{Fall} and {Creatures of the Night}

We kicked off fall with themes about Trees and Leaves and Creatures of the Night.

Pre-K 1 started with a fun pocket chart rhyme. It says:

The leaves are falling down,

Red, yellow and brown.

The leaves are falling down,

All over ______ and all over town!

We had our name cards out to take turns reading our names in the rhyme and then we added some really silly name cards with ideas from the class. Santa Claus, Ms. Molly, Luke Skywalker and Happy all had their names added to cards!

Pre-K 2 cut out owls for a door bulletin board after reading Owl books. Owl Babies by Martin Waddell was very popular. You can watch the story being read on YouTube here.



Pre-K 2 also had adorable owl sheets numbered 1-5 that they cut out and sequenced.

This owl roll and cover game was very popular, too. The peas made progress with counting, taking turns and visually discriminating numbers.

Pre-K 1 did a cut and color tree sequencing art project.

At circle time we discussed what grew on trees. These are some smart kiddos! They guessed many fruits, leaves, apple blossoms, etc.

We studied leaves and examined them under magnifying glasses.

We make little books usually once a week to use for guided reading, learning predictive text and sight words. They are very short but the kids love making them.

More pics of the roll and cover game. I love how serious these guys look!

Pre-K 2 worked on visually discriminating between different types of leaves.

They also played a beginning sounds game on the white board.

Ms. Rhonda did the coolest project of the week! She talked about day and night and brought this really cool prop to demonstrate how the sun provides daylight.

Then she made a night box! As you can imagine, the kids LOVED it. Pre-K 2 played with it and then let Pre-K 1 have a turn. Here she is making it with a little help!

How clever is this? She punched holes for a string of Christmas lights that fit into the holes. They illuminated the inside of the box with this lovely glow.

Acting silly in the night box.

And you know that old lady who swallows EVERYTHING?!

She's done it again.

And since we are working on sequencing right now, we used the story to sequence everything she swallowed. Don't you love that concentrating tongue bite? Love it!



Lastly, Ms. Rhonda had a really neat art and literature connection activity. We read this story:

It is the perfect mix of spooky tale and practical explanations! When a brother and sister are sent on a late-night errand by their mother one evening, they realize that they'll have to pass by the Ghost-Eye Tree to reach their destination. They may think they're tough, but what will happen when they have to face the tree in the dark of night? After reading the story, we made our own Ghost Eye Trees!


Pre-K 2 also made these festive fall leaves. They are sun catchers, and the picture doesn't do them justice. They are so pretty hung in the windows of their room.

Pre-K 2 made this adorable sad scarecrow and crows, too! The scarecrow was done during a cooperative project where groups worked seperately on the head, arms, legs, body, etc. I really love him. Those crows are pretty adorable, too.

Pre-K 1 rounded off the week with these scarecrows. Their favorite part was stuffing the bags!
Happy Fall, ya'll!

Fun on the Farm

Our farm unit was SO much fun! We did so many things that we couldn't take pictures of it all. We could have kept going with our farm unit, the kids loved it and so did we. We started by discussing what we knew about farms and farmers for Morning Message.

I have a Nursery Rhyme Literacy Pockets book, which I really love because I adore nursery rhymes and because it includes several super cute activities including a mini book for each one. We made Little Bo Peep mini books for predictive reading and then got busy making these sheep. Oh my word. I can not tell you how much I love these sheep. They are all so different in little ways that give them big personality.



Another teacher gave us a barn to play with and we added farm animals and did a lot of pretending.



Pre-K 2 did guided reading with the mini books On the Farm.

We counted farm animals and worked on writing numbers.

Pre-K 1 also made pigs. Ms. Jennifer cut the pieces of the barn out and we all put it together, and then added our sheep and pigs to the farm. We also made roosters out of paper plates, and one made his debut on the barn! 



We did this activity for art and literacy. 

Our barn doors opened up and we used riddles to make a game adding animals to the barn.

We had a suprise, too! Colleyville Heritage High School's FFA students brought some goats to our playground for us to visit with.

I'm not gonna lie, these goats pooped pretty much everywhere and the kids thought it was the most hilarious and gross thing, haha!









We also read this favorite story:

We read it over several days, exploring some of the vocabulary and learning it in context. The kids thought this book was hilarious. They re-read it to eachother over and over. See this giggling? A funny story never gets old.



Another favorite story was this one:

If you have a visit to the library, check it out, because this will produce lots of giggling and be warmly recieved by silly four and five year olds.



Pre-K 2 did a fun snack craft making edible fences with farm animals. They added icing and pretzels to a graham cracker and then put animal crackers in their pens! The kids put them together all by themselves and then ate them up. :)



Here's the finished product!

Pre-K 2 wrapped up the week with a cooperative project using Rosie's Walk.

In this story a hen, Rosie, unwittingly evades a sneaky fox while walking through the barnyard. She leads him through one disaster after another as he tries to catch her and fails each time, all the while completely oblivious to the danger she is in! Here is Pre-K's re-telling of the story in pictures.

 

Well, that wraps up our Farm Week! Our next theme is Fall-Leaves and Trees which is just the beginning of my favorite season and all the wonderful weather and holidays that come with it! Happy Friday to all.