We have had a Super Senseriffic Week so far!

As the month of September winds down and October approaches, new and exciting themes are being introduced.  However, we are still very much involved in our Five Senses Study.  The children enjoyed activities that have to do with their senses of smell and taste this week.  They learned that their noses (nariz, in Spanish) have little tiny hairs in them called cilia, that clean the air as they breathe it in.  Those hairs, cilia, keep the dust and dirt in the air from getting into their lungs.  They also learned that there is a sticky substance inside their noses called mucus.  Mucus helps trap odors, dirt and dust.  Air passes through the hair and mucus and reaches nerve cells.  The nerve cells are connected to the brain.  They send messages about smells in the air straight to the brain! The children learned that their brain remembers smells.  When the brain gets the message from the nerve cells in the nose, it tells us what we are smelling! Our class had the opportunity to smell several different familiar scents, name them,  and to choose their favorite to be the scent of a flower they made using skills such as cutting with scissors, glue control..."Little Drops of Glue, Whoo!", and a new art material to the class...paint dotters.  They also spent time with the classroom herb garden, deciding which herbs they most liked to smell.  Each child drew their favorite herb to smell in their science journal.

I think the sense that we all love to learn about the most is the sense of taste!  The children learned all about their tongues today! They learned that their tongue is the muscle that is in charge of tasting.  It can also sense whether food/drink is hot or cold.  They examined each others tongues and saw that they all were covered in tiny bumps and spikes.  These are called papillae.  Our friends thought it was cool that the papillae grab onto the food in their mouths and help it to move around.  They also learned that saliva helps to make the food soft in order to send it safely into their bodies.  The favorite lesson, however, included TASTING food to figure out if it was sweet, salty, sour, or bitter.  They discovered that there are different sections of the tongue to decipher this.  The taste buds send messages to the brain! Today, the children will bring home a diagram of the tongue that they used in Centers.  Please ask them about their tasting experience. :)

In other areas this week so far:
*The children have been estimating, guessing how many objects are in a container, counting the actual number, then printing that number.  They were pretty darn good at this!

*working with measuring teaspoons, tablespoons, and cups to measure ingredients for making play dough.

*pulling numerals from a stack, counting that many slips of recycled paper, crumpling the paper slips up, then making baskets or "hoops" to match the number.  It's Hh week, so a game of hoops was in order!

* computer fun with "All About Me".

* book writing and dictation

*Hh stories and songs:  Ask about "Hannah Had The Hiccups"!  It's a favorite!

* SO MUCH MORE!!!  Please see the pics at the top of the blog (you can click on them to make them bigger) to get the more complete picture of our exciting learning adventures.  These Bright-Eyed Bears have certainly earned their name!  Your children are so BRIGHT!!!

Stay tuned!

Happy week!
Mrs. Carson

Wonderful Exploring!

  

Every day is about exploring new things in JK.

New friendships!

                                                                  Science and Math!
                                                                     Art and color!

Computers and technology!

                            Life! Grow with us, and discover how much fun learning can be.

This week, the children will continue their study of the five senses with smell and taste.  We have all sorts of fun activities planned.  They will measure ingredients for and make their own scented play dough, smell and taste herbs as well as plant them in the shoes they brought to school, cook and eat (of course), learn about how digestion works in their bodies, and so much more.
The letter focus of the week is Hh.  The children will learn the shape, sound, sign, of Hh, as well as print it themselves using different methods.  One method is with the wet/dry try, as part of the Handwriting Without Tears program.  The children begin with a printed H on a mini chalkboard.  Using a tiny wet sponge that fits just perfectly in the correct pencil grip used for writing, the children erase the H, just over the print.  They then reinforce the H shape by drying where the wet H appears, using tiny bits of tissue.  Once the board is completely blank, the children will draw their own H, using the big line down, second big line down, little line across method.  The letter is reinforced three times during this activity. :)  So much learning going on! Stay tuned!
Happy Week!
Mrs. Carson

Excellent Ee Week! Sense of Hearing! All Sorts of Exploration!!

"We are the world!  We are the children!  We are the ones who make a brighter day!!"  These bright and beautiful self-portraits shine in our classroom, just like their true selves shine.

