Hello, and welcome to the blog! It is here that you will be able to take a peek into the life of our class. Each day your child's notebook contains information about our daily activity, but in the blog, you'll get to see the kids in action. I hope you'll use it not only for the enjoyment of seeing your child at school, but also as a tool to help your child tell you about their experiences. I also use it as a way to inform you about what we do and why we do it!
The first week of school, we participated in a scavenger hunt. Each child had pictures on a clipboard representing different areas in the classroom. One at a time, we looked for the areas in the room represented by the pictures. The purpose of the activity was to let them become familiar with the pictures and find where each center is in the classroom.
The second week of school, our theme was Body Parts. We learned about body parts with Mat Man.
We sang a song and built Mat Man, one body part at a time.
You can see an example of the song and Mat Man assembly here.
One at a time, we added parts, according to the song.
Here's Mat Man all complete!
Once we had practiced building Mat Man, we moved to drawing him, first as a group, and then later in the week, individually. Lincoln drew his legs.
Wyatt drew his feet.
Leo drew some hair.
Another activity we do in our class is motor group. Motor group is kind of like a mini PE class. We practice gross motor skills such as jumping, crawling, throwing and catching. I also use it as a time to practice equally important skills such as listening, following directions, and turn taking. In this picture, you can see our speech therapist Michele Newman leading motor group. This time, she was requiring each child to practice a speech skill before being allowed to jump to the next step. I didn't include other pictures, but this was an obstacle course that included jumping, crawling under a pole, and then carrying weighted balls to place in a box.
Each day we do a brief instructional activity in math, literacy, or writing.
On this day, we started our first page of our Handwriting Without Tears workbook.
Being able to work in small and large groups is an important skill in preschool and beyond.
Students have to be able to wait for and follow directions, as well as share materials on the table.
These skills are critical to success in the general education classroom, and I try to create many opportunities to practice them throughout the week.
Cooking on Thursdays is another fun activity!
On this week, we made funny faces with english muffins, cream cheese, and raisins.
Cooking is a valuable opportunity to practice language skills.
Requesting needed items, vocabulary development, and sequencing are skills that can be addressed in a quick 15 minute cooking session.
Wyatt, Lincoln, and Leo enjoyed their creations! Yum!
One new center we started using this year is the workshop. The purpose of workshop is to teach students to be able to work independently. Each child has a work station which is a 3-drawer storage cart. Here, Leo is working.
Above the work station is a work system strip. The work system is an organizational tool which tells the student what tasks they have to do, and the order in which they have to do it.
Wyatt is working on a matching folder.
Working from left to right, they pull the number, color, or shape off the strip and match it to the same number, color, or shape on the drawer.
Lincoln is completing his first task.
Inside each drawer is a task to complete. The tasks are all skills at the child's independent level, not their instructional level. Instructional level skills are taught in a one on one setting at a different time.
You can see in this picture the finish box. As each task is completed, it goes in the box on the floor to the right of the work space.
Developing the ability to work independently will be an important skill as the children move beyond preschool, so we are starting now to create those good habits.
Hope you've enjoyed these pictures. I'll update with new pictures in a few weeks!
