Happy Halloween!

*Disclaimer: O.k., so I tried to take a panoramic photo, but it did not turn out quite as I had anticipated. My guess is that I moved too slow while taking the shot, as you can see, it ended up mashing or stretching several faces, or cutting kids out all together. Makes for a kind of funny picture though, doesn't it? ;)

We had such a BUSY and fun day! We started off by decorating Trick-or-Treat bags with Halloween stickers. All classrooms, including ours, took turns touring the school, trick-or-treating throughout each room. Upon our return to the classroom we read scary stories (Spooky Wheels on the Bus, and The Great Monster Hunt), followed by our Pumpkin Food party. Next up was to create a memory book about our pumpkin patch field trip. And last but not least, a rotation of 3 Halloween crafts! 

Whew! Another action packed day is under our belt. I took lots of pictures, which you can find in the photo tab above. I wish you all a safe and dry night of Trick-or-Treating!

Happy Halloween!

Preschool Skills That Predict College Graduation

Reading, writing and arithmetic are without a doubt invaluable skills to learn in school. But they are by NO means the only skills we work on throughout the day here at Touchstone. As early childhood educators, it is our job to try to set children up for success by teaching important life skills such as empathy, listening, following directions, and self-control. In essence, teaching them how to think.

All four of these skills involve ACTIVELY THINKING about a given task. Children  at age 4 often react impulsively, and need to actually learn how to calm themselves down and actively think about a task in order to complete it successfully or socially appropriately.

 Here is an interesting segment from a morning T.V. show which reports on a study on pre-k skills that predict college graduation. 

http://www.katu.com/amnw/segments/Preschool-Behavior-That-Predicts-College-Graduation-175601411.html

A few activities to practice the idea of actively thinking are:
- ask your child questions before/during/after reading such as: 1. "look at this picture, what do you think is happening?" 2. "why do you think that just happened" or, "what would you have done in that same situation." 3."who was the character of the book and where did it take place?"
-purposefully trick your child by giving the wrong answer when practicing academics with them.
-switch the rules of a familiar game. See if your child can remember what you changed.

Plumper Pumpkin Patch

Here is a glimpse from our pumpkin patch field trip on Thursday. I posed the entire album in the photos tab above. This was by far the most fun pumpkin patch field trip I have taken with a class. They got to learn first hand about pumpkin varieties and how a farm works. What a fun day it was!

When we arrived we all sat for a discussion from one of the farmers. She taught us about all the different types of pumpkins they grow on the farm.

Then it was time for a tour of the farm on the Hayride! 

They grow Christmas trees too...

and raise farm animals ranging from ponies, to pigs, turkeys, goats, llamas, and donkeys!

Mini Apple Pie

We read a book in class a bout the life cycle of an apple tree in class on Monday, called "The Apple Pie Tree". In essence, the story follows a brother and sister through the seasons as their apple tree matures and grows apples ripe enough to bake a pie with.

In planned centers this week, one of our activities is to make cinnamon smelling play-dough and use it to make a mini apple pie. The kids are having a blast with this activity! Take a look-

Homemade Applesauce, YUMMM.

Step 1. Cut the apples

Step 2. Add Cinnamon and sugar

Step 3. Let it cook

Step 4. Mash it, serve it, eat it!

Step 5. Write about how it was made!

Car Talk

Each day I add a question for you to discuss with your child while you are on the way home from school on my Car Talk board, located by the door on your way out of the classroom.

You know what we are scheduled to do most days by reading the newsletter, but sometimes the most memorable parts of the day happen in those "in between"  or spontaneous moments spent at school. Car Talk is always current, relevant, and fresh in your child's mind.

Try it for a week, see where the conversation goes...

Apple Tasting

Sanaa tried all three apples...

but liked the yellow apple the best!

Then she graphed her favorite.

Students tasted a red, yellow, and green apple. Next they drew their favorite one and graphed it on our apple tree. Once the votes were in, we did all sorts of Apple Math. Activities included:
                - counting the number of votes for each color
                - counting which color had the most/least votes
                - adding the total of red +green, green+yellow, yellow+red votes
                - counting the total votes

Here's our apple tree!

Nature Walk

On Thursday afternoon I woke students up early from nap to go on a short nature walk. We made special note of all the trees around our school that were turning colors! Each student collected items indicative of the Fall season and we will explore them next week through sorting and graphing. 

Question of the Week

Here is the class giving Miss Laura a big birthday hug on Thursday! During snack I asked each student "how old do you think Miss Laura turns today?", here are their answers:

Sanaa- 15 or maybe 16

Dishitha-14

Aila- 13

Yuval- 3 dollars

Paityn- 3

Maliya- 61

Rishabh- 6

Hayden- 92

Evan- 17

Angela- 4

Austin- Well, how old was she on her last birthday?

Sydney- 15

The real answer- ?????

Music Class

Miss Dawn comes in on Wednesdays from 11:30-12 to teach a music class! During this time she teaches classic nursery rhymes and finger plays, as well as about different genres of music.

In this picture students are listening to "Great Balls of Fire" by Jerry Lee Lewis. Everyone has a "ball of fire" in their hands (a balled up scarf) and are asked to listen for when the song lyrics say "great balls of fire!" and throw their scarf in the air. It looks like a lot of fun :)

Planned Centers

Fall is Here! The colors of the season are changing around us outside. We have had many discussions this week about what we see and feel that lets us know that Fall is upon us.

 Planned centers are a fun way way to incorporate theme related discussions with academic learning. Take a look at what we are up to this week in Planned Centers:

Hayden is creating a stain glass window, using Fall leaf colors

Kruthi is creating an ABB pattern using leaves

Angela is using watercolors to paint a Fall leaf

Siddharth is counting the dots on the dice, and stamping the
matching numeral on his paper

Fun with Numbers

Number scramble

Paityn matched 3 dots to her number 3

Dishitha matched 4 Fall leaves to her number 4

Today we played a number matching game that went over pretty well with the class, called Number Scramble.

Each student was given a number between 1 and 12. They were then asked to search the room for a card with the matching number of dots OR leaves on it. The skills performed in this activity were identifying numerals and one-to-one correspondence. Everyone found their number, great work kids!