As we get to know each child in our classroom, we celebrate their likes, dislikes, strengths, weaknesses, and individuality as opportunities to grow, learn, and strive for being the best one can be.  I love learning about my Bright-Eyed Bears.  Each and every one of them offers something special and unique to our classroom family.

We have gardeners!

Builders!

Artists!

                                                                        Writers!

                                                          Friends!  And so much more!!!

These children are AMAZING!

This week we are focussing on our sense of hearing.  The children loved the story The Listening Walk, by Paul Showers.  You could have heard a pin drop as they listened to this mesmerizing story.  Silently, the class then took a listening walk of our own around campus.  We heard many wonderful sounds.  The children settled in the garden outside of the Theater to draw pictures and dictate about what they heard along the way of our walk.  Finally, they shared their drawings and talked about what they heard as a group, back in the classroom.  What a fun discussion we had after getting an earful of excitement in our very own back yard!

Working on the computer was a very exciting new activity for this week.  We visited www.starfall.com
to work on the "All About Me" activities.  The children really enjoyed learning how to "work" the mouse, and choosing their favorite things to showcase on the screen. I enjoyed the one on one time with each of my buddies!  I think they did too! :)

We have so many wonderful goings on in the Bright-Eyed Bear Classroom.  Stay Tuned! :)

*Please be sure to sign up for a Parent/Teacher Conference if you have not already done so. :)
*Remember that every Friday is Exploring and Spirit Day. :)

Happy Week!
Mrs. Carson

Fantastic Ff Week! Super Sight Week! Planting Vegetable Soup Week!

Last week continued to bring fantastic learning experiences.  Here are just a few:

Sharing time with our new middle school buddies Kaelin and Cameron, who will join us every Tuesday and Thursday for lunch.

Learning about our sense of sight through play with light table objects, and exploration of kaleidoscopes and color paddles was so much fun!

As the children continue to learn about themselves and their bodies they are experiencing activities that make them think about how they are put together.  We studied Mat Man earlier this year and watched how his body was made of different parts beginning with a head, body, arms and legs.  The children are learning all about different shapes and created self portraits using shapes to make up their heads, bodies, and arms and legs.  The shapes came out of common school objects and reinforced how each child is put together and how each child has a personality all their own.  The results were fabulous!  Please come to see them.  The portraits are showcased on our bulletin board in the classroom.

Creativity and color are always celebrated in class, but especially during sight week when the children are learning about the colors, how we see them, and even their names in Spanish! :)

This new week will bring lessons on the sense of hearing, letter Ee, and with the computer!  Stay Tuned!

What a great week!

Our focus letter of this week is letter F.  We have had a fabulous time playing learning games like replacing the first consonant of each child's name with the letter F.  The children laughed and laughed each time they heard their "new" names called for lining up, when volunteering information, and during class discussions. They found it especially funny when Mrs. Fummings and Mrs. Farson addressed each other. Fantastic Fun!

The class as a whole really enjoys picking out rhyming words from songs and stories we share in class.  This week they learned a new song called "Five Fast Fishes", and it goes like this:

Five fast fishes swimming down the river.

Five fast fishes swimming down the stream.

Swimming past five floating logs.

Swimming past five croaking frogs.

Floating logs.

Croaking frogs.

Floating logs.

Croaking frogs.

Five fast fishes....fa la la la la.

Every week the children will learn a song which features the focus letter of the week.  These songs not only enhance learning the letter sound, but also add music and movement to the mix, with rhyme and rhythm.

The children heard stories, sang songs, charted words with the beginning sound of F, learned the sign of F, how to print it, and so much more this week.  Yet, I would have to say that the most fabulous F word of the week was FIELD TRIP!!! Our trip to Crisp Park was really fantastic.  Riding on the bus was exciting for the children.  It was a short bus trip, with a long line of laughter.  We even sang "The Wheels On The Bus" song!  The children really enjoyed the company of the parents who were able to join us at the park, as did Mrs. Cummings and myself.  Thank you!  We can't wait for the next trip.  Until then, I know you will be happy to see the smiling faces of our Bright-Eyed Bears enjoying the first! Please click on the thumbnail pictures at the top of the page to see them full-size.  Feel free to download the ones you like! :)

