Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, We Have Fun in our Room!

I always enjoy opening the school year with my Chicka Chicka Boom Boom unit! It gets the kids to dive into literature, while going beyond a simple "read aloud". This week we focused on recognizing the repeating pattern that is in Chicka Chicka Boom Boom and practiced reading aloud together. It was fun to see all of their faces light up when they realized they could read too!

We made our own version of Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, but we called it Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Look Who's in our Room! Can you spot your child's name and face :)? We will add this book to our classroom library so all the kids can practice reading on their own.

We experimented with a coconut as well! We sat in a circle and held, smelled and shook the coconut prior to forming a hypothesis about whether the coconut would sink or float in water. We talked about the word "hypothesis" and what it means. The students really enjoyed listening to the swooshing sound coming from inside of the coconut!

Here is our prediction chart. We had a lot of "floaters" :).

Below is a picture of student documenting his hypothesis...attempting a writing lesson is always a real stretch the second week of school, but the class did such a great job!

Check back in for a video that documents our experiment :)!

First Week Fun

As I have learned throughout the years, the more time you spend on teaching routines and expectations, the more productive the year will be. I try to spend A LOT of time going over simple things like how to raise our hands, how to line up, how to put away our folders, how to walk up and down the stairs, etc. If the class masters these routines, less time will need to be spent on behavior management and more learning can occur. Below I have shared a link that talks about the importance of routines and some of the things we do daily in our classroom:

http://teacher.scholastic.com/classroom_management_pictures/

This week we learned about how to use the scissors, and what we should and shouldn't do with them. In order to gain a better understanding of each child's ability, I started with a basic straight line cutting sheet. Each child did a great job showing fine motor control and responsibility with the scissors!

We also worked with glue bottles and learned the saying, "Only a dot will do!" with the help of a gluing sheet that was in the shape of an apple. They placed a dot of Elmer's glue on each little circle and once it was all filled, we sprinkled glitter over the dots to create a one of a kind apple!

Lastly, we learned how to use a paintbrush and how to paint with watercolors. Each child traced over his/her name with all different crayon colors and then used watercolor paint over it. They turned out pretty neat!

Back to School, Back to School, to Prove to Mommy & Daddy that I'm the Sharpest Tool :)

The first day of school is always a fun and exciting time. Every child comes from a different preschool experience and environment, so the first day in pre-k is always an adventurous one! We started off the day with basic morning work (coloring sheet), which allowed for each child to find his/her seat and release any nerves they might have had by socializing with some new friends at his/her table. We then slowly went through circle time, introduced ourselves and worked on creating a self portrait. I love seeing their self portraits and watching how they develop throughout the year!

We are missing quite a few of our classmates on our first day, but we are looking forward to being all together next week!