce new vocabulary for labeling parts and behavior as we examine them further. We will extend the children's experiences with plants by having each child plant, and learn to care for, his/her own seed. We will also continue to build on the concepts of line and symmetry by helping the children search for symmetry in the natural world and use line to represent their ideas and observations.

Expressive Arts:
Materials: markers, crayons, colored pencils, scissors, tape, glue, paper
Rationale: To enhance the children's observation skills by encouraging them to use lines as a way to represent plant and insect specimens as well as collect data.
Skills: creative-expression, fine motor skills, hand eye coordination, self- expression

Sensory:
Materials: sand table, plastic frogs, insects, snakes, and lizards
Rationale: To provide and opportunity to engage in small group interaction as they represent the way that frogs and lizards come out of their mud holes as a result of spring arriving. This activity also promotes learning about building homes for the frogs, snakes, and lizards as well as learning about how they move and what they eat.
Skills: creative expression, symbolic play, physical properties, sensory stimulation

Science:
Materials: seed sorting activity on the light table, identifying different types of insects, and bringing in any insects we find outside into the classroom. Weather calendar and graph. Tadpole and fish for observation. Paper, clipboards, markers, etc.
Rationale: As we enter into the spring season having these types of activities will help build collective awareness as the children learn about seeds, insects, and the spring season. They will be able to ask questions, share what they know about the materials, and become more observant. Children will have the opportunity to observe and record the growth of the seeds once they are planted this week and also record the weather each day.
Skills: observation skills, expressing thought, learning facts, recording skills, critical thinking, sorting, and making comparisons.

Language and Literacy:
Materials: magnetic letters and pictures of objects beginning with each letter of the alphabet, pencils, paper, tape, mailboxes with the children's names, envelopes, new books about insects and plants, and stories on tape in the loft.
Rationale: The magnetic letters and pictures will allow children to learn more about letter sounds as they search for objects that begin with each letter. Those who are more familiar with letters and letter sounds will be encouraged to combine letters and blend sounds to form words.
Skills: Fine motor skills, letter recognition, creative expression, and communication through writing/ dictation.

Math and Manipulatives:
Materials: interlocking puzzles, mosaic buttons for working with symmetry, spring bingo, sunken garden symmetry activity
Rationale: The children will have the opportunity to add the flowers to a symmetrical template of the sunken garden they saw at the Como Conservatory. To add depth to the children's understanding of symmetry we will introduce new axes of symmetry (i.e. diagonal, horizontal) to challenge their thinking. The spring bingo game will provide opportunities to work on matching skills as well as following directions.
Skills: matching, symmetry, patterns, games with rules, problem solving

Dramatic Play:
Materials: frog and bird costumes, kitchen set, woodland animals in the cave, flowers.
Rationale: We will be adding flowers to the dramatic play center to promote opportunities for the children to express what they know about our spring and plant curriculum topics.
Skills: creative expression, social problem solving, self-expression, group cooperation, listening skills, language development

Blocks:
Materials: hollow blocks, unit blocks, insects, cove molding, small wood shapes
Rationale: The insects were added to the unit blocks to help inspire children to build homes for, and act out what they have learned about insect behavior.
Skills: large motor skills, creative expression, group corporation, listening skills, problem solving, symbolic representation, manual dexterity

Large Motor Gym:
Materials: monkey bars, rolling slide, notch blocks, cushioned "rock", doughnut with slide, A-frame with an angled bridge between
Rationale: The new rolling slide has been a challenge embraced by the children as they use all their muscles and motor planning in order to reach the top. The new angled bridge that joins the two a frame ladders promotes balance as well as coordination.
Skills: large gross motor skills, balance, core-strength, coordination, climbing, grasping, risk taking, spatial awareness, depth perception.

Playground:
Materials: Shovels, rakes, trikes, wheel burrows, side walk chalk
Rationale: Now that spring is here children can use their large motor skills to pedal the trikes and pump on the swings. Bringing out the chalk has also created new forms of play like drawing lines to be used as a race track or road. Many of the children are digging in the sand and soil, which helps strengthen their core muscles and upper body.
Skills: cardiovascular endurance, large motor skills, problem solving, group coordination, balance, social skills.

Snack:
Monday: Blueberry Pancakes
Tuesday: Carrots and Pretzels
Wednesday: Rice cakes and Milk
Thursday: Cucumber slices and Crackers
Friday: Salad

Overview
This week we will be focusing on building collective awareness of the curriculum topics of spring, plants, and insects. To kick-off our exploration of spring, the children helped write new words to the "winter song" in order to reflect what they know about seasonal cycles. They will now begin charting weather patterns and temperatures in order to track patterns and change over time. The children's knowledge of the wide variety of plants will be enhanced by the field trip to the Como Conservatory this week. In the classroom we will start investigating seeds and discuss plant care in order to build up to a re-examination plant life-cycles. The children have already begun finding insects and worms on playground. We will emphasize respect for all life as we carefully examine these living creatures and wonder about their roles in nature.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: thin and thick markers, crayons, colored pencils, tape, staplers, glue sticks, scissors, paper punchers and construction paper
-Rationale: We will use lines to make shapes and practice arranging drawn and cut shapes to represent ideas.
-Skills: self-expression, creative expression, fine motor strength and control in hand and finger muscles.

Sensory
-Materials: fine sand, plastic frogs, lizards, and snakes, sticks, rocks
-Rationale: To provide an opportunity for the children to represent their knowledge of these animas and also engage in symbolic play with peers.
-Skills: sensory stimulation, knowledge of physical properties, symbolic play, creative expression, representational abilities

Science
Materials: insect pictures: caterpillars, beetles, frogs, grasshoppers, worms, etc, paper, makers/pencils. Seed sorting activity on light table with magnifiers and photos of plant life-cycles. A calendar for charting spring time weather patterns.
Rationale: We will give children an opportunity to express their interests, curiosity, questions or personal experiences with insects on the paper covered board of insects. This will raise awareness as we enter into the spring season and begin encountering more insects. We are also building collective awareness of plants by beginning with a variety of seeds for comparison and examination. Questions are posted to promote thinking and the sharing of ideas. The weather calendar will encourage children hone their observation skills by looking at the sky in order to chart different types of weather and record rising temperatures.
Skills: Generating ideas, making predictions, develop factual knowledge, scientific inquiry, critical thinking, making comparisons, sorting, observation and recording skills.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: new non-fiction books related to curriculum, tape-stories in loft, mailboxes, envelopes, organizer with children's names, an assortment of writing materials such as pens, pencils, markers, paper, tape, stickers, staplers, letter of the week "R" materials, a variety of fiction and non-fiction books.
-Rationale: We introduced tape stories to the loft as a way for children to gather together in a cozy place to enjoy the written word. They will also have the opportunity to independently follow the story line through illustrations and by listening for the cue to turn the page.
-Skills: fine motor, communication through writing/dictation, awareness of symbol systems, expansion of vocabulary, expression of thought, effective social interaction, letter recognition

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: spring bingo cards, mosaic pattern blocks, symmetrical interlocking puzzles, mirrors.
-Rationale: The spring bingo cards provide an opportunity to practice matching in the context of a group game with rules. The geometric shapes and mosaic pattern blocks are conducive to teaching/learning symmetry and also allow for hands-on exploration of this concept.
-Skills: matching, line patterns, geometry, spatial skills, patterns, symmetry, reasoning, problem solving, logical thinking, games with rules, fine motor

Dramatic Play
-Materials: frog and bird costumes, kitchen table and props, small plastic animals and woodland cave.
-Rationale: The frog and bird costumes give the children an opportunity to play out "spring themed" play scenes. They can reflect what they are learning about these animals and the change of seasons to use as a basis for their dramatic play. The symbolic cave is available with small plastic animals, fabric, and wood pieces for the children to use as they represent the changes they see in the outdoor environment and animal behavior.
-Skills: Role-play, symbolic play, peer interactions, social skills, social problem solving, sharing, symbolic representation, receptive language, listening skills, cooperation.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, insects, hollow blocks, thin boards, cove molding, clipboards, variety of small wood shapes.
-Rationale: The insects in the block area provide inspiration for building in new ways in order to create houses, caves, traps, etc.
-Skills: creative building, problem-solving, spatial skills, geometry, symmetry, symbolic representation, manual dexterity, upper body strength, group cooperation, listening skills.

Large Motor
Gym
-Materials: Roller slide, cushioned "rock", monkey bars, notch blocks, climber with donut slide, A-frame with ladder bridge
-Rationale: New roller slide provides the challenge of climbing to the top with the aid of a rope and the thrill of rolling down. The new cushioned rock is used to enhance balance and core strength as the children attempt to steady themselves without sliding off.
-Skills: balance, core-strength, coordination, grasping skills, climbing, upper and lower body strength, balance, hand-eye coordination, spatial awareness, depth perception, physical risk taking, construction skills

Playground
-Materials: shovels, buckets, bikes, insect examination cases, sidewalk chalk
-Rationale: We will continue to encourage upper body strength and coordination through digging in both the sand and soil. We are also supporting the development of propulsive skills through swinging and bike riding. The children took the initiative in using sidewalk chalk to draw a racetrack for the bikes---extra motivation to get rolling!
-Skills: Upper body strength, cardio vascular endurance, propulsion skills, social skills, balance, movement through space.

Special Interest
New fish were added last Friday! Brianne's fiancé Will brought in more Zebra Danios, sword tail, rainbow shark, and ghost shrimp to keep our lonely fish company. This of course sparked new excitement about fish which we will support by adding new reference materials and encouraging the children to share their interests and curiosities.

Snack
Monday - Pineapple Smoothies
Tuesday - Oranges & wheat crackers
Wednesday - Animal Crackers (Field Trip)
Thursday - Graham crackers & pumpkin butter
Friday- Popcorn & milk

Overview
Welcome back to school! The main focus for the first week back will be on building relationships with the new student teachers Kaila, Brianne, and Kim.

We will also begin the process of teaching the children the elements of art by starting with drawing lines. We will encourage the children not only to draw a variety of lines but also search for them in the environment and in the artwork of others. From there we will progress to combining lines to make shapes and symbols.

The Rock Group from last session sparked the curiosity of many other children in the class. Since this topic has such potential and depth, the Rock Group and I have decided to bring it into the classroom science center. The "experts" will help teach the other children what they know about rocks and new questions will also be explored.

With spring in the air, our life cycle curriculum and focus on transformation will really come alive. Over the next ten weeks we will develop the topics of seasonal cycles, plant, and insect life cycles.

The mathematical concept of symmetry will be addressed throughout the classroom with particular focus in the block area.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: thin and thick markers, crayons, colored pencils, tape, staplers, glue sticks, paper punchers and construction paper
-Rationale: To enhance the children's understanding of the artistic element of line by drawing thin, thick, straight, curved and zig-zag lines.
-Skills: self-expression, creative expression, fine motor strength and control in hand and finger muscles.

Sensory
-Materials: fine sand, small scoops, bottles, cups and funnels
-Rationale: To explore conservation concepts and contribute to the children's understanding of measuring volume.
-Skills: sensory stimulation, knowledge of physical properties, volume, conservation, fine motor coordination, pouring skills

Science
-Materials: a variety of rocks with sorting trays, tadpole, fish, mealworms, magnifying glasses, data collection clipboards
-Rationale: To give the children an opportunity to focus on the properties of rocks by studying size, shape, color, and texture as they sort them.
-Skills: scientific inquiry, observation, comparison, first-hand exploration, physical science, conceptual knowledge-knowledge of the natural world, descriptive language.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: letter tiles, mailboxes, envelopes, organizer with children's names, an assortment of writing materials such as pens, pencils, markers, paper, tape, stickers, staplers, letter of the week "R" materials, a variety of fiction and non-fiction books.
-Rationale: We will incorporate the concept of symmetry by encouraging the children to search for letters that are symmetrical using the letter tiles. We will also discuss the letter R, the sound it makes, words that begin with this letter, and practice writing.
-Skills: fine motor, communication through writing/dictation, awareness of symbol systems, expansion of vocabulary, expression of thought, effective social interaction, letter recognition

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: magnet board with geometric shapes and axis line, mosaic pattern blocks, symmetrical interlocking puzzles, mirrors, Construx builders, legos , light table and gems on top of the loft.
-Rationale: The geometric shapes and mosaic pattern blocks are conducive to teaching/learning symmetry and also allow for hands-on exploration of this concept. We will also support creative expression and construction skills through the building materials provided.
-Skills: geometry, spatial skills, patterns, symmetry, reasoning, problem solving, logical thinking, fine motor, construction skills.

Dramatic Play
-Materials: kitchen table and props, small plastic animals and woodland cave.
-Rationale: The symbolic cave is available with small plastic animals, fabric, and wood pieces for the children to use as they represent the changes they see in the outdoor environment and animal behavior.
-Skills: Role-play, symbolic play, peer interactions, social skills, social problem solving, sharing, symbolic representation, receptive language, listening skills, cooperation.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, hollow blocks, thin boards, cove molding, clipboards, variety of small wood shapes.
-Rationale: We will use the blocks to model symmetrical structures and encourage the children to find the line of symmetry. We will also support them as they create their own symmetrical structures.
-Skills: creative building, problem-solving, spatial skills, geometry, symmetry, symbolic representation, manual dexterity, upper body strength, group cooperation, listening skills.