As part of our All About Me and My Five Senses Unit, the children learned about their sense of sight this week.  They learned about important parts of their eyes; the iris, pupil, and cornea.  We talked about and demonstrated how the pupils of the eye grow bigger in the dark in order to allow more light in, and get smaller when bright light flashes into them in order to protect the eye.  This discussion was able to lead us into another very important discussion about fears of the dark, and how we just need to let our eyes adjust to see that our bedrooms are just the same in the dark as they are in the light of day.  :)  It was a really great sharing time!  Some other great "sight" activities we have explored so far are using kaleidoscopes, prisms, color paddles, and building with colorful pyramid blocks on a light table.  This Friday in Exploring, one of the rooms will be built around continued light table exploration and "The Magic Eye", a magnifying device which will allow the children to see fibers from their clothes, the makeup of their hair, and so much more...MAGNIFIED! Join us if you can on Friday.  It's going to be a really exciting morning!  We'll begin Exploring at 9:30 am.

Have a great day!

Mrs. Carson

Bright-Eyed Bear Business!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend!  I have a blast from the past for you Bright-Eyed Bear Parents.  We watched this as part of a center activity in Science the other day.  I think the children of today enjoyed it just as much as those of us from "yesterday" did.  Take a look.

Our little Bright-Eyed Bears are so enjoying watching the tiny tadpoles grow.  There was all sorts of enthusiasm expressed when the little jelly-filled eggs suddenly became teeny-tiny swimming creatures.  Then, in just one day, they doubled in size.  I hope you enjoy watching them grow with us.  The children are recording what they observe in their science journals through drawings and dictation.

This week the children continued to study about their sense of touch.  They learned all about skin and how important it is for health and safety, learning about the world around you, and holding us all together.  We read fun books like, The Skin You're In, and Soft, Smooth, Bumpy, Spikey.  One of our very Bright-Eyed Bears picked up a texturized block we were using on Friday during Exploring and said, "Mrs. Carson, my sensory receptors are sending messages to my brain telling me that this block is really bumpy!" I was so proud!!! :)
Many of our Friday Exploring activities revolved around sensory fun.  The children were so excited to explore and discover the wonderful textures, scents, and visually pleasing delights of the plants they brought in for our herb and vegetable garden.  We put out magnifying glasses, a water table filled with soil and worms, books, etc. and let them loose in the "jungle" that the many plants transformed Miss Bowen's classroom into. Mrs. Pollock took off with that idea and helped the children to make a tasty "dirt" snack out of crushed chocolate cookies, chocolate pudding, and gummi worms!  Mrs. Jotch extended her very popular last week's porch activity with shaving cream play, and building with connecting sticks.  I put together a sensory obstacle course in my classroom, complete with  a velvet soft pillow tunnel, hard smooth over-climb, bubble wrap crawl-through, and bumpy textured balance beam.  I think the favorite room, however, was the Exploratorium where Mrs. Reynolds and Mrs. Cummings  lay a tarp across the floor so the children could jump on, squish, squash, and knead potter's clay with their bare feet and hands.  The teachers had almost as much fun watching the children explore as the children had exploring!  Almost :)

Next week:

*Picture Day is Tuesday! :)
*Crisp Park Field Trip is Wednesday! Everyone is invited to join us!!!! :)  We'll be at the park from
8:55-10 or so.
*Library Day is every Thursday!  Please help your child to remember to bring his/her book back so he/she can get another one.
*Focus letter: F
*Focus sense: sight

Happy Week!
Mrs. Carson

Tadpoles and Tiddlywinks!

After the rains came down yesterday, enthusiasm from discovery went up!  The Bright-Eyed Bears took a walk and discovered tadpole eggs floating along peacefully in the massive puddles that formed near the ECC building.  We found our classroom tadpoles under a campus bridge early in their life and have been watching them grow since the beginning of the school year. The children have enjoyed books, videos, and cd stories about the metamorphosis from tadpoles to frogs.  Yet, we have missed seeing the eggs in real life during our study.  It was a special treat on Tuesday to see those jelly-filled little eggs containing a teeny tiny little tadpole, no bigger than a dot.  We very gently scooped some up to bring back to our Exploratorium to raise in a group aquarium along with Mrs. Jotch's and Miss Bowen's classes. Here is a picture of our new little friends.  Enjoy!

