Grace Garden Preschool

"We are the Dinosaurs Marching!" is what the Ladybugs sang this week, as they stomped around the room pretending to be prehistoric friends of all shapes and sizes. 

Our sensory table overflowed with plastic carnivores and herbivores, and the Ladybugs had a great time maneuvering them through sand. The Ladybugs read Oh my Oh my Oh Dinosaurs! by Sandra Boynton and Dinosaurs Roar by Paul and Henrietta Stickland, both sweet dinosaur books with gentle illustrations. Pastor Amy taught us the story of creation in chapel, using beautiful oil paintings to signify light, water, and the living things God put on Earth. We also learned a song that thanked God for making dinosaurs! The Ladybugs made dinosaur masks out of construction paper and they glued sand to cardboard Tyrannosaurus Rexes.

In addition to dinosaurs, the Ladybugs learned about the color yellow, the letter C, and the number 3. We painted at the easel with yellow paint, made yellow play dough, formed shapes with yellow yarn as we glued it to yellow paper. The Ladybugs colored letter Cs on paper, used C cutters to shape play dough, and we talked about some familiar words that begin with this letter.

We have also been focusing on being kind to our friends. The Ladybugs are doing a great job! We love watching how they hug each other throughout the day.

Thank you for doing such a great job coloring the homework assignment! We hope you have enjoyed the display in the hall as much as we have. And thanks to Hudson and Grace for our yummy snacks.

Next week, more dinosaurs! Have a terrific weekend.

Love,
Ms. Shannon and Ms. Tammy

The Ladybugs became firefighters, doctors, and construction workers this week, as we continued our unit on Community Helpers. 

We wore firefighter hats and sang, "Down by the Station"; we hung stethoscopes around our necks and played "Doctor, Doctor, Nurse" (instead of Duck, Duck, Goose!); and we mixed cookie dough by pounding it with hammers and other tools, as we pretended we were construction workers! Our sensory table was filled with dirt, rocks, and sand, so the Ladybugs could drive toy police cars, ambulances, and construction vehicles through it.

We moved on to the letter B, the color red, and the number two this week. The Ladybugs painted with red, drew with red markers and crayons, and investigated our red prop box, filled with red objects from our room. They also discovered what the letter B looks like and learned what words start with B. And the Ladybugs learned to hold up two fingers to count to two! We talked about colors and shapes as the Ladybugs rolled Play Doh and drew with rulers and stencils.

In chapel, Pastor Amy taught us about how God taught Moses the 10 laws on the summit of Mount Sinai, focusing on "Love your neighbor, as you love yourself". We took that idea to our classroom, and applied it to how we play together and share our toys. The Ladybugs sang "The People in Our Neighborhood" in music class with Mrs. S, which you may remember hearing on Sesame Street when you were a child!

As you already know, we gave the Ladybugs some homework this week. After noticing how much taller your kiddos are getting (some have grown nearly two inches since the beginning of the year!), we decided to trace their little bodies so that they can decorate them with you at home. There's no deadline, but we would love to hang their finished projects in our classroom. Thank you for taking time to do this!

How thrilled we are to report that Koen is now a Ladybug! Hooray! Edie, thank you so much for making the Ladybugs' tummies so happy.  Your snacks were a huge hit this week! 

We are going to have a blast next week when we begin our two week unit on dinosaurs. Until then, have a fantastic weekend. We'll look forward to seeing everybody on Tuesday.

Love,
Ms. Shannon and Ms. Tammy

The Ladybugs didn't miss a beat transitioning back into our school routine this week!
Community helpers were the topic, as we talked about how we all work together to make our communities a better place. We started off looking at the book, ABCs of Jobs by Richard Brown, a terrific book with detailed photos and descriptions of various professionals. We decided to focus on mail carriers this week. On Tuesday, the Ladybugs played in a pretend post office, where they could mail boxes, letters, and envelopes. They also put mail in our very own mail box. On Wednesday, they made mail bags and wrote postcards to send to themselves! Have your child check the mail box with you in a few days, and they should be surprised to see their postcards arrive at home. In order to enjoy the beautiful weather on Wednesday, we took a buggy ride, and pointed out the mail boxes we saw at the homes across the street.

The Ladybugs also focused on the letter A, the color blue, and the number one this week. We talked about the letter A, and cut out magazine pictures of things that start with that letter. We also filled a box with blue items from our room, including a ball, a lego, tape, tissue paper, and a musical instrument. We taught the Ladybugs to hold up their pointer fingers to count to one!

We tended to our garden on Tuesday and under all of the leaves that had accumulated over break, we found radishes that were ready to harvest! What a great surprise!

The cold weather on Thursday inspired us to put on our chef hats and bake a batch of warm blueberry muffins for our snack. The Ladybugs love to cook, and they especially enjoyed mashing a portion of our berries to flavor the batter! We included our recipe in the folders.

We were thrilled to welcome our newest friend, Hudson, to our class. We are so happy she is a Ladybug!

Next week, we will continue learning about community helpers. Have a terrific weekend together!

Love,
Ms. Shannon and Ms. Tammy