Large Motor
Gym
-Materials: climbing ladders, monkey bars, notch blocks, climber with donut slide, A-frame with ladder bridge
-Rationale: To provide more climbing challenges along with opportunities for risk taking. The notch blocks will allow the children to creatively build their own designs for motor challenges.
-Skills: climbing, upper and lower body strength, balance, hand-eye coordination, spatial awareness, depth perception, physical risk taking, construction skills
Playground
-Materials: shovels, buckets, bikes (hopefully!)
-Rationale: The children will enjoy exploring the playground free of most of the deep snow.
-Skills: cardio vascular endurance, upper and lower body strength, social skills, balance, movement through space.

Snack
Monday - Animal crackers & milk
Tuesday - Granola bars & milk
Wednesday - Apples & graham crackers
Thursday - Pretzels & carrots
Friday- Popcorn & milk

Overview
Experimentation with water in its solid and liquid states has intrigued the children. This week we will introduce heat as another way to transform water and expand their understanding of the water cycle. The children have been using both standard and non-standard tools for measuring height and weight. Now we will incorporate measurement of volume through making fresh squeezed orange juice and experimenting with water at the science tables.

The introduction of printmaking with paint was so inspiring that we decided to bring the easel back to the room to allow for more creative expression with this motivating medium. We will provide inkpads and small letter stamps so the children can continue stamping their own names and the names of their friends and families.

The children's construction skills continue to develop as they use the Legos and Construx. To incorporate a new element into their structures, and to fulfill their desire to build something that "goes," we will provide wheeled components to these popular manipulatives.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: letter stamps and ink pads, easel with tempera paint
-Rationale: To promote creative expression with paint. To provide an opportunity to incorporate literacy into drawings and letter writing.
-Skills: self-expression, creative expression, symbolic representation, fine motor strength and dexterity in hand and finger muscles.

Sensory
-Materials: clay slabs with an array of appealing materials to add to them, moist sponges to help smooth out the clay
-Rationale: To encourage adding detail to clay creations
-Skills: sensory stimulation, knowledge of physical properties, symbolic representation, creative expression.

Science
-Materials: warming trays, water, containers for measuring volume, tadpole, fish, mealworms, magnifying glasses,
-Rationale: To build awareness of evaporation as part of the water cycle. Continued observation of mealworm life cycles and care of classroom pets.
-Skills: scientific inquiry, observation, experimentation, first-hand exploration, guessing and reasoning, conceptual knowledge-knowledge of the natural world, descriptive language.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: mailboxes, envelopes, organizer with children's names, teachers' names, and common words, mail carrier uniforms and props, an assortment of writing materials such as pens, pencils, markers, paper, tape, stickers, staplers, letter of the week "B" materials.
-Rationale: The message center was moved to the back of the classroom where much of the children's dramatic play happens. This new arrangement will support continued letter writing and encourage dramatic play around the theme of Post Office.
-Skills: fine motor, descriptive and creative writing/dictation, awareness of symbol systems, expansion of vocabulary, expression of thought, effective social interaction, letter recognition, representation of community roles.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: Construx builders, legos, light table with translucent duplos, puzzles, balancing scales, materials to order by size and weight
-Rationale: Measurement of size and weight will continue. Wheels have been added to support the children's interest in building things that move.
-Skills: seriation, ordering, sequencing, measuring, mathematical vocabulary, symbolic representation, comparing, reasoning, fine motor, problem solving, logical thinking, construction skills.

Dramatic Play
-Materials: chef hats, aprons, ordering slips, various restaurant foods, pencils, menus, kitchen table and props, mail carrier materials, small animal and woodland cave.
-Rationale: These props support the prominent dramatic play themes that the children have been developing over the past several weeks.
-Skills: Role-play, symbolic play, peer interactions, support general social skills, social problem solving, sharing, literacy, symbolic representation, receptive language, listening skills, cooperation.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, hollow blocks, thin boards, cove molding, clipboards, baskets.
-Rationale: The children continue to build cooperatively with blocks on a daily basis. We support them in problem solving by focusing their attention on balance and geometric design as they work to represent their ideas through building large and small structures.
-Skills: creative building, problem-solving, spatial skills, geometry, symmetry, symbolic representation, manual dexterity, upper body strength, group cooperation, listening skills.

Large Motor
Gym
-Materials: Rope ladder, hopscotch, pitch back, ball jump, trampoline, climber, soccer kick.
-Rationale: Teachers will continue to challenge the children to climb the rope ladder and work on their throwing and catching skills at the pitch back. The children will also work on their kicking skills by aiming a ball at the goal.
-Skills: climbing up and down, core strength, arm strength, dynamic and static balance, eye-foot coordination, throwing, catching, visual tracking, jumping and landing, endurance, spatial awareness, gross motor, kicking

Playground
-Materials: playground equipment, shovels, buckets, sleds
-Rationale: The children's endurance is challenged as they trudge through the deep snow. They also work cooperatively to clear pathways with child size snow shovels. There is also a "swamp monster" living near the climber who makes cooperative dramatic play exciting!
-Skills: cardio vascular endurance, properties of nature (snow, ice, water), upper and lower body strength, social skills, balance, movement through space.

Overview
Experimentation with water in its solid and liquid states has intrigued the children. This week we will introduce heat as another way to transform water and expand their understanding of the water cycle. The children have been using both standard and non-standard tools for measuring height and weight. Now we will incorporate measurement of volume through making fresh squeezed orange juice and experimenting with water at the science tables.

The introduction of printmaking with paint was so inspiring that we decided to bring the easel back to the room to allow for more creative expression with this motivating medium. We will provide inkpads and small letter stamps so the children can continue stamping their own names and the names of their friends and families.

The children's construction skills continue to develop as they use the Legos and Construx. To incorporate a new element into their structures, and to fulfill their desire to build something that "goes," we will provide wheeled components to these popular manipulatives.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: letter stamps and ink pads, easel with tempera paint
-Rationale: To promote creative expression with paint. To provide an opportunity to incorporate literacy into drawings and letter writing.
-Skills: self-expression, creative expression, symbolic representation, fine motor strength and dexterity in hand and finger muscles.

Sensory
-Materials: clay slabs with an array of appealing materials to add to them, moist sponges to help smooth out the clay
-Rationale: To encourage adding detail to clay creations
-Skills: sensory stimulation, knowledge of physical properties, symbolic representation, creative expression.

Science
-Materials: warming trays, water, containers for measuring volume, tadpole, fish, mealworms, magnifying glasses,
-Rationale: To build awareness of evaporation as part of the water cycle. Continued observation of mealworm life cycles and care of classroom pets.
-Skills: scientific inquiry, observation, experimentation, first-hand exploration, guessing and reasoning, conceptual knowledge-knowledge of the natural world, descriptive language.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: mailboxes, envelopes, organizer with children's names, teachers' names, and common words, mail carrier uniforms and props, an assortment of writing materials such as pens, pencils, markers, paper, tape, stickers, staplers, letter of the week "B" materials.
-Rationale: The message center was moved to the back of the classroom where much of the children's dramatic play happens. This new arrangement will support continued letter writing and encourage dramatic play around the theme of Post Office.
-Skills: fine motor, descriptive and creative writing/dictation, awareness of symbol systems, expansion of vocabulary, expression of thought, effective social interaction, letter recognition, representation of community roles.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: Construx builders, legos, light table with translucent duplos, puzzles, balancing scales, materials to order by size and weight
-Rationale: Measurement of size and weight will continue. Wheels have been added to support the children's interest in building things that move.
-Skills: seriation, ordering, sequencing, measuring, mathematical vocabulary, symbolic representation, comparing, reasoning, fine motor, problem solving, logical thinking, construction skills.

Dramatic Play
-Materials: chef hats, aprons, ordering slips, various restaurant foods, pencils, menus, kitchen table and props, mail carrier materials, small animal and woodland cave.
-Rationale: These props support the prominent dramatic play themes that the children have been developing over the past several weeks.
-Skills: Role-play, symbolic play, peer interactions, support general social skills, social problem solving, sharing, literacy, symbolic representation, receptive language, listening skills, cooperation.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, hollow blocks, thin boards, cove molding, clipboards, baskets.
-Rationale: The children continue to build cooperatively with blocks on a daily basis. We support them in problem solving by focusing their attention on balance and geometric design as they work to represent their ideas through building large and small structures.
-Skills: creative building, problem-solving, spatial skills, geometry, symmetry, symbolic representation, manual dexterity, upper body strength, group cooperation, listening skills.

Large Motor
Gym
-Materials: Rope ladder, hopscotch, pitch back, ball jump, trampoline, climber, soccer kick.
-Rationale: Teachers will continue to challenge the children to climb the rope ladder and work on their throwing and catching skills at the pitch back. The children will also work on their kicking skills by aiming a ball at the goal.
-Skills: climbing up and down, core strength, arm strength, dynamic and static balance, eye-foot coordination, throwing, catching, visual tracking, jumping and landing, endurance, spatial awareness, gross motor, kicking

Playground
-Materials: playground equipment, shovels, buckets, sleds
-Rationale: The children's endurance is challenged as they trudge through the deep snow. They also work cooperatively to clear pathways with child size snow shovels. There is also a "swamp monster" living near the climber who makes cooperative dramatic play exciting!
-Skills: cardio vascular endurance, properties of nature (snow, ice, water), upper and lower body strength, social skills, balance, movement through space.

Overview
The children have loved exploring all of the different things in our classroom that sink and float. Since this topic has been so popular, we've decided to move it to the sensory table for this week so the children can have more room. We will also be adding new materials for the children to use. We will add boats and pennies for the children to investigate. We will have the children estimate how many pennies it will take to sink the plastic boat. The children have discovered that the heavier items sink and the lighter items float. They have made the connection that the more weight the object has, the more likely it is to sink.

With all of the melting snow last week, the children have been excited about finding leaves and twigs in our snow table. Because of this, we will be discussing what we find in snow once it melts in our science station. We will promote observation skills and prediction about the types of things we will find.

We will be taking a new direction in the art center and introducing letter shapes for printmaking with paint. The children will be able to select shapes and paint colors to use in order to make a picture. We will work on promoting literacy skills and fine motor skills.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: letter shapes for printmaking with paint, oil pastels, clay slabs, clay tools, seashells, imprinting materials, plastic animals
-Rationale: We will begin printmaking using letters in order to help incorporate literacy into the arts. At the light table, we will highlight a book about representational drawing that has captured the interest of many children in the class. It will be available for reference along with colored pencils and oil pastels so the children can experiment with new techniques. The focus on making impressions will continue at the clay table with seashells and animals.
-Skills: self-expression, fine motor, problem-solving, flexible thinking, creative expression, sensory input, symbolic representation, dexterity in hand and finger muscles.

Sensory
-Materials: sensory table, water, float/sink materials
-Rationale: To provide opportunities to experiment with materials that float and sink in the water.
-Skills: sensory stimulation, knowledge of physical properties, observation.

Science
-Materials: melting trays, snow, tadpole, fish, mealworms, magnifying glasses,
-Rationale: To provide a new experiment with the snow we will focus on examining the leaves, rocks, etc that we find in it after it melts.
-Skills: scientific inquiry, observation, flexible thinking, first-hand exploration, guessing and reasoning, conceptual knowledge-knowledge of the natural world, descriptive language.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: mailboxes, envelopes, organizer with children's names, teachers' names, and common words, mail carrier uniforms and props, an assortment of writing materials such as pens, pencils, markers, paper, tape, stickers, staplers, letter of the week "B" materials.
-Rationale: We will continue to encourage letter writing to our friends in Ross' class. Later in the week, we will introduce a new letter of the week, "B".
-Skills: fine motor, descriptive and creative writing/dictation, awareness of symbol systems, expansion of vocabulary, expression of thought, effective social interaction, letter recognition, representation of community roles.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: Construx builders, legos, scales, height chart, puzzles, Montessori cylinders, nesting cups, color tiles, light table, and translucent duplos
-Rationale: We will introduce the use of Construx builders as a new material along with the continued use of legos. We wanted to introduce a new material in order to promote new creative building ideas. Together, these materials work on developing fine motor skills, problem solving, and construction skills. The measuring station will continue to allow the children to explore nonstandard and standard measurements.
-Skills: seriation, ordering, sequencing, measuring, mathematical vocabulary, symbolic representation, comparing, reasoning, fine motor, precision, counting, problem solving, logical thinking, construction skills.