The children will use their Science Journals to record information thru drawings and dictation as they watch their tadpoles grow.  Science in motion!

The children are learning to play and playing to learn every day!

As part of our All About Me & My Five Senses unit of study, the children are learning each week about one of their five important senses.  This week, the focus is on the sense of touch.  We read a book from Scholastic by Dana Meachen Rau, that taught the children that their skin is an organ just like their heart, lungs, and other organs inside.  Skin is the only organ that's on the outside!  They also learned that their skin receives messages from the world through touch and sends them to their brains. That's how they know what is cold, wet, bumpy, soft, etc.  The children tested this theory out with some fun partner games.  In the photo above, one friend pulled a picture card from a deck, "read" it to the other friend who then put their hand into the "feely box" in search of the item on the card. The feeler friend was blindfolded and had to simply use their sense of touch to find the item.  Fingertipping fun!
Below is a photo of Bright-Eyed bears enjoying a mystery bag game.  The children had to reach into a numbered bag, feel around, then guess what was in the bag based upon their sense of touch.  There were three bags.  One bag was filled with flour. Another was filled with sea shells.  The last was filled with bubble wrap.  Each child drew pictures and dictated to the teacher about what they guessed was in each bag.  I can't wait for you to see the results!  Science journals will come home once a month for you to enjoy.

Our first focus letter of the school year is letter L.  The children learned the song about "Luscious Lollipops", read a book about a little lamb who laughed too much, chose which Handwriting Without Tears wood shapes should make the letter L, and practiced many ways of learning the shape, sound and print of L.  A favorite new activity was yesterday's "punching" lesson.  The children practiced the proper writing grip by gripping a large push pin.  They used the push pin to punch holes down the big line of L, then the little line over.  This is a fabulous and fun fine motor muscle builder!

There is so much more to tell about all of the fun and learning we are having in The Bright-Eyed Bear classroom.  Stay tuned!  In the meantime, enjoy the picture gallery! Have a great day!

Thank you, Bright-Eyed Bear Parents!

It was such a pleasure to spend time with you last evening during Back To School Night!  Mrs. Cummings and I really enjoyed getting the opportunity to speak with each of you, and brag on your child.  The Bright-Eyed Bears are awesome.  Their enthusiasm is contagious, and it has so far been an amazing school year! What lucky teachers we are!  :)      

This week the children learned about mixing colors.  We experimented with shaving cream, play dough, finger paint, and transferring colored water using eye droppers.  The children even had the opportunity to use spray bottles filled with colored liquid to spray a white sheet and watch the colors all run together.  There were some real artists! We read stories such as "Little Blue and Little Yellow" about two little color blobs who were best buddies. One day they hugged each other and turned green!  In Exploring today, the children made open-ended rainbow art.  For some, this was a favorite choice activity.  For others, it was definitely the "rainbow snack"!  Fruit in all shades of the spectrum was arranged to make an edible rainbow complete with a "cloud" of cool whip...mmmmm!
The children really did an amazing job transitioning through their first Exploring day.  We all had a wonderful time.  In addition to the Rainbow Art Room and Rainbow Snack Room, there was a Building Room complete with blocks of all kinds,  a Shadow Dancing Room complete with the creativity of Mrs. McIvor and her super duper shadow puppets and scarves, and an outdoor shaving cream and foam water table experience and straw connecters building area.  AWESOME!!!

More fun in learning and new experiences from this week included:
*a fire drill, complete with princesses, a fighter pilot, and a Home Depot helper.....as we were in the Exploratorium at the time of the "bell".
*meeting Mr. Clean Hand and Mr. Dirty Hand along with the wonderful Mrs. Smay in the library.  The children had their first book check out too!
*more counting and measuring activities.
*practicing for assignments of new classroom jobs, weekly.
*making play dough
*So MUCH MORE! :)

Now we are off to enjoy a long weekend packed with all sorts of adventures.  However, come Tuesday we'll be fresh and ready to engage in another exciting week of fun in learning!  Have a happy and healthy, safe Labor Day weekend!
Big Bright-Eyed Bear Hugs to all!

Mrs. Carson