Happy December

Dear Families,

        I hope you are finding yourself enjoying the beginning of the holiday season.  Things are going very well in preschool.  We have transitioned from our bear theme to a Gingerbread/Christmas/Holiday/ theme.  We are reading the books; Gingerbread Baby and Pete the Cat Save Christmas.  We are learning songs to play with jingle bells.  Our dramatic play center is full of baking supplies, a Christmas tree to decorate, and dress up clothing.  Our sensory table has “reindeer food” (oatmeal) that the children will bring home next week to put out for Santa’s reindeer to eat while they are waiting for Santa to deliver toys.  We have many craft activities going on right now including ornament making. 

        We welcome Ethan K. to our Tues/Thurs class.  We now have 10 students in our Tues/Thurs class and continue to have 7 students in our Wed/Fri class.

        Holiday parties are coming up next week. You are invited to join us for a group time, snack and a craft activity from 1-2 on December 20^th or 21^st.  Our sweet treats are covered for these parties but if you’d like to send in juice boxes, fruit, napkins or plates please let me know via email, phone call or in the communication folder.

      Don’t forget to subscribe to our class blog.  I add photos and updates periodically of the happenings in our class.  Also, remember never hesitate to call, email, or write with any questions or concerns.

Updates

Dear Families,

Scholastic orders are due this Friday.  It's a great way to get great books for Christmas.  See the link to the right to place an online order.

Holiday parties are on December 20th and 21st from 1-2 p.m.  Please let me know if you are interested in bringing: juice boxes, napkins, plates, snacks, etc... 

We just started our bear theme.  We are reading many bear books including, Bear in the Square, Brown Bear Brown Bear, Bear Snores on etc...  Our dramatic play center is set up for Goldilocks and the Three Bears. 

We will have a teddy bear picnic on December 6th and 7th. Please see note in backpack.

Ms. Sandy's last day is December 7th.  She is moving on to student teach in a Kindergarten class in a Cincinnati Public School.  We will miss her very much as she has made great connections with the students and has been such an asset to our class.

Ms. Janie is BACK!!!!  We are very excited to have Ms. Janie back healthy.

News and photos

A few notes:
-Conference slips have gone home and you should have received an email from me as well.  Many of you have signed up.  Please let me know if you'd like a conference.

-Scholastic book club flyers have been sent home.  It's a great way to get Christmas gifts for all the children in your family.  There is a link in this blog to order.  The Pete the Cat books are always a favorite of preschoolers.

-Ms. Janie is coming back on the 19th! We are so excited.

-Ms. Sandy is doing her lead teaching project this week meaning she has done the lesson planning and will run our group times and transitions throughout the day.  She has set the classroom up for learning all about pizza.  Pizza is a fun theme as we can incorporate so many different things such as learning about shapes, parts to a whole, the letter "P", and so on.  We will taste test toppings and graph the results.  One of my favorite parts about preschool is that we are learning all day long but the learning is so much fun and natural.

-October was a busy  month.  Check out our pictures below.

The fire department visited our Wed/Friday class in October. 

We acted out the spooky walk with our Tues/Thursday class.  Here is Collin crawling through the "grass."

Feeling the "cold and slimy" in the cave.

"Rattling bones and ghostly moans."

Couldn't get enough of the cold and slimy.

Happy 5th Birthday, Kyle!

Happy 4th Birthday, James!

We carved a pumpkin on the morning of our Halloween party!  Ryan enjoyed it!

Sophia

Christopher

Collin

Ethan

Zander

Kyle

Aiden

Maddie

Acting out one of our favorite October stories, "Big Pumpkin" by Erica Silverman.

Riley

James

Hailie

Donnie

Riley busy in our pizza parlor.

Bree serving up a pizza.

Our pizza making station.

A couple of our class chefs.

Gabriel the chef.

Collin the customer.

Busy making pizzas.

Corn starch and water make for a fun sensory experience.

Gabriel

This is Noah and our Tap-it.  The Tap-it is an interactive device similar to a smart board but designed specifically for various levels of competence.  We really enjoy the website starfall.com. 

Some news...

Dear Families,

I wanted to let you know about some exciting news for my family.  As you may know my husband and I have a 3 year old little boy named Oliver.  Our family is growing and we are having another little boy.  Our baby is due in March.  The plans are for me to work as close to my due date as possible and stay home with the baby for 8 weeks.  I plan on being back at school for most of the month of May.  We already have a substitute teacher lined up.  Her name is Holly Brock. She worked as my substitute when I had my first child.

Ms. Holly will get to know the students well before my maternity leave because she will be subbing for Ms. Janie beginning Friday.  Ms. Lynda Higgins has been working in Janie's place since the beginning of the school year and we are sad to see her move on.  She has been such an asset to our class.

Ms. Janie is doing well.  She has received great news at her last appointments and we anticipate her to continue to heal well and join us in the near future. 

Ms. Sandy continues to be in our class. She is our student teacher from the University of Cincinnati.  She will be with us until December 1st.  She has also been a huge asset and the students have really benefited from having her as a teacher.

Any questions please never hesitate to contact me.

Sincerely,
Gretchen

Halloween Party

Halloween Party

You are invited to join us on October 30th or 31^st from 1-2 p.m. for our Halloween Party. 

We will have a special group time, craft activity and trick or treat in our classroom.

No costumes allowed but of course Halloween themed clothing is great.

You may also bring in or send in an item for the children to collect trick or treating.  No peanut or nut products please. Besides candy you can send in items such as pencils, erasers, stickers, rings etc… 

We have 9 students in our Tues/Thurs class and 7 in our Wed/Fri class.

Preschool News

We've been busy.  These last couple weeks we've transitioned to a fall leaf theme.  We have taken nature walks around our school to collect leaves.  We've played with corn in our sensory table.  We've explored the fall colors of brown, red, green, yellow and orange.  We've read many fall stories and talked about season changes.  We are practicing putting on our own jackets and zipping all by ourselves.  Our dramatic play center has been busy since we've added baby dolls and dress up clothing.  Next week it'll become a pumpkin farm!  We've completed many craft projects.  One that we sent home already was the corn letters.  Each child explored the first letter of their name in a new way by gluing corn kernels on paper.  Teaching literacy with the young child can be done in so many fun ways such as the corn tactile letters but also by making letters out of play dough or practicing letters in finger paint.  There are many stages of literacy development.  Some children are still scribbling which is a completely normal developmental stage.  The key in literacy development is to celebrate each stage.  Look for a handout soon in the take home folders with the stages of literacy development. 

Our fall celebration will happen on October 30 and 31st from 1-2 p.m.  You are invited to join us for a special snack, group time and a little trick or treating.  Due to allergies in the class please wait until I send home a list of safe treats to bring in or send in with your child.  More info about the parties will be coming soon. 

Any questions please never hesitate to call, email or write me a note.  I am very much looking forward to this school year.  Both our classes are full of fantastic students who are creating great friendships. 

Here are some photos of our fun finger painting sensory experience from this week. 

We painted with apples!

During group time we talked about all the things you can do with apples.  The students were happy to hear that painting was one of them.  We painted with apples on Tuesday and Wednesday of this week.