Dramatic Play
-Materials: chef hats, aprons, ordering slips, various restaurant foods, pencils, menus, kitchen table and props, mail carrier materials, small animal and woodland cave.
-Rationale: We will continue to offer pretend food in the kitchen area for the children to incorporate into their dramatic play scenarios. The front cave will continue to support interest in winter animals and hibernation.
-Skills: Role-play, symbolic play, peer interactions, support general social skills, social problem solving, sharing, literacy, symbolic representation, receptive language, listening skills, cooperation.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, hollow blocks, thin boards, cove molding, steering wheels, clipboards, baskets.
-Rationale: With the addition of a photo book of previous block structures, the children have been inspired to make new structures with the hollow blocks such as a pirate ship and a house. We will also continue to work on extending the play scenarios of airplanes, castles and trap building. This works to develop representational building and social development.
-Skills: creative building, problem-solving, spatial skills, geometry, knowledge of force and motion, social skills, large motor, symbolic representation, manual dexterity, upper body strength, group cooperation, listening skills.

Large Motor
Gym
-Materials: Rope ladder, hopscotch, pitch back, ball jump, trampoline, climber, soccer kick.
-Rationale: Teachers will challenge the children to climb the rope ladder and work on their throwing and catching skills at the pitch back. The children will also work on their kicking skills by aiming a ball at the goal.
-Gym Skills: climbing up and down, core strength, arm strength, dynamic and static balance, eye-foot coordination, throwing, catching, visual tracking, jumping and landing, endurance, spatial awareness, gross motor, kicking

Playground
-Materials: playground equipment, shovels, buckets, sleds
-Rationale: We will continue to explore the outdoors as new snow falls on older ice packed snow. We will facilitate playing on the play structure as well as sledding and doing penguin slides on our bellies down the icy tracks on the hill.
-Skills: endurance, creative problem solving, patience, properties of nature (snow, ice, water), social skills, balance, movement through space.

Snack
Monday - Pizza
Tuesday - Oranges & animal crackers
Wednesday - Graham crackers & milk
Thursday - Pretzels & carrots
Friday- Popcorn & milk

Overview
Hands-on experiments with snow, water, and ice have led the children to question why ice floats in water. To provide an opportunity for them to experiment further, we have created a sink/float station in the science area. The children have been noticing the colored ice and snow that has been left behind by other classes. We will incorporate this into our classroom by providing colored ice and colored water along with snow at the sensory table. To bring more attention to measurement, a new measuring station will be set-up in the back of the room that is filled with balances, scales, rulers, and thermometers. As dramatic play is blossoming in both the kitchen area and writing center, the restaurant will continue to encourage role-taking while the letter writing will further incite pen pal connections with students in Ross' AM class.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: glitter glue, vellum, Q tips, art cart with winter collage materials, clay slabs, clay tools, seashells, imprinting materials, plastic animals
-Rationale: We added glitter glue at the light table to provide an alternative medium for creative expression and to incorporate new experiences with light and reflection. The use of Q tips for spreading the glue will help the children develop their fine motor dexterity. As the winter collages are both new and exciting, children will continue representing their views on this season. With a focus on imprinting, the clay table will include detailed seashells and animal pieces.
-Skills: self-expression, fine motor, problem-solving, flexible thinking, creative expression, sensory input, symbolic representation, increase fluency with materials, strengthen self-worth, dexterity in hand and finger muscles.

Sensory
-Materials: sensory table, ice, snow, eye droppers, watercolors
-Rationale: To provide opportunities to see how the colored water affects the ice and snow differently. Additionally, they can revisit the idea of color mixing as they combine the colored snow to make new hues.
-Skills: sensory stimulation, knowledge of physical properties, creative expression, enhancing symbolic representation, mixing colors, fine motor.

Science
-Materials: tadpole, fish, mealworms, magnifying glasses, experiments with floating and sinking, materials that float, materials that sink
-Rationale: As the children are still anticipating the cycling of more beetles, the sequenced paper will again be available for representing the stages. While at the sensory table last week, children noticed some ice floating and some sinking. To provide further exploration and inquiry, an experiment will be set-up for the children to test which materials float or sink.
-Skills: scientific inquiry, sequencing, observation, flexible thinking, first-hand exploration, guessing and reasoning, grouping, conceptual knowledge-knowledge of the natural world, descriptive language.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: mailboxes, envelopes, organizer with children's names, teachers' names, and common words, mail carrier uniforms and props, an assortment of writing materials such as pens, pencils, markers, paper, tape, stickers, staplers, letter of the week "N" materials.
-Rationale: As our letter writing connection with Ross' class has just begun, the children will be encouraged to draw pictures or write letters in response to the letters they received.
-Skills: fine motor, descriptive and creative writing/dictation, awareness of symbol systems, expansion of vocabulary, expression of thought, effective social interaction, letter recognition, representation of community roles.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: Measurement station will include nonstandard measurement graph, unifix cubes, chart for measuring foot size, balance, scale, mail scale, yardsticks, rulers. Continued use of sequencing and seriation materials such as puzzles, Montessori cylinders, nesting cups, color tiles. Legos. The back cave will include a mirror, light table, and translucent duplos for building.
-Rationale: Fostering the children's interest of measurement, the measuring station will allow them to explore the many materials that measure both nonstandard and standard, how to measure, and what the measuring vocabulary means. In the math cave, puzzles will be highlighted to further develop analytical thinking about part-whole relationships. The legos will be given a more enclosed space to promote small group interaction and imaginary play. The cave under the loft in the back of the room will be newly transformed into a light, inviting space that will inspire children to build with translucent duplos on a light table surface reflected against a mirror.
-Skills: seriation, ordering, sequencing, measuring, weighing, number concepts, mathematical vocabulary, symbolic representation, comparing, logical thinking, reasoning, fine motor, precision, counting, one to one correspondence.

Dramatic Play
-Materials: chef hats, aprons, ordering slips, various restaurant food, pencils, menus, kitchen table and props, mail carrier materials, small animal and woodland cave.
-Rationale: To expand on restaurant exploration, the children will be encouraged to portray the typical situations in restaurants through deliberate table settings and props. The small seasonal cave will continue to highlight hibernation and winter animal habitats.
-Skills: role play, symbolic play, peer interactions, support general social skills, social problem solving, sharing, literacy, symbolic representation, receptive language, listening skills, cooperation.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, hollow blocks, thin boards, cove molding, steering wheels, clipboards, baskets.
-Rationale: To further extend play scenarios from the airplane small group and also from castles and trap building, the hollow blocks will encourage representational building and social development.
-Skills: creative building, problem-solving, spatial skills, geometry, knowledge of force and motion, social skills, large motor, symbolic representation, manual dexterity, upper body strength, group cooperation, listening skills.

Large Motor
Gym
-Materials: rope swing, balance beam, mats, scooters, bean bag throw, and circular mat climbing structure.
-Rationale: Teachers will challenge the children to try to throw the bean bags from farther distances and to hold onto the rope swing for longer periods of time to build muscular endurance. Group games with balls, parachutes, or our bodies will additionally facilitate specific large motor skills and encourage group cooperation.
-Gym Skills: stretching, climbing, balance and coordination, endurance, strength, upper body coordination, following directions, self-regulation, exploration of body, accuracy, overhand throwing, aiming.

Playground
-Materials: playground equipment, shovels, buckets, sleds, watercolors
-Rationale: We will extend the snow "painting " to the outdoor environment by bringing colored water in spray bottles to the playground. Building with snow and playing on the play structure will also be facilitated as well as sledding.
-Skills: constructing, endurance, creative problem solving, connection to indoor ideas, patience, properties of nature (snow, ice, water), social skills, balance, movement through space, expressive art, color concepts.

Overview
Small groups are off to a good start, which brings new excitement to the children's school day. This week, we planned more hands on activities that will help the children understand why ice and snow melt at different rates. This has been a topic of great debate and the children have provided many interesting theories. We will also introduce a new and exciting material to motivate the children to build and enhance their construction skills, legos. The children will be able to use the legos as a small building manipulative in addition to the large blocks. We will continue to work on our self-portraits in the art center, along with adding in the idea of creating winter collages that represent what we see outside. In our science center, the mealworms have recently begun their final transformation into beetles. In order to provide a way for the children to represent the changes and stages they have observed, we made numbered sequence charts for them to fill with their own drawings.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: children's self portraits, art cart with winter collage materials, clay tools, seashells, imprinting materials, watercolor paint on the light table.
-Rationale: Children will continue to use watercolors to enhance their self-portraits. They will also be able to use beautiful materials from our art cart to create a winter collage. The clay table will continue to focus on the technique of making impressions and "transforming" the clay into something new.
-Skills: self-expression, fine motor, problem-solving, flexible thinking, creative expression, sensory input, symbolic representation, increase fluency with materials, strengthen self-worth.

Sensory
-Materials: sensory table, ice, water, shovels, animals frozen in ice.
-Rationale: To provide the children with a problem to be solved as they manipulate the ice, we froze plastic animals into the ice. This will allow the children to use their new knowledge of what makes ice melt in order to free the animals.
-Skills: sensory stimulation, knowledge of physical properties, creative problem-solving, enhancing symbolic representation, fine motor.

Science
-Materials: tadpole, fish, mealworms, experiments with snow and ice from the sensory table, salt, magnifying glasses.
-Rationale: Since the mealworms are entering their final stage, we will provide the children with sequenced paper with boxes labeled 1 through 4 so they can sketch what changes they have seen the mealworms go through. This provides them with the opportunity to reflect on the life cycle of the mealworm and continue to work on the idea of sequence. We will also introduce new ways to melt ice with the addition of salt.
-Skills: scientific inquiry, observation, flexible thinking, first-hand exploration, reasoning, grouping, conceptual knowledge-knowledge of the natural world, descriptive language.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: mailboxes, envelopes, organizer with children's names, teachers' names, and common words (to, from, mom, dad, love), an assortment of writing materials such as pens, pencils, markers, paper, tape, stickers, staplers, letter of the week "M" materials.
-Rationale: We will continue writing letters to friends and family by having the children write letters to children in Ross's class. Literacy activities such as this are excellent ways to enhance social connections not only in our class, but in the whole school community. We will introduce the dramatic play concept of mail-carriers who will deliver our letters to our friends in Ross's class.
-Skills: fine motor, descriptive and creative writing/dictation, awareness of symbol systems, expansion of vocabulary, expression of thought, effective social interaction, letter recognition.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: graph depicting foot size in terms of nonstandard measurement tools such as unifix cubes, chart for measuring foot size , chart for recording measurements. Continued use of sequencing and seriation materials such as nested cups, life cycle puzzles, and life cycle cards. Introduction of legos.
-Rationale: By using nonstandard measuring tools we allow the children to see that there are many different ways to measure things. We will start at nonstandard and work our way to standard measurement. We will also introduce legos as a small manipulative builder. This provides the children with smaller materials to work with than the hollow blocks so they can work on fine motor skills.
-Skills: seriation, ordering, sequencing, measuring, symbolic representation, construction skills, geometry, fine motor, precision, and counting.

Dramatic Play
-Materials: chef hats, ordering slips, various restaurant food types, clipboards, pencils, and menus, mail carrier materials, kitchen furniture and related props.
-Rationale: The children have been enjoying taking on the roles of restaurant staff and customers and have incorporated the use of menus they made themselves. Also, the children continue to use the cave areas as creative spaces where wonderful dramatic play schemes develop.
-Skills: role play, symbolic play, peer interactions, support general social skills, social problem solving, sharing, creative expression, literacy, symbolic representation, self-expression, communication geared towards giving and receiving information.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, hollow blocks, thin boards, cove molding cut in various lengths, balls, steering wheels, clipboards, chairs.
-Rationale: The children use the hollow blocks to enhance their dramatic play themes. To help extend this play, and also promote growth of their construction skills, we will encourage the children to think of new details that would support their play scenarios.
-Skills: creative building, problem-solving, spatial skills, geometry, knowledge of force and motion, social skills, large motor, symbolic representation, manual dexterity, upper body strength, group cooperation.

Large Motor

Gym
-Materials: rope swing, balance beam, mats, scooters, bean bag throw, and climbing structure.
-Rationale: To provide the children with challenging new activities that will challenge and continually develop their physical skills.
-Gym Skills: stretching, climbing, balance and coordination, endurance, upper and lower body strength, following directions, self-regulation, exploration of body, accuracy, overhand throwing.

Playground
-Materials: playground equipment, shovels, buckets, tarps, trees,
-Rationale: We will continue building our snow forts outside to continue expanding on the idea of animal hibernation.
Sledding will still be offered as a social, enjoyable, and large motor activity.
-Skills: dexterity, digging, constructing, endurance, creative problem solving, connection to indoor ideas, patience, properties of nature (snow, ice, water), molding/hardening, social skills, movement through space.

