Happy Johnny Appleseed Day!

It was Johnny Appleseed day... and we celebrated in the usual way.... learning all about the man who LOVED apples!  You can see us all decked out in our special hats and the cute little apple friends we made for our room.   If you don't know the story of Johnny Appleseed, his mission in life was to share apples with everyone he met.  Since it was such a long time ago he traveled by foot and carried everything he needed... so his cooking pot also served as a hat.  (I think we look adorable.)  This week will be filled apple fun... an apple taste test and making apple pies.   Fall is such an amazing time of year and it is so exciting to feel the change coming.  We start with apples and before you know it....we will be celebrating Halloween.  (And I am not telling any kind of fib when I tell you our class has already picked out Halloween costumes and changed their mind about 5 times...)  Enjoy an apple today and say thanks to Johnny Appleseed.  (also knows as John Chapman.)

Our First "Reader"

It is finally here!!! Our first little reading book that we made in our classroom.  We each helped make the book and practiced reading... so everyone was very excited to take it home and share it with their family.  I am very proud of our boys and girls and their first step into reading!

Alumini Visit

 One of my favorite days... days where our former students stop in to say "hi" and show us all the cool stuff they are learning in big school.  Our friend, above, was in our class last year and she came by to talk to the boys and girls about preschool learning.  She told them about how they have to behave and all of the things they are learning about... and she read them TWO books!  Two books by herself without any teacher help.  That was AWESOME!!!!  And our friend seen below stopped by to say "hi" and read this super proud teacher a book all by herself.  I am soooo proud of these two girls and can't wait for them to stop in again.

Picture Day

 Picture day is always kind of a crazy day because no matter what we do... there is always so much waiting.  (And you know as adults that takes more patience than even we have.... so for preschool boys and girls it feels like it takes FOREVER!)  I didn't spoil anyone's surprise by taking pictures with our photographer's backdrop but I think they all turned out really good.  Mrs. Kelli & I tried our very best to keep everyone's hair as neat as possible, but no matter what, our four year old fall picture day has come and gone. 

Working Together

Just a fun day... working together and getting even smarter.  We are getting adjusted to the routine of the day and now understand how our daily schedule shows us the way...We know our Pledge of Allegiance and the Salute to the flag of South Carolina... and are sort of figuring out that if we do our best and take our time..... we really do have more time to play in centers.  Puzzles and Lego's continue to evolve into more than just "a center to dump stuff out."  We are actually making some pretty amazing structures and using all of the things that are in front of us.

  And... as part of our unit on friendship, we did a fun "friendship interview."  It was so fun to watch the children learn that we like some things that are different and some that are the same... but it doesn't really matter because we are friends anyway.  (Oh but we did learn that every friend in our class likes ice cream and cupcakes!!!!)   Look at these faces.... so totally perfect... and amazingly created by God!

Fall Family Trees

Another great art project created by the children in our class.... our fall family tree.  I love these paintings because you can see each child's creativity, especially in their tree trunks.  These sweet little trees sometimes have more than we expect... sometimes there are special friends and favorite pets.  Of course the best part of this art project is to know that even though we have our own special family at home.... we are ALL part of God's family... making us all sisters and brothers in HIS love!

Bonnie San

 Konnichiwa!  It was our second week of Japanese and we LOVE it.  It may sound a little strange when your children repeat some of what we are learning, but believe me when I say it will scare you how much they actually learn this year!  We can now count to ten and say hello and goodbye.

Terrific Thursday

 This was not some kind of hieroglyphic .... it was a learning activity we did today on our big flip chart...  We were deciding if something was a letter, number, picture, or word... and yes we got them all right. ---- Sometimes you have to do an activity like this to understand what all this number and letter business is all about.  So we learned that  numbers are for counting.... letters are for writing and yes... pictures can be words.  (Note there is no picture of gummies.... we were just having a treat when someone asked me what it looked like as a word.)   We have also been trying out the puzzles in our room.  I know they can be a little intimidating, but we are all finally warming up to the idea that solving them really isn't as hard as we thought it would be.

 But at the end of the day... we were all on the stars!!! We worked really hard, showed some great behavior, and best of all..... had LOTS OF FUN!!!!

WAY TO GO!!!! Happy 15th day of school and Happy Thursday!!!!  What a great DAY!!!!

Some Of Our Work

 Just to show you how hard we are working - here are a few papers from our week.  I LOVE our family story. (above.)  The were all wonderfully illustrated by your child.  Take a few minutes today to review your child's work for this week.  Give them praise and ask questions about we learned - we are well on our way to kindergarten.

Friendship Necklaces

Since we have been in school we have been learning about ourselves and each other.  And as you know.... I keep talking about how totally precious we are in God's sight!  So this week we talked more about ourselves by talking about our families and friends.  It is pretty neat to hear how our families are alike and different.  As we talked about friends, we talked about how fun it is to share with each other.  So we made these friendship necklaces to share with our class.  Each one of us made a necklace and put it in a basket.  At the end of the day, we put the basket of 13 necklaces out and each child picked one out... "kinda" like a friend swap.  We LOVED making these treats to share with each other.  It is so awesome to have a friend and to be a friend!!!