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