Snack
Monday - Graham crackers & milk
Tuesday - Oranges & Pretzels
Wednesday - Apples & Animal crackers
Thursday - Trail mix & milk
Friday- Oatmeal & raisins

Overview
The many exciting play schemes emerging throughout the classroom are providing beautiful opportunities for children to form closer connections with both peers and teachers, express creative abilities, and deepen their understanding of classroom concepts. For this week, we will continue learning about life cycles by highlighting the capabilities of magnifying glasses as a tool for observing our changing mealworms. Many children have discovered that a few mealworms have entered the pupa stage. To further enhance the children's understanding of the mealworm transformations we will introduce a motor activity that requires acting out each of the stages in sequence. To encourage connections between the indoors and outdoors, ice will be fully incorporated into building snow forts on the playground, constructing caves and animal schemes at the sensory table, and experimenting with the freezing/melting cycle in the science area. Creative expression through art media will incorporate painting self portraits, writing letters, and transforming clay.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: crayons with warming trays, crayon shavings, clay, clay tools, seashells, imprinting materials, small wooden pieces, watercolor paint on the light table, children's self-portraits.
-Rationale: To build on the excitement of the crayon melting at the warming trays, the children will be able to use crayon shavings to enhance their experience with melting. At the light table, children will use watercolors to enhance the self-portraits they created last session. The clay table will take on a new focus by emphasizing the technique of making impressions and by incorporating the idea of "transforming" the clay into something new.
-Skills: self-expression, fine motor, problem-solving, flexible thinking, creative expression, sensory input, symbolic representation, increase fluency with materials, strengthen self-worth.

Sensory
-Materials: sensory table, snow, ice, hot water, cold water, sticks, trees, plastic animals.
-Rationale: To enhance the building of animal caves and forts using only snow and ice, we decided to remove the plastic containers and molds. This way the children will be able to use their newfound knowledge of the properties of snow and ice more fully.
-Skills: creative building, self-regulation, sensory stimulation, knowledge of physical properties, enhancing symbolic representation, connection between human life and animal life, connection between indoors and outdoors, vocabulary development, fine motor.

Science
-Materials: tadpole, fish, mealworms, experiments with snow and ice from the sensory table, melting trays, magnifying glasses. The light projector will take on a new role of introducing the relationship between color and light by drawing with markers on the overhead.
-Rationale: Further emphasis will be placed on the mealworm stage changes, which are now pupas, through observation and discussion. Additionally, conversations about proper magnifying glass usage may influence more detailed examination and information gathering.
-Skills: scientific inquiry, observation, appropriate use of tools, hand-eye coordination, flexible thinking, communicating about events in the past and present, first-hand exploration, generalizing, making use of appropriate sources of information, reasoning, grouping, conceptual knowledge-knowledge of the natural world, descriptive language, heuristic language, and informative language.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: mailboxes, envelopes, organizer with children's names, teachers' names, and common words (to, from, mom, dad, love), an assortment of writing materials such as pens, pencils, markers, paper, tape, stickers, staplers, and stencils (with letter shapes and general shapes). Various children's literature has been purposefully placed around the classroom that relates to the children's interests and classroom curriculum. Letter of the week "M", materials relating to "M".
-Rationale: The children have been very interested in writing letters to friends and family so we will continue to support literacy skills through this intrinsically motivating activity. In the loft area, further interactions with the letter of the week will allow for exploration and interaction with the sound, shape, and use of the letter "M". The selected books will stimulate imagination and understanding of concepts while expanding listening, reading, and comprehension skills.
-Skills: fine motor, descriptive and creative writing/dictation, awareness of symbol systems, expansion of vocabulary, expression of thought, effective social interaction, letter recognition.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: chart for measuring foot size, chart for recording measurements, graph depicting foot size in terms of nonstandard measurement tools such as unifix cubes, and an assortment of seriating materials. Sequencing materials include card games with steps for familiar activities, life cycle cards, and life cycle puzzles.
-Rationale: As some children have developed an understanding of seriation and ordering by size, we will introduce the concept of measurement as a way to compare size in a more systematic way.
-Skills: seriation, ordering, sequencing, measuring, symbolic representation, matching/discriminating, comparing, logical thinking, reasoning.

Dramatic Play
-Materials: kitchen furniture and related props, chef hats, ordering slips, clipboards, pencils, and menus. In the caves, stuffed animals and open ended natural materials, animal costumes and fabric.
-Rationale: To continue imaginary play and conversations in regard to the classroom curriculum of animals, life cycles, and hibernation. The cave areas provide cozy and creative spaces for play schemes to blossom. Additionally, play in the kitchen area has recently focused on restaurants and servers. To further encourage these roles and creative expressions, children will be able to design their own menu relating to materials in the kitchen area or to their own personal favorite foods.
-Skills: role play, symbolic play, peer interactions, support general social skills, problem solving, sharing, creative expression, literacy, symbolic representation, self-expression, communication geared towards giving and receiving information.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, hollow blocks, thin boards, cove molding cut in various lengths, balls, steering wheels, clipboards, chairs.
-Rationale: As ramp building has moved to the animal cave and the smaller block area, the back of the room has transformed block dramatic play schemes into train stations, floating castles, robots, bear caves, and animal traps. Recently developed, these play schemes have been carrying over from day to day. At this point, our goal is to extend the conversations, creations, and interactions while encouraging all children of various imaginative abilities to engage and explore. Some children have also begun creating maps for the train, boat, etc. to follow, which enhances literacy, direction following, and symbolic representational thought.
-Skills: creative building, problem-solving, spatial skills, geometry, knowledge of force and motion, social skills, large motor, symbolic representation, literacy awareness, manual dexterity, upper body strength, group cooperation.

Large Motor
Gym
-Materials: rope swing, balance beams, tumbling mats, giant beanbag throw, monkey bars.scooters. Animal based yoga poses.
-Rationale: To extend concepts of animal movement, an introductory yoga activity will allow children to stretch and acknowledge various body muscles and functions while also eliciting discussions of how animals move and look. For motor representation of the mealworm life cycle, a game will be played that encourages the children to use their bodies to pose as certain stages of the life cycle (egg = curl up, larva = slither, pupa = curve, beetle = crawl).
-Gym Skills: swinging, upper-body strength, stretching, throwing, balance and coordination, endurance, following directions, self-regulation, spatial awareness.

Playground
-Materials: playground equipment, shovels, buckets, tarps, trees, water (to make snow harder), ice chunks, sleds.
-Rationale: Building on ideas in the classroom and sensory table specifically, children will continue creating snow forts. We will use water to emphasize the snow, water, ice, melting, and freezing cycles, and also to help our snow forts harden. Children have recently found ice chunks on the playground, and they will be encouraged to use the ice to build igloos or to strengthen their current caves. Sledding will additionally be offered as a social, enjoyable, and large motor activity.
-Skills: dexterity, digging, constructing, endurance, creative problem solving, connection to indoor ideas, patience, properties of nature (snow, ice, water), molding/hardening, social skills, movement through space.

Snack
Monday - Sweet potato crisps & orange slices
Tuesday - Pretzels & milk
Wednesday - Carrots & rice cakes
Thursday - Apple crisps & crackers
Friday- Oven fries

Overview
The children are so glad to be back at school! All members of the teaching team are here now and the consistency has had positive effects on all of us. For the next two weeks we will help the children understand cycles/transformation through hands on activities related to freezing and melting. We will incorporate a motor component to our study of animals by encouraging the children to act as animals do in the winter by building dens in the snow. The mealworms have begun to change to the pupa stage of their life cycle so we will use this opportunity to continue incorporate the mathematical concept of sequence.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: crayons with warming trays, clay, clay tools, sequins, beads, small wooden pieces. Watercolor paint on the light table.
-Rationale: We will introduce warming trays for use with crayons to give the children an opportunity to explore melting through a creative art activity. The clay will also be available in conjunction with small beautiful items that can be added to their creations.
-Skills: self-expression, fine motor, problem-solving, creative expression, sensory input, symbolic representation.

Sensory
-Materials: sensory table, snow, molding materials, plastic animals
-Rationale: To connect to the outdoors by providing opportunities for the children to learn about caves and forts by modeling and creating them for toy animals. A small group of children has already begun exploring snow caves last week, so this will allow more children to be involved and to extend the snow building onto the playground.
-Skills: creative building, self-regulation, sensory stimulation, knowledge of physical properties, enhancing symbolic representation, connection between human life and animal life, connection between indoors and outdoors.

Science
-Materials: tadpole, fish, mealworms, experiments with snow and ice from the sensory table. In the back of the room we have a light projector with a variety of opaque and translucent objects.
-Rationale: We will draw the children's attention to the changes in the mealworms and encourage careful observation and data collection.
-Skills: scientific inquiry, observation, generalizing, making use of appropriate sources of information, reasoning, grouping, conceptual knowledge-knowledge of the natural world, descriptive language, heuristic language, and informative language.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: mailboxes, envelopes, organizer with children's names, an assortment of writing materials such as pens, pencils, paper, tape, staplers, and stencils (with letter shapes and general shapes). A variety of books have been chosen that relate to our curriculum. Letter of the week "S."
-Rationale: We will emphasize the use of the mailboxes as a way to share messages of friendship. We have already begun discussions about how to address these messages and sent an email message to a classmate who was on vacation. The children are excited about this form of communication and it provides many opportunities for letter and letter sound recognition as children address and sign their messages. We will use the writing center in the top of the loft to continue our study of the alphabet by highlighting one letter each week and adding it to our classroom dictionary. The books we have selected are meant to accompany, inform, and expand on children's explorations in the different areas of the classroom. We also have a variety of old favorites for the mere enjoyment of reading!
-Skills: fine motor, descriptive and creative writing/dictation, fine motor, and letter recognition.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: a chart for measuring foot size, chart for recording measurements, seriating materials, nesting cups, colored wood chips in various hues for ordering. There are xylophones that support ordering along the dimensions of size and pitch. Sequencing materials include card games with steps for familiar activities, as well as life cycle cards for ordering. Shape puzzles and interlocking puzzles.
-Rationale: We hope to include a personal connection to seriation by using the children's bodies as objects to measure, compare, and order.
-Skills: seriation, ordering, sequencing, logical thinking and reasoning.

Dramatic Play
-Materials: kitchen furniture, spoons, forks, knives, cups, dishes and cooking pots along with different fruits in baskets. In the cave, we have stuffed animals (bears, raccoons, squirrels, owls, raptor birds, wood pieces, acorns, photos depicting hibernating animals. Under the loft, in the back of the classroom we have big bears, raccoons, bunnies, animal costumes, and pillows.
-Rationale: To encourage children to engage in make-believe play, to support conversations related to animals and their habitats and provide opportunities for self-expression, imagination, and creativity.
-Skills: role-play, symbolic play, peer interactions, support general social skills, problem solving, sharing.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, hollow blocks, cove molding cut in various lengths, balls
-Rationale: The cove molding and balls have motivated the children to build new ramps. At this point they are focused on connecting the pieces together. The materials encourage problem-solving as the children attempt to create smooth connections for the balls to pass over.
-Skills: creative building, problem-solving, spatial skills, geometry, knowledge of force and motion, social skills, large motor.

Large Motor
Gym
-Materials: ladders, A-frame ladder bridge, donut, monkey bars, rope pull, climber with slide, and bean bags.
-Rationale: The children have been learning about animals and how different animals act in the cold weather. The children will be prompted with an exciting plot of "getting to their cave in time for hibernation" and led through the path/obstacle course, using the gym equipment provided, in order to do so.
-Gym Skills: jumping, climbing, balance and coordination, strength, endurance, following directions, turn taking, self-regulation.

Playground
-Materials: playground equipment, shovels, buckets, tarps, trees, water (to make snow into ice).
-Rationale: The outdoors provide not only fresh air and large motor space, but also allow children to truly apply the concepts and ideas from the classroom to their own lives and bodies. Building off of ideas in class about snow forts and hibernation caves, the children will be encouraged to build their own snow fort, either with tarps, natural structures such as trees, or the base of the playground structure.
-Skills: dexterity, digging, constructing, endurance, creative problem solving, connection to indoor ideas, patience, properties of nature (snow), molding.

Snack
Monday - No School
Tuesday - Classmade hot chocolate & Animal crackers
Wednesday - Rice cracker & sunbutter sandwiches
Thursday - Cooked carrots and rice cakes
Friday- Cereal & milk

Overview
Welcome back to school! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season. This first week back will be a period of readjustment. It won't take too long however, for all of us to settle back into our routines. The children may express some concern about having new teachers, Abbie, Brittany and Emma. If your child is having reservations about the changes please let me know and I will provide extra support. Our focus for the week will be on classroom routines, establishing relationships with the new teachers and getting reacquainted with friends. The curriculum includes revisiting the topic life cycles by incorporating new experiences and materials related to this concept. We have also added some new materials to the art area that will inspire the children to represent their thinking and ideas in new ways. We will introduce the mathematical concepts of seriation and sequencing to enhance the children's logical thinking and reasoning skills.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: clay, clay tools, sequins, beads, small wooden pieces. Watercolor paint on the light table. Colorful paper, hole-punches, regular scissors and interesting edging scissors, glue and staplers.
-Rationale: We will incorporate the children's interest in three-dimensional design that flourished before break by revisiting clay as a medium for creative expression. The watercolor paints at the light table are connected to previous explorations with color mixing. The children will now be able to incorporate their knowledge of color mixing into works of art. The paper, scissors and glue, while fostering dexterity with new tools, will also inspire paper collage making.
-Skills: self-expression, fine motor, problem-solving, creative expression, sensory input, symbolic representation.

