APPLE CRISP

In preparation for Open House on the 10th October, we made Mr.Billadeau's mom's secret Apple Crisp recipe.  Friends collected seeds from the apples to add to our collection, which has been growing thanks to your donations.
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We have been working on story telling, so today we introduced puppets, but not just any puppets.
The children posed for a photograph and we created a little laminated version of them.

Friends spent a long time this morning creating stories together.  We will hopefully be videoing some of the stories, or writing them down so the children can act them out for the class. 

Learning to create their own story is important.  It improves their language skills, develops their creative thinking and imagination, as well as deepening cultural understanding.

                                                                                                                                                                   
                                                                                                           






                                               

Friends were also excited to work with the two boxes in big blocks.  They decided to turn them into a house.  Luca thought it needed a door, and then he had the idea to put the two boxes together and make a doorway going from one box to the other.

As you can see a lot of tape was used in the making of this beautiful home.

After all this hard work friends enjoyed sitting down to snack, and some even came back for seconds.

During story time I read a book called 'Alex and Lulu' by Lorena Siminovich, about friends who are very different but like each others company. 



QUESTIONS
What type of story are you creating with your puppet?
How many carrots were you able to eat at snack today?
Can you remember one thing that Alex liked to do that Lulu didn't?

ROSH HASHANAH

Thank you to Sara, David, Amber and Robby for joining us and sharing the Jewish holiday, Rosh Hashanah. They brought apples and honey, and read a book called 'Sammy the Spiders First Rosh Hashanah'. 

Rosh Hashanah is the Jewish new year. This means celebrations, happiness, and also reflecting on the past year and setting goals for the coming one. For families, there are so many wonderful traditions to engage in--dipping apples in honey, braiding and tasting round challah, making cards, and listening to the blast of the shofar. (Taken from  jlibrary.org/rosh-hashanah )


Work choices followed with apple tasting.  There was a choice of 5 different apples and friends could vote on their favorite.

 

We also tried lemonade that the children made yesterday afternoon.

Mr Andrews finished the morning by acting out a story about a competition between the wind and the sun.

QUESTIONS

What happened to Sammy the Spider at Rosh Hashanah?

Which was your favorite apple?

What happened to the man in the story that Mr. Andrews told?

To our friends who celebrate Rosh Hashanah

L’shana tova," a happy and sweet new year.

FROGS AND TURTLES

The children were asked to come over and sort frogs and turtles. These have a lot of attributes, giving the children many more options to work with. 

Do I choose frogs or turtles?  Do I look for a certain color or type of turtle or frog?

Then I ask them to count how many they have collected,  using the 10 frame tray to help them count one at a time.

 

A few of the children even made stories about the turtles and frogs.

Storytelling was popular today.  Friends were reading books together or making their own books.  We listened to all the stories at group time.  A wide range of topics were covered, from aliens to nanas.

Luca took a closer look at some of the items we brought back from the woods yesterday.  Grace and Evy started to investigate the seeds that some of us have brought in to share.

Our book today was 'Apples and oranges, going bananas with pairs" by Sara Pinto.  Each page asks how 2 things are alike. 

 QUESTIONS

How many turtles and frogs did you count?
How are a starfish and an octopus alike?
Out of all the stories your friends wrote which was your favorite?


REMINDERS
28th September Saturday Social 10:00am to 12:30pm

FIELD TRIPS
If you have already signed up. Thank you.  If you haven't yet, we still have spaces available. 
 7th October for Minnehaha Falls
 21st October for the Farm

LUNDHOLM WOODS

Hiking to Lundholm woods looking for seeds and leaves on a beautiful day with our Pre-k class was a delight.

On the way we looked at a small marshy area next to the path.











Nothing very exciting happening today but the big rocks make a great observation area as well as allowing us a place to stand while we explore the edge of the water with sticks.

3,2,1 GO!

 

Nice long walking paths are an ideal place to run from one tree to the next, or from Mr. Billadeau to Ms. Small. The woods are a classroom environment with so many opportunities for our minds and bodies to develop.             


Testing our bodies climbing fallen trees.

                                                                             

















Using our imaginations "Ms.Small, look, window washers."

                Solveig found a quiet spot to contemplate, or is she fishing?          

Beatrix found the smallest fungi I had ever seen, can you see it?

Can you see it now?

                                                                 Mr Billadeau found Thor's hammer, so Ike had to try it out.

Luca found a hole underneath a fallen tree. "What lives in there?"

                  Valentina found the mud kitchen.

Grace balancing on a log

  .                                                                                      A group of friends playing a game                                          

Everyone climbing the hill to get back to the walking path

Time to head back for snack and P.E.

Our friend Margot was out on Tuesday, she was a flower girl at her Uncle's wedding and brought photos in to share.  We read 'The flower girl wore celery' by Meryl Gordon.  It is about a little girl that has expectations about what a flower girl is and what the day will be like.  While it was not exactly the same as Margot's experience we were able to see some similarities. which connected to our discussions on, different, same and exactly the same.

QUESTIONS

What did you find in the woods?

What was your favorite thing about your hike ?

Did the little girl wear celery?

Man’s heart, away from nature, becomes hard; [the Lakota] knew that lack of respect for growing, living things soon led to lack of respect for humans too.” – Luther Standing Bear (c. 1868-1939)