Sensory
-Materials: sensory table, snow, molding materials.
-Rationale: To connect to the outdoors by providing opportunities for the children to learn about the properties of snow through play. We will encourage the children to build with the snow and these ideas will also be extended to the playground.
-Skills: creative building, sensory input, knowledge of physical properties, connection between indoors and outdoors.

Science
-Materials: tadpole, fish, mealworms, experiments with snow and ice from the sensory table. In the back of the room we have a light projector with a variety of opaque and translucent objects.
-Rationale: We will help bring the ideas of life cycles and transformations to a more conscious level through exploration and discussion of mealworm life cycles and the water cycle. We will support the children in making connections between these new experiences and past experiences studying cycles. The projector will allow children to engage in additional investigations as they observe the properties of light and shadow.
-Skills: scientific inquiry, observation, generalizing, making use of appropriate sources of information, reasoning, grouping, conceptual knowledge-knowledge of the natural world, descriptive language, heuristic language, and informative language.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: an assortment of writing materials such as pens, pencils, paper, tape, staplers, and stencils (with letter shapes and general shapes). A variety of books have been chosen that relate to our curriculum. Letter of the week "D."
-Rationale: We have set-up several writing areas in the classroom. One is located in the front of the classroom facing the science area to spark children's interest in writing and/or dictating what they observe there. The children's names along with their pictures are located in this area, as well as the mailboxes. We will use the writing center in the top of the loft to continue our study of the alphabet by highlighting one letter each week and adding it to our classroom dictionary. The books we have selected are meant to accompany, inform, and expand on children's explorations in the different areas of the classroom. We also have a variety of old favorites for the mere enjoyment of reading!
-Skills: fine motor, descriptive and creative writing/dictation, fine motor, and letter recognition.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: seriating materials, nesting cups, wood blocks in various shades of stain for ordering. There are musical instruments that support ordering along the dimensions of size and pitch including tone blocks and a xyophone. Sequencing materials include card games with steps for familiar activities, as well as life cycle cards for ordering. Shape puzzles and interlocking puzzles.
-Rationale: Seriation is the ability to arrange objects in a sequential order according to one aspect such as size, weight or volume. The preschool years are a good time to support children's focus and critical thinking skills as they engage in the process of seriation. The development of the children's knowledge of this foundational concept is important for logical-mathematical thinking. Sequencing is the ability to organize and order successive events and experiences. Recognizing sequences is not only important in understanding life cycles, but also helps young children's developing sense of order, logic, and reason.
-Skills: seriation, ordering, sequencing, logical thinking and reasoning.

Dramatic Play
-Materials: kitchen furniture, spoons, forks, knives, cups, dishes and cooking pots along with different fruits in baskets. In the cave, we have stuffed animals (bears, raccoons, squirrels, owls, raptor birds, wood pieces, acorns, photos depicting hibernating animals. Under the loft, in the back of the classroom we have big bears, raccoons, bunnies, animal costumes, and pillows.
-Rationale: To encourage children to engage in make-believe play, to support conversations related to animals and their habitats and provide opportunities for self-expression, imagination, and creativity.
-Skills: role-play, symbolic play, peer interactions, support general social skills, problem solving, sharing.

Blocks
-Materials: Unit blocks, hollow blocks and long wood planks
-Rationale: The children have used both types of blocks to represent their ideas and to support their dramatic play. Last session the children began building ramps using the wood planks. We will provide photos of their previous work so they can add depth to their creations and experiment with ramps in new ways.
-Skills: creative building, spatial skills, geometry, knowledge of force and motion, social skills, large motor.

Large Motor
-Materials: Gym- monkey bars, A-frame ladder bridge, climber with slide, and ladders. Outdoors-playground equipment, shovels, buckets, molding materials, sledding hill.
-Rationale: The gym set-up is basic and familiar. Outside, the children will have opportunities to enjoy the snow and cold fresh air.
-Skills: balance and coordination, strength, and endurance.

Snack
January 4-7
Monday -No School
Tuesday - Pretzels & milk
Wednesday - Rice cakes & raisins
Thursday - Popcorn & milk
Friday- Apples & rice crackers

January 10-14
Monday -Bananas & crackers
Tuesday - Carrots & pretzels
Wednesday - Rice cakes & raisins
Thursday - Popcorn & apples
Friday- Trail mix

Overview
The children worked hard and learned many things in their respective small groups. It has been wonderful to see the children sharing their small group experiences with each other. Many of the children were inspired by the story telling group's performance of Goldilocks and the Three Bears and have been building stages and putting on performances in the block area. The pizza Mary's group made was big hit and the children enjoyed sharing how they made it. The children were very interested in the wood sculptures the construction group brought back from their field trip. This interest has sparked a classroom wide building project. All of the children have constructed structures using wood scraps and have decorated them using various found and natural materials. In order to connect this project with the continued exploration of animal homes and habitats, we will next provide natural paint colors and small pictures of animals for the children to add to their wood buildings.

To reflect the changing season and a continued interest the things animals do to prepare for cold weather the science center will be modified this week. We will be focusing on how animals and people stay warm in the winter. The children will have the opportunity to experiment with how animals use their fur or down and extra fat to stay warm in the winter. The children's exploration of color mixing will be expanded with the addition a colored-water mixing experiment on the light table. Some of the children have been interested in exchanging letters and drawings with their peers so we will be introducing a mail-box station during large group and then will help the children set-up their own mailboxes.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: wood scraps, tacky glue, shells, corks, small stick on letters and numbers, small recycled plastic materials, tempera in natural colors, pictures of different types of animals.

-Rationale: All of the children have been excited to create wood scrap structures and many of the children have embellished their buildings with recycled and natural materials. We will add natural paint colors and animal pictures for the children to glue on their structures to build upon the children's interest in animal homes.

-Skills: Creative risk-taking, fine motor development, symbolic representation, and self-expression, construction skills

Sensory
-Materials: Standing easels, paper, smocks, finger paint in varying colors

-Rationale: The children delighted in mixing the paint colors with brushes and one focus of the science area is color mixing, thus finger paint allows the children to have a sensory experience while further exploring color mixing.

-Skills: Sensory stimulation and pleasure, fine motor development, concepts/properties of color mixing, self-expression

Science
-Materials: Animal furs, down jacket, plastic bags, Vaseline (pretend fat), red/yellow/blue/clear colored water, pipettes, clear containers for mixing water, red/yellow/blue/green colored transparencies, transparent red/yellow/blue/green/purple colored builders, light table, over head projector, white cloth, loom, strips of fabric, wool and seed pods

-Rationale: The children have shown a continued interest in mixing colors at the light table and when painting. To extend this interest we will be adding colored water mixing station to the light table. By using colored water the children will have the opportunity to not only mix colors but will able be able to change the hue of each color. Thus also exploring light and dark colors. The children will also have the opportunity to explore color mixing on the overhead projector. This provides an opportunity for the children to share their color mixtures with their peers, which may spark deeper discussions about color mixing and help to create a sense of a learning community. The children continue to work together weaving ribbons and natural materials onto the loom.

-Skills: Color recognition, concepts/properties of color mixing, observation, inquiry, comparing, sorting, asking questions, predicting, hypothesizing, interpreting and reasoning about events, knowledge of the natural environment

Dramatic Play
-Materials: dishes, cups, assorted nuts, corn, bananas, dress-up clothes, animals costumes swathes of material in forest hues, green and brown materials to add to add to the animal café. In the cave there are plush animals, wood pieces, pictures of animal homes, hollow blocks, and fabric.

-Rationale: The children continue to be excited about the Animal Café and dressing up as different animals. The animal café gives the children the opportunity to expand on the restaurant play theme while connecting the play with the larger curriculum topic of animals and the foods they eat. The cave has a new winter look with white fabric, questions and books about hibernation. The cave continues to provide a cozy close place that promotes small group interaction and exploration of more specific animal homes and habitats.

-Skills: Role-play, peer interaction, social problem solving, creating imaginary scenarios, large and fine motor development, and symbolic representation.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: Mobilos, nature puzzles, tracks matching game, small weaving boards, number peg boards, weaving puzzles

-Rationale: The children continue to delight in the Mobilos. Exploring numeral concepts and counting remains a popular activity. We will expand on these concepts with the addition of number peg boards, with the children will have the opportunity to practice counting to 10 using one-to-one correspondence. The children continue to engage in patterning concepts while using the weaving boards. This week we are also adding a few weaving puzzles for the children to practice their fine motor and problem solving skills.

-Skills: Number sense, matching, classifying, patterning, one to one correspondence, counting with one-to-one correspondence, counting concepts, whole/part relationships, problem solving skills and fine motor development.

Language and Literacy
- Materials: A variety of writing implements, paper, post-it notes, envelopes, mailboxes for each child, a poster with the upper and lower case alphabet, a well stocked library with books about animals, habitats, seeds, and fall, posting of the letter of the week, objects that begin with the particular letter of the week, past letter of the week books- which contain lists of the children's ideas for words that began with the particular letter, pictures of the children making the letter with their bodies, and a prompt which asks the children to draw something that starts with the letter.
- Rationale: The children continue to utilize the writing center in various ways; to create signs, write letters, and draw pictures. In order to support the children's growing interest in writing notes and drawing pictures for their peers, the teachers will help the children set-up their own mailbox. Each mailbox will have a picture of the child and a picture of the child with whom they share their cubby with, therefore encouraging the children to not only to send mail to one another but also to the children in Dalia's class. In order to extend and support the children's growing awareness of print and letter recognition, the literacy center will feature a letter of the week. The teachers will highlight the letter through objects that begin with the letter, opportunities for the children to find the letter in words through out the classroom and school, and opportunities for children to practice writing the letter. The teachers created small books highlighting the children ideas and learning about previous letters and these books will also be available for the children to look through.
- Skills: Letter recognition, listening and receptive abilities, writing/drawing, fine motor control, and using books for reference and pleasure

Blocks
-Materials: hollow blocks, wooden planks, unit blocks, and wooden cars with accompanying people, v-shaped cardboard planks, and acorns for rolling down the ramps.

- Rationale: The children have continued to use the hollow blocks and planks to create ramps. With the creation of various sized ramps the children have been investigating how the cars move differently down each ramp. With the addition of the v-shaped cardboard planks the children can roll both cars and acorns down with out having them fall off the side. The addition of acorns to the ramps helps connect the block area to the larger classroom curriculum concepts of plants and animals. Lately they have been rolling the acorns down to hungry squirrels below. The children also continue to build cabins and roads with the hollow blocks.

- Skills: Construction skills, geometry, problem solving, investigating, communication, dramatic play, symbolic representation, and large and fine motor

Large Motor
-Materials: Indoors- rolling hill, jumping station, scooter boards, climbing wall, monkey bars, slide, stairs, triangle climber and donut hole. Outdoors- sleds, shovels, buckets

-Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that will challenge their physical skills

-Skills: body awareness, body in motion, turn taking, safe "risk taking" opportunities, jumping, dynamic balance, depth perception, lower body strength/coordination, flexibility, agility, upper and lower-body strength and coordination, eye-hand and eye-foot coordination, cooperation, social interactions, full body strength and coordination, muscular endurance, hand strength

Special Interest
-Materials: paper, markers, signs, tape, hammer, nails, wooden board, dedication signs on the playground.

-Rationale: Many of the children delight in finding the small dedication plaques on the playground; they often refer to them as secret messages. The teachers noticed this interest and helped the children create their own signs and map to put out on the playground. Some of the signs are just laminated pieces of paper and the children have been writing messages to each other on the playground. This interest has fostered social interaction and discussions among peers and has created a sense of community.

-Skills: writing/drawing, fine motor control, discussing, visual scanning, peer interaction, and symbolic representation.

Snack
Wednesday - Oatmeal & raisins
Thursday - Crackers & fruit butter
Friday- Party snack and celebration

Overview:
As small groups wind down for the session, the children are excited for the culminating events of each group. Mary's group will be visiting a local pizza shop and then making pizza for the classroom. Ann's group will be visiting an Architects' studio to see how models and blueprints are used in a professional manner. Emily's group will be performing Goldilocks and the Three Bears for our class and Ross' class. Each group has worked hard and is very excited about our final week of meeting.

Many of the themes from previous weeks continue to flourish in our classroom. The ramps and cars remain a popular activity, inspiring children to experiment and predict outcomes. The Animal Café continues to draw many children during free play. The interest in animal homes can be seen throughout the room. The animal cave, Animal Café, bird watching station, and nest making stations give a plethora of opportunities for children to discover and act out the role of animals preparing for winter.

The science center in the classroom will be changed this week to reflect the children's growing interests in nest making, camouflage and color mixing. The child-sized loom and fabric strips will be located next to the writing station to encourage children to work together to add fabric. Clay, twine, twigs, and other materials will be placed in a nest making station to connect the ideas of weaving in nature. White fur will provide a visual and tactile experience for the children as we focus on the ways animals hide during winter. Many of the children have shown and interest in mixing colors at the tabletop easels. To provide another approach to this activity, a color mixing station will be set up at the light table.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: table easels, tempera paint in varying colors, paper, small boxes, tacky glue, glass beads, wooden shapes, foam stickers, natural materials.
-Rationale: The children continue to enjoy painting with the smaller brushes and more color options. Six of the students created structures from boxes and other cardboard materials. The rest of the children have expressed an interest in creating similar structures.
-Skills: Creative risk-taking, fine motor development, symbolic representation, and self-expression, construction skills

Sensory
-Materials: Flax seed, funnels, scoops, paddle wheels, tubes, and bottles.
-Rationale: The children continue to flock to the flax seed table. Watching the seeds go through the funnels and the different speeds at which the tall containers are filled continues to be an interesting and rewarding experience for the entire class.
-Skills: Social interaction, turn taking, sensory stimulation and pleasure, communication, fine motor development, problem solving.

Science
-Materials: Loom, strips of fabric, bird nests, clay, straw and yarn, colored transparencies, solid color animal cut outs, transparent colored shapes
-Rationale: The children have been very interested in animal homes. The bird nests brought into the classroom by the afternoon class have intrigued many of the children. Students will have the opportunity to practice weaving like the birds with the use of the loom. Many of the children are interested in mixing the colors at the tabletop easels. By bringing this activity to the light table, more opportunities to engage in this process with a different material will allow children to add more depth to their knowledge of color mixing. We are also using the childrens' interest in color to introduce the idea of animal camouflage.
-Skills: Observation, inquiry, comparing, sorting, asking questions, predicting, hypothesizing, interpreting and reasoning about events, knowledge of the natural environment

Dramatic Play
-Materials: Kitchen with dishes, assorted nuts, corn, bananas, dress-up clothes, swathes of material in forest hues, materials to add to our forest, dark cloth to make a den, pillows. Plush animals, wood pieces, pictures of animal homes, fake nuts, hollow blocks, and fabric in the animal cave.
-Rationale: The children continue to be excited about the Animal Café and dressing up as different animals. The children have been talking about dens the past few weeks, so creating a den under the loft will add another dimension to the Animal Cafe.
-Skills: Role-play, peer interaction, social problem solving, creating imaginary scenarios, large and fine motor development, and symbolic representation.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: Mobilos, nature and number puzzles, tracks matching game, frog counting game, small weaving boards
-Rationale: The children are very excited about the addition of the Mobilos to our classroom. Discovering numeral concepts and counting remains a popular activity and we are also beginning to talk about patterns.
-Skills: Number sense, matching, classifying, seriating, patterning, one to one correspondence, counting concepts, whole/part relationships, and fine motor development.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: Colored pencils, skinny markers, scissors, post it notes, staplers, tape, envelopes, paper, "L" objects, and sandpaper letters, couch, book shelf, plethora of books.
-Rationale: The focus on the letter "L" will continue this week to go in depth with the letter sound and uses. The children are excited about the idea of writing, drawing, making books, sending mail, and using the written word to express themselves.
-Skills: Letter recognition, listening and receptive abilities, writing/drawing, fine motor control, and using books for reference.

Blocks
-Materials: Hollow blocks, unit blocks, wooden cars, wooden people, notch blocks.
-Rationale: The children are very interested in making ramps and roadways for cars. The children are experimenting with speed as they create different ramps and have fewer or more wheels on their constructed cars. Stage building has also been a predominant theme during free play. The children have started creating stages with compartments and complex sets represented by the notch blocks.
-Skills: Construction skills, geometry, problem solving, communication, dramatic play, symbolic representation, and large and fine motor.

Large Motor
-Materials: Indoors- climbing wall, slide, stairs, A-frame and balancing beams, donut hole, monkey bars, basketball hoops, balls, and mats. Outdoors-Sleds for pulling, shovels, rakes, wheelbarrows, hay bales.
-Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that will challenge their physical skills.
-Skills: Upper and lower body strength, endurance, hand-eye coordination, receptive skills (throwing, grasping, reaching, catching), balance, visual/spatial discrimination, propulsive skills

Special Interest
-Materials: Stories, finger plays, and felt board stories at dismissal time.
-Rationale: The children have developed favorite stories, poems, and finger plays to do during dismissal and transition times. Teacher use this time to bring some classroom content to the children, but also emphasize enjoyment and silliness.
-Skills: Listening, discussing, enjoyment of group activities, encourage self-control, community building.

Overview
Small groups have continued to flourish throughout the week. Emily's group went to see Stone Soup last week and has chosen the Three Bears to perform. Mary's group has continued to explore different food through play dough. They made their own play dough and then used that dough to create a pretend meal together. Ann's group created blueprints for their own buildings and then built them out of recycled materials. The children have really enjoyed group time and have begun to generalize things they learn in group into their play throughout the day.

In the classroom the children have enjoyed building different kinds of homes for the animals in the caves, playing at the flax seed table, and building many different ramps and bridges in the blocks. The restaurant theme has also carried through in the dramatic play area

This week we will be focusing on the creation of an Animal Cafe in the back of the room to get the children to think about different kinds of food animals eat. This will also provide opportunities to talk about the extra food animals eat and store in preparation for winter. The flax seed table will address new kinds of motion with the addition of two paddle wheels. Large group times will continue to focus on teaching beginning literacy skills as well as community building activities.

Expressive Arts
- Materials: tabletop easels, tempera paint, small brushes, small paint trays with six colors
- Rationale: The children have shown continued interest in painting. The smaller brushes will allow them to experiment with narrow brush strokes.
- Skills: Self-expression, creative risk-taking, symbolic representation, fine motor development

Sensory
- Materials: flax seed, scoops, funnels, bottles, tubes, paddle wheels
- Rationale: The children have continued to enjoy scooping, filling, and pouring. We added tubes that the children can connect to funnels and bottles for additional problem solving opportunities. The paddle wheels will allow them to experiment with cause and effect relationships as they see the seed flow over the wheel to make it move.
- Skills: Social interaction, turn taking, sensory stimulation and pleasure, communication, large and fine motor development, problem solving, and knowledge of the natural environment.

Science
- Materials: feathers, nests, string and sticks for the children to practice creating their own nests, film about birds constructing nests, pictures of animal tracks and matching animal for a matching game, tadpole and fish, bird watching station.
- Rationale: A nest making station has been added to support the children's interest in birds and the way nests are constructed. To extend the concept of habitats the children will have the opportunity to match pictures of various animals to their accompanying habitat. To further the children's thinking about feathers and their colors some pictures of camouflaged birds will be added to the science center. The children will be challenged to find the bird in the picture and then to think about how the colors of their feathers helped that bird hide.
-Skills: Observation, inquiry, comparing, sorting, measuring, asking questions, predicting, hypothesizing, interpreting and reasoning about events, knowledge of the natural environment

Math and Manipulatives
- Materials: Mobilos, interlocking nature themed puzzles, number puzzles
- Rationale: The children are continuing to explore number concepts and counting through puzzles, games and morning meeting songs. They have enjoyed exploring whole/part relationships by building with flexi-blocks so we added a new builder, the Mobilos. The Mobilos have wheels and can be incorporated into the ramp building that continues to take place daily in the hollow block area.
- Skills: One to one correspondence, counting concepts, number sense, whole/part relationships, construction skills and fine motor development

Language and Literacy
- Materials: A variety of writing implements, paper, post-it notes, envelopes, a poster with the upper and lower case alphabet, a well stocked library with books about animals, habitats, seeds, and fall, posting of the letter of the week "L", objects that begin with the particular letter of the week, a scavenger hunt based on the letter of the week
- Rationale: The children continue to utilize the writing center in various ways; to create signs, write letters, and make tickets for plays. In order to extend and support the childrens' growing awareness of print and letter recognition, the literacy center will feature a letter of the week. The teachers will highlight the letter through objects that begin with the letter, opportunities for the children to find the letter in words through out the classroom and school, and opportunities for children to practice writing the letter. There are also sensory tiles with the letter on them available. Letter sound will also be incorporated into group games and songs.
- Skills: Letter recognition, listening and receptive abilities, writing/drawing, fine motor control, and using books for reference and pleasure

Blocks
-Materials: hollow blocks, wooden planks, unit blocks, wooden cars with accompanying people, notch blocks.
- Rationale: The children have begun to use the hollow blocks and planks to create ramps. With the creation of various sized ramps the children have been investigating how the cars move differently down each ramp. The children also continue to build boats, ships, and roads with the hollow blocks. The addition of the notch blocks will encourage the children to use problem solving skills to create structures. The notch blocks will also support set building among the children who have been performing plays.
- Skills: Construction skills, geometry, problem solving, investigating, communication, dramatic play, symbolic representation, and large and fine motor

Dramatic Play
- Materials: Kitchen with dishes, aprons, dresses, animal themed costumes, acorns, corn, other types of food that relate more to animals. In order to give the restaurant a more woodsy feel, we added fabric hanging over the kitchen area to simulate the night sky and the treetops. Fabric was also added to cover the pipes as if they were trees. The children will be encouraged to decorate the area and make it look more like a forest. In the animal cave there are stuffed woodland animals with logs, branches, vines and wood pieces, different types of cloth to create more cozy homes, pictures of animals' dens and accompanying hibernation questions.
- Rationale: Animal themed costumes and acorns will be added to the dramatic play area to connect this area with the classroom curriculum of plants, animals, and life cycles. More costumes will be added to this area to support the emerging interest in plays and acting. The children continue to show interest in the restaurant theme, and recently the restaurant has begun to serve the many different kinds of animals (both stuffed and costumed) we have in the room. The cave continues to provide a cozy close place that promotes small group interaction and exploration of more specific animal homes and habitats.
- Skills: Role-play, peer interaction, social problem solving, creating imaginary scenarios, large and fine motor development, and symbolic representation.

Large Motor
-Materials: Indoors- climbing wall, slide, stairs, A-frame and balancing beams, donut hole, monkey bars, basketball hoops, balls, and mats. Outdoors-Tricycles, shovels, rakes, wheelbarrows.
-Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that will challenge their physical skills.
-Skills: Upper and lower body strength, endurance, hand-eye coordination, receptive skills (throwing, grasping, reaching, catching), balance, visual/spatial discrimination, propulsive skills

Special Interest
-Materials: musical instruments in the loft, including a xylophone, maracas, wood box and accompanying mallets to create music.
-Rationale: To provide children opportunities to express their creativity through sound and rhythm. The children will also begin to gain an understanding of musical notes, pitch, and tone through musical activities arranged during large group time.
-Skills: Creative expression, temporal awareness, pitch/tonal awareness

Overview:
The classroom has been a very busy place with the start of small groups. All of the children are enjoying their experiences and are clearly excited about what they are learning. New friendships are being formed and established friendships are growing stronger within the groups. The children have also been sharing what they have learned in their small groups with the rest of the class. We have observed many plays and construction projects during free play.

The children have shown a continued interest in the birds and squirrels at the bird feeder. We have been making daily trips out to refill the bird feeder. We made popcorn last week and put some extra kernels out for the birds. The children delighted in checking to see if the popcorn had been eaten. Some of the children have incorporated stuffed birds into their play at the sensory table, they pretend to feed the birds and make nests with the flax seed. The children have also begun to notice and delight in the various feathers on the light table.

Last week the children planted the pumpkin seeds and they have been growing fast. The children have enjoyed watering and talking about the growing plants. We now have pumpkin seeds and plants in various stages of the growing cycle, so the children will have opportunities to simultaneously observe the changes in a growing plant. The children wanted to see if the sunflower seeds they removed from the plant would grow, so we are experimenting to see if they will sprout as easily as the pumpkin seeds.

The recent cold and blustery weather has finally made fall seem like it is really here. The children have been drawing their observations of the changing seasons, which will soon be posted outside of the classroom.

Expressive Arts
- Materials: tabletop easels, tempera paint, large brushes
- Rationale: The children have shown continued interest in painting. Many of the children have been exploring how colors change when they are mixed together and they have shown delight in the variety of colors they have created.
- Skills: Self-expression, creative risk-taking, symbolic representation, fine motor development

Sensory
- Materials: flax seed, scoops, funnels, bottles, tubes, buckets, and small bird figurines
- Rationale: The children have continued to enjoy scooping, filling, and pouring. To further their sensory play we will add tubes and buckets so the children can explore how the seed moves through tubes and into a bucket on the floor. Bird figurines will also be added to support the children's play with feeding and creating nests for the birds.
- Skills: Social interaction, turn taking, sensory stimulation and pleasure, communication, large and fine motor development, problem solving, and knowledge of the natural environment.

Science
- Materials: seeds and seedlings in plastic bags, growing plants in pots, rulers for measuring the height of the growing plants, feathers, nests, string and sticks for the children to practice creating their own nests, film about birds constructing nests, pictures of animals and habitats for a matching game, tadpole and fish, bird watching station, and bird sounds listening station
- Rationale: The growing plants and sprouting different types of seeds will continue to help the children conceptualize the cycle of life. To extend to the exploration of birds a listening station will be added so the children can hear the different sounds birds make. A nest making station will be added to support the children's interest in birds and the way nests are constructed. To extend the concept of habitats the children will have the opportunity to match pictures of various animals to their accompanying habitat.
-Skills: Observation, inquiry, comparing, sorting, measuring, asking questions, predicting, hypothesizing, interpreting and reasoning about events, knowledge of the natural environment

Math and Manipulatives
- Materials: snap together building pieces, unfix cubes, interlocking nature themed puzzles, number puzzles
- Rationale: The children are continuing to explore number concepts and counting
- Skills: One to one correspondence, counting concepts, number sense, whole/part relationships, and fine motor development

Language and Literacy
- Materials: A variety of writing implements, paper, post-it notes, envelopes, a poster with the upper and lower case alphabet, a well stocked library with books about animals, habitats, seeds, and fall, posting of the letter of the week, objects that begin with the particular letter of the week, a word find around the classroom based on the letter of the week
- Rationale: The children continue to utilize the writing center in various ways; to create signs, write letters, and make tickets for plays. In order to extend and support the children's growing awareness of print and letter recognition, the literacy center will feature a letter of the week. The teachers will highlight the letter through objects that begin with the letter, opportunities for the children to find the letter in words through out the classroom and school, and opportunities for children to practice writing the letter.
- Skills: Letter recognition, listening and receptive abilities, writing/drawing, fine motor control, and using books for reference and pleasure

Blocks
-Materials: hollow blocks, wooden planks, unit blocks, wheel sets that fit on the unit blocks, wooden cars with accompanying people
- Rationale: The children have begun to use the hollow blocks and planks to create ramps. With the creation of various sized ramps the children have been investigating how the cars move differently down each ramp. The children also continue to build boats and roads with the hollow blocks.
- Skills: Construction skills, geometry, problem solving, investigating, communication, dramatic play, symbolic representation, and large and fine motor

Dramatic Play
- Materials: Kitchen with dishes, fruits and veggies, aprons, dresses, animal themed costumes, acorns, pads of paper and pictures of food to use as order pads and menus, a menu making station in the loft. In the animal cave there are stuffed woodland animals with logs, branches, vines and wood pieces
- Rationale: Animal themed costumes and acorns will be added to the dramatic play area to connect this area with the classroom curriculum of plants, animals, and life cycles. More costumes will be added to this area to support the emerging interest in plays and acting. The children continue to show interest in the restaurant and recently the restaurant has begun to make food for the children watching the plays. The cave continues to provide a cozy close place that promotes small group interaction and exploration of more specific animal homes and habitats.
- Skills: Role-play, peer interaction, social problem solving, creating imaginary scenarios, large and fine motor development, and symbolic representation.

Large Motor
-Materials: Indoors- climbing wall, slide, stairs, A-frame and balancing beams, donut hole, monkey bars, basketball hoops, balls, and mats. Outdoors-Tricycles, shovels, rakes, wheelbarrows.
-Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that will challenge their physical skills.
-Skills: Upper and lower body strength, endurance, hand-eye coordination, receptive skills (throwing, grasping, reaching, catching), balance, visual/spatial discrimination, propulsive skills

Snack
Monday - Oven fries & milk
Tuesday- Trail mix & milk
Wednesday - Raisins & rice cakes
Thursday - Pretzels & peas
Friday- Carrots & hummus

Overview
We introduced the concept of habitats this week and have been discussing what people and animals need to survive and be happy. As part of this process we are asking the children about their own habitats and hanging pictures of everyone's house on the bulletin board. We will be connecting the idea of habitats and homes throughout the room with different types of animals and the things they need in their habitats. We have added branches to the animal cave to build nests in for the stuffed animals that would live in a tree. We will also be discussing and modifying the classroom's fish tank to reflect the needs of the fish.

It is clear that many of the children are interested in the changing season, often commenting on the falling leaves and temperature outside. A scavenger hunt on the playground will aid children in noticing the details of the changing season. Child sized rakes have been brought out to the playground and used to make many leaf piles. A jumping station has been created on the playground where the children can jump down into a giant leaf pile. The children have already shown their delight at their ability to make the piles and then even more excitement when they get to jump into what they have created.

From cutting vegetables and opening the pumpkin to feeding the birds, the children have become more keenly aware of seeds. The pumpkin seeds they removed from the pumpkin two weeks ago have sprouted and the children are excited to plant them and watch them grow. The children have expressed an interest in the birdseed from the bird watching station. To reflect this interest and take a closer look at the seeds, we will be filling the sensory table with flaxseed and acorns.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: Tabletop easels, paint, paper, large tongue depressors, and simple clay tools
-Rationale: The children have completed the classroom wide collage. To introduce a new artistic medium we are introducing paint with wide brushes. We will encourage the children to represent their ideas and talk about the colors, lines, and shapes they create or notice on each other's paper.
-Skills: Social interaction, collaboration, creative risk-taking, fine motor development, symbolic representation, and self-expression

Sensory
-Materials: Flaxseed, acorns, gutters
-Rationale: To foster the children's interest in seeds we will be switching from water and frogs to flaxseed and acorns. Many connections between the children have been forged at the sensory table. The new materials will rekindle excitement and intrigue in this area of the classroom.
-Skills: Social interaction, turn taking, sensory stimulation and pleasure, communication, large and fine motor development, problem solving, and knowledge of the natural environment.

Science
-Materials: Feathers, light table, tweezers, magnifying glasses, pumpkin seeds, potting soil, pots to plant to seeds, two tadpoles, an aquarium with four fish, a bird watching station, and thermometer.
-Rationale: The bird watching station, tadpoles, and fish all allow students to interact with the animals and spark conversations about animal habitats and what happens in the animal world as the seasons change and time passes. The thermometer will be added to the bird watching station to help children visualize the changing temperature and bring an item that has been of great interest in the fish tank to another meaningful setting. Feathers on the light table will bring another aspect of the bird watching station into the classroom. Children will be able to sort, classify, and explore the feathers of different species of birds.
-Skills: Observation, inquiry, comparing, sorting, weighing, asking questions, predicting, hypothesizing, interpreting and reasoning about events, knowledge of the natural environment

Dramatic Play
-Materials: Kitchen with dishes, fruits and veggies, and dress-up clothes. Some new aprons have been added to the dress up clothes. There has also been the addition of pads of paper and pictures of food to use as order pads and menus. A menu making station has been added to the loft. In the animal cave there are stuffed woodland animals with logs, branches, vines and wood pieces.
-Rationale: To encourage social interaction and the expression of children's knowledge of restaurants by taking on familiar roles within the restaurant setting. With the progression of the restaurant, the menu making station will give children the added freedom to decide what type of food their restaurant will serve. The cave provides a cozy close place that promotes small group interaction and exploration of more specific animal homes and habitats.
-Skills: Role-play, peer interaction, social problem solving, creating imaginary scenarios, large and fine motor development, and symbolic representation.

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: Unifix cubes with numbered trays, number puzzles, fall theme lotto, snap together pieces, interlocking puzzles reflecting natural themes such as animals and plants.
-Rationale: We will move from emphasizing matching, color and shape to number concepts and counting.
-Skills: One to one correspondence, counting concepts, number sense, whole/part relationships, and fine motor development.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: A variety of writing implements, paper, post-it notes, envelopes, scissors, and a posting of the upper and lower case alphabet. A well stocked library with books about animals, fall/leaves, seeds, vegetables, school, and families.
-Rationale: The library is placed near the couch for cozy reading time with friends and teachers. Throughout the room there will be many opportunities to enjoy the spoken and written word. The children have begun using the writing center for many different activities throughout the room, whether it is sign making for the block center, the children are utilizing the writing center in many different ways. Some of the children have begun making masks with the paper and scissors at the writing center.
-Skills: Letter recognition, listening and receptive abilities, writing/drawing, fine motor control, and using books for reference.

Blocks
-Materials: Hollow blocks and unit blocks with wheel sets that fit on the unit blocks as well as wooden cars, with people in them. There are also some road signs and some wooden gas station models. Plush animal toys.
-Rationale: We have decided to add plush animal toys to encourage the concept of habitats to influence the children's constructions. Children learn more about animal shelters and needs as they incorporate animal homes into their cities, cabins, or roads. The road/city building with cars is an interest that the children continually come back to each day, so the city building will continue to be encouraged. Children use creativity and problem solving while developing their awareness of geometry through building. Communal building with hollow blocks encourages cooperation and problem solving.
-Skills: Construction skills, geometry, problem solving, communication, dramatic play, symbolic representation, and large and fine motor.

Large Motor
-Materials: The continued enthusiasm for the shovels and rakes indicates that the children would enjoy the extended use of the playground materials. The playground will be set up with shovels, and buckets, as well as child-sized rakes and wheelbarrows. The gym features a race track with push cars, a wide balance walk way, a bumpy walk, a jumping station from a large pile of mats, a small trampoline, a bean bag toss, and dramatic play areas of a repair shop and a gas station.
-Rationale: Group games bring the children together and introduce the children to following simple game rules and directions. We also use this opportunity to focus on specific motor skills and patterns. The racetrack focuses on propulsion skills and the dramatic play areas facilitate cooperation and social interaction. The rakes and wheelbarrows on the playground are to encourage the children to interact with their environment. The leaves have been falling off the tree, and the children expressed interest in a leaf pile. Working together to create a leaf pile to jump into encourages both social skills and large motor development.
-Skills: Cooperation, communication, risk taking, upper body strength, lower body strength, coordination, depth perception, role playing, symbolic representation, balance, directional awareness, and spatial awareness

Special Interest
-Morning Meeting: Classroom community building continues as well as singing songs and having discussions about seasonal changes. An emphasis on the habitats of animals will be encouraged, as will the role of animals in the transportation of seeds.
-Rationale: The morning meeting emphasizes togetherness and fosters the building of classroom community. We will continue to discuss ongoing play themes and encourage the children to revisit areas they have frequented before, while adding encouragement to explore the new materials in the sensory table or visit the lively restaurant. We will continue to introduce new stories into morning meetings, emphasizing the changing season and the ways in which the changing temperature influences animals and seeds.
-Skills: Listening, discussing, enjoyment of group activities, encourage self-control, to introduce topical conversations and continue to build a sense of community.

Overview:
Now that the children are settled into the classroom and are familiar with each other and the materials we have seen some wonderful developments in their dramatic play and block building. Many children have built roads and buildings using blocks, others have built elaborate skate-parks. We also have a restaurant with a very friendly waitstaff!

In addition to supporting emerging play themes the teachers are also continuing to make the curriculum come alive for the children through collaborative projects such as a fall inspired group collage, and by baking pumpkin muffins from a pumpkin the children cleaned and baked themselves.

The children agreed that it would be a good idea to plant the pumpkin seeds, which fueled a new direction in the study of the life cycles of plants, sprouting and planting seeds. Some of the children have noticed after playing outside that they have seeds stuck to their clothes. We will use this to delve even further into our study of seeds by examining how seeds travel and why it would be necessary for them to travel.

The busy squirrels around the school have caught the attention of many of the children. The children are curious about their behavior and enjoy making their own interpretations of what the squirrels are up to. This curiosity and interest is now being carried on to birds with the addition of a bird watching station to the classroom. As the weather gets colder we will frame our questions and conversations with children around what animals do to prepare for, and live outside when it is cold.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: Clay, glue, paper, natural collage materials (both from school and collected by the children), large tongue depressors, and clay tools
-Rationale: To provide a way for children to express their understanding about the changing seasons and the natural world by creating a large fall inspired collage. The clay exploration will be extended by adding tools that will encourage marking and shaping the clay in new ways.
-Skills: Social interaction, collaboration, creative risk-taking, fine motor development, symbolic representation, and self-expression

Sensory
-Materials: Water, toy frogs, several rocks, foliage, turtles, chutes, and gutters
-Rationale: The children have been making important connections at the water table. These connections have been both social and academic. We added gutters and chutes available for the children to use, because many of them have been expressing interest in creating water parks. The chutes and gutters will allow the children to learn about new properties of water as well as extending their symbolic play.
-Skills: Symbolic representation, social interaction, turn taking, sensory stimulation and pleasure, communication, large and fine motor development, role play, and knowledge of the natural environment.

Science
-Materials: Vegetables, tweezers for collecting seeds, magnifying glasses, balancing scales, seed sorting by size and variety, four baggies hung at the science table containing pumpkin seeds and damp paper towels. Two tadpoles, an aquarium with four fish and a bird watching station.
-Rationale: To extend the children's conceptualization of seeds, plants, sprouting, and the ensuing cycle of life. The bird watching station is one of the areas where the children can begin to make connections with their surrounding environment. The children are also encouraged to systematically record their observations on the charts or clipboards.
-Skills: Observation, inquiry, sorting, weighing, asking questions, hypothesizing, interpreting and reasoning about events, knowledge of the natural environment

Dramatic Play
-Materials: Kitchen with dishes, fruits and veggies, and dress-up clothes. Some new aprons have been added to the dress up clothes. There has also been the addition of pads of paper and pictures of food to use as order pads and menus. In the animal cave there are stuffed woodland animals with logs and wood pieces.
-Rationale: To encourage social interaction and the expression of children's knowledge of family life by taking on familiar roles. With the addition of the restaurant materials the children will be encouraged to explore their knowledge of roles outside of the home. The cave provides a cozy close place that promotes small group interaction.
-Skills: Role-play, peer interaction, social problem solving, creating imaginary scenarios, and fine motor development,

Math and Manipulatives:
-Materials: Colored shape sorter/stacker, color/shape lotto, fall theme lotto, inset puzzles emphasizing color/shape, interlocking puzzles reflecting natural themes such as animals, plants, fruits and vegetables.
-Rationale: We are starting with sorting and classifying by shape and color not only to emphasize recognition and labeling, but also to lay a foundation for later mathematical concept development. This center we left the same as last week as the children are still actively engaging with all of the materials.
-Skills: Color and shape recognition, matching, one to one correspondence and whole/part relationships, and fine motor development.

Language and Literacy
-Materials: A variety of writing implements, paper, envelopes, and a posting of the upper and lower case alphabet. A well stocked library with books about animals, fall/leaves, seed, vegetables, school and families. In the loft there are books about how animals prepare for winter with paper and pencils for recording what the children notice about the animals they see from the windows.
-Rationale: The library is placed near the couch for cozy reading time with new friends and teachers. Throughout the room there will be many opportunities to enjoy the spoken and written word. The children have begun using the writing center for many different activities throughout the room, whether it is sign making for the block center, or creating order tablets for the dramatic play, the children are utilizing the writing center in many different ways.
-Skills: Letter recognition, listening and receptive abilities, writing/drawing, fine motor control, and using books for reference.

Blocks
-Materials: Hollow blocks and unit blocks with wheel sets that fit on the unit blocks as well as wooden cars with people in them. There are also some road signs and some wooden gas station models.
-Rationale: The road/city building with cars is an interest that the children continually come back to each day. Children use creativity and problem solving while developing their awareness of geometry through building. Communal building with hollow blocks encourages cooperation.
-Skills: Construction skills, geometry, problem solving, communication, dramatic play, symbolic representation, and fine motor.

Large Motor
-Materials: The playground will be set up with shovels, and buckets, as well as child-sized rakes and wheelbarrows. The gym features a race track with push cars, a wide balance walk way, a bumpy walk, a jumping station from a large pile of mats, and dramatic play areas of a repair shop and a gas station.
-Rationale: Group games bring the children together and introduce the children to following simple game rules and directions. We also use this opportunity to focus on specific motor skills and patterns. The racetrack focuses on propulsion skills and the dramatic play areas facilitate cooperation and social interaction. The rakes and wheelbarrows on the playground are to encourage the children to interact with their environment. The leaves have been falling off the tree, and the children expressed interest in a leaf pile. Working together to create a leaf pile to jump in encourages both social skills and large motor development.
-Skills: Cooperation, communication, risk taking, upper body strength, lower body strength, coordination, depth perception, role playing, symbolic representation, balance, directional awareness, and spatial awareness

Special Interest
-Morning Meeting: Classroom community building continues as well as singing songs and having discussions about seasonal changes. We will also be having discussions about animals as well as learning some new songs.
-Rationale: The morning meeting emphasizes togetherness and fosters the building of classroom community. We will continue to discuss ongoing play themes and encourage the children to revisit areas they have frequented before, while adding encouragement to try the new bird watching station or the new tools in clay. We will introduce stories into morning meetings, including one about seeds and another about animal habitats.
-Skills: Listening, discussing, enjoyment of group activities, encourage self-control, to introduce topical conversations and continue to build a sense of community.

Overview
The children are becoming more and more comfortable with the classroom routines and are clearly enjoying their school experience. We have noticed friendships forming already and the soup making experience contributed greatly to building a sense of classroom community. Through this activity the children became more aware of each other, not only for the contributions they made to the soup, but also through the process of preparing, cooking, and eating the vegetables. Thank you for helping make the project such a success!

We will continue using vegetables as a way to facilitate learning about color as well as to build awareness of plant life cycles. An exploration and inquiry into seeds will be emphasized in the science area as many of the children discovered and collected seeds from inside their vegetables as they were cutting them.

To introduce another way to learn about life cycles and seasonal changes, we will be investigating the leaves of the trees near our school. Many children have been talking about recent trips to apple orchards with their families so we will build on these experiences with discussions about how some trees grow apples and by visiting and picking crab apples from a tree near the school.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: Clay, natural collage materials, glue and paper.
-Rationale: To provide another way for the children to express their understanding of the natural world and seasonal change, they will be invited to select collage materials from the art cart that they associate with fall. These items will be added to the classroom array for creative use with glue and paper.
-Skills: Self-expression, creative risk-taking, fine motor development, symbolic representation

Sensory
-Materials: Water, frogs, foliage, rocks
-Rationale: Many social connections have been made at the water table and with the addition of dramatic play props role-play can be incorporated into these small group interactions. As the children play with the frogs the teachers will help the children make connections to the tadpoles (they finally arrived in our science center!) and build awareness of the frog life cycle.
-Skills: Experimentation, sensory stimulation and pleasure, role play, communication, knowledge of the natural world.

Science
-Materials: Vegetables, child-friendly knives for cutting, tweezers for collecting seeds, magnifying glasses, balancing scales, seed sorting by size and variety. Two tadpoles, and an aquarium with four fish. We have also created a seek-and-find game that brings the children's attention to natural elements on the playground: trees, plants going to seed, garden etc.
-Rationale: To support children's intrinsic curiosity of the world around us. Use our observations to spark conversations and discussions and encourage the children to share what they know, listen to their classmates' ideas and wonder about things they don't understand.
-Skills: Observation, inquiry, sorting, weighing, asking questions, hypothesizing, interpreting and reasoning about events

Dramatic Play
-Materials: Kitchen with dishes, fruits and veggies, and dress-up clothes. In the animal cave there are stuffed woodland animals with logs and wood pieces.
-Rationale: To encourage social interaction and the expression of children's knowledge of family life by taking on familiar roles. The cave provides a cozy close place that promotes small group interaction.
-Skills: Role-play, peer interaction, social problem solving, creating imaginary scenarios

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: Colored shape sorter/stacker, color/shape lotto, fall theme lotto, inset puzzles emphasizing color/shape, interlocking puzzles reflecting natural themes such as animals, plants, fruits and vegetables
-Rationale: We are starting with sorting and classifying by shape and color not only to emphasize recognition and labeling, but also to lay a foundation for later mathematical concept development.
-Skills: Color and shape recognition, matching, one to one correspondence and whole/part relationships, fine motor development

Language and Literacy
-Materials: A variety of writing implements, paper, envelopes, and a posting of the upper and lower case alphabet. A well stocked library with books about animals, fall/leaves, seed, vegetables, school and families. In the loft there are books about how animals prepare for winter with paper and pencils for recording what the children notice about the animals they see from the windows.
-Rationale: The library is placed near the couch for cozy reading time with new friends and teachers. Throughout the room there will be many opportunities to enjoy the spoken and written word.
-Skills: Letter recognition, listening and receptive abilities, writing/drawing, fine motor control, using books for reference

Blocks
-Materials: Hollow blocks and unit blocks with farm animals and small fabric squares.
-Rationale: Children use creativity and problem solving while developing their awareness of geometry through building. Communal building with hollow blocks encourages cooperation.
-Skills: Construction skills, dramatic play, symbolic representation, problem solving

Large Motor
-Materials: Slide climber, wall mounted ladders, monkey bars, rocking boat, A-frame jumping station, and an open area for group games. The playground will be set up with shovels, and buckets.
-Rationale: Group games bring the children together and introduce the children to following simple game rules and directions. We also use this opportunity to focus on specific motor skills and patterns. A simple set-up in the gym is inviting and allows us to assess gross motor abilities and confidence.
-Skills: Risk taking, climbing, coordination, upper body strength, depth perception, balance, jumping and landing.

Special Interest
-Morning Meeting: Classroom community building continues as well as singing songs and having discussions about seasonal changes.
-Rationale: The morning meeting emphasizes togetherness and fosters the building of classroom community. We also discuss ongoing play themes and encourage the children to revisit topics from the previous day. This emphasizes making thoughtful decisions about what they will do after leaving the meeting.
-Skills: Listening, discussing, enjoyment of group activities, encourage self-control, to introduce topical conversations and continue to build a sense of community.

Snack
Monday - Apple crisp & milk
Tuesday- Cucumber slices & pretzels
Wednesday - Rice chex & raisins
Thursday - Apples & crackers
Friday- Yogurt & graham crackers

Overview
It was lovely to see so many of you at the Open House! Home visits and the Open House are great ways to begin the relationship building process that will be a primary focus these first few weeks of school. Those meetings help make the transition to school easier for the children, parents and teachers. This first abbreviated week will be a period of adjustment for everyone. Getting up early and heading off to school may be exciting the first day, but may be difficult for the rest of the week. I will be taking cues from the children to figure out what kind of support each of them needs. Please talk to me if you have concerns about your child's adjustment to school.

To begin the school year, the materials selected are meant to be familiar and appealing. The student teachers and I will be observing and recording developmental abilities and themes we see in the children's play. We plan curriculum by incorporating individual and group goals with the children's ideas and interests. This helps give children a feeling of ownership of their school experience. An umbrella topics for the year is life cycles and transformation, which we will explore in a variety of ways through hands-on experiences. I will provide more information and explanation as the topic continues to emerge and grow.

Expressive Arts
-Materials: Clay, paint, colored pencils, collage materials
-Rationale: To provide a variety of materials that will inspire expression of ideas and creative design.
-Skills: Self-expression, creative risk-taking, fine motor development

Sensory
-Materials: Water, cups, pitchers, bottles, and funnels
-Rationale: Warm water is a soothing sensory experience that is familiar and promotes social interactions as children negotiate sharing ideas and materials.
-Skills: Experimentation, sensory stimulation and pleasure, fluency with objects, and beginning understanding of the concept of conservation

Science
-Materials: Vegetables, balancing scales, vegetable matching by color, a variety of natural items on light table, aquarium with fish. On the playground we will encourage exploration of the natural areas and draw children's attention to the vegetable garden, plant and animal life.
-Rationale: Through these hands-on experiences, conversations with other children, and interactions with adults, your child will formulate their own theories and develop foundational knowledge about the natural world. He or she will use this knowledge as they grow to make sense of more abstract concepts such as seasonal cycles and life cycles. To reflect the seasonal changes outside, we have brought in natural items such as colored leaves, acorns, and pinecones for sorting.
-Skills: Observation, inquiry, sorting, weighing, asking questions, hypothesizing, interpreting and reasoning about events

Dramatic Play
-Materials: Kitchen with dishes, fruits and veggies, and dress-up clothes. In the animal cave there are stuffed woodland animals.
-Rationale: To encourage social interaction and the expression of children's knowledge of family life by taking on familiar roles. The cave provides a cozy close place that promotes small group interaction.
-Skills: Role-play, peer interaction, social problem solving, creating imaginary scenarios

Math and Manipulatives
-Materials: Colored shape sorter/stacker, inset puzzles emphasizing color/shape, interlocking puzzles reflecting natural themes such as animals, plants, fruits and vegetables
-Rationale: We are starting with sorting and classifying by shape and color not only to emphasize recognition and labeling, but also to lay a foundation for later mathematical concept development.
-Skills: Color and shape recognition, matching, one to one correspondence and whole/part relationships, fine motor development

Language and Literacy
-Materials: A variety of writing implements, paper, envelopes, and a posting of the upper and lower case alphabet. A well stocked library with books about animals, vegetables, school and families.
-Rationale: The library is placed near the couch for cozy reading time with new friends and teachers. Throughout the room there will be many opportunities to enjoy the spoken and written word.
-Skills: Letter recognition, listening and receptive abilities, fine motor control

Blocks
-Materials: Hollow blocks and unit blocks with farm animals and small fabric squares.
-Rationale: Children use creativity and problem solving while developing their awareness of geometry through building. Communal building with hollow blocks encourages cooperation.
-Skills: Construction skills, dramatic play, symbolic representation, problem solving

Large Motor
-Materials: Slide climber, wall mounted ladders, monkey bars, rocking boat, A-frame jumping station. The playground will be set up with shovels, buckets, bikes, and wagons.
-Rationale: A simple set-up in the gym is inviting and allows us to assess gross motor abilities and confidence.
-Skills: Risk taking, climbing, coordination, upper body strength, depth perception, balance, jumping and landing. On the playground there are opportunities for digging, hauling, pedaling, running.

Special Interest
-Morning Meeting: Music and rhythmic movement will be used to help the children learn each other's names and the classroom routines. The morning meeting also emphasizes togetherness and fosters the building of classroom community.