Relationship

Goosa Loosa is so loved. 

Emmy getting her lunch hand-fed to her.

Balancing on the rocks.  A little risky play is so healthy. 

Punkin has been allowed more outdoor time due to his ornery personality and he is loving it.  

See-Saw

Lots of teamwork and problem solving to make this hotel.

Using a fulcrum.

Ramps

 I have ended this week with the word relationship.  I have had an amazing feeling of connection this week and a reminder about why I do what I do and what I truly believe in.  After a busy week of meetings with other preschool teachers and administrators, I left feeling like I'm not doing enough and ready to push harder on small groups and curriculum. For a short moment, I fell into the trap that many teachers are in to push our children to grow up too fast.  It's a brainwashing that happens to so many educators, even though God gave us a gift to teach and be creative with teaching... somehow it is all taken away by following a curriculum.  I don't know what the answer is, but I do know that I am happiest, and my students are happiest when I listen to God and my desire to empower learners in a play based and nature-based environment.  As a society we undermine how much our children can do, how important play is, and how VERY important relationship is. Play needs to be happening more in classrooms and it needs to be uninterrupted.  Play is where learning happens at a young age.   I can't have the most solid relationship with your children if I am pushing academics as the most important part of our very short school day together, I can't bring the happiness to your child if all I am doing is pulling for small groups, assessing for state documentation and falling into the trap of today's educational system that so many educators are in.  I ended the week with my foundation to love, teach kindness, teach risk taking, challenge, empower, follow Jesus (we talked about how our tummies hurt when we are doing something that God would not like), which is kind of difficult to understand when the stomach flu is going around.  ;) I pray for your children every day and I truly want what is best for them.  

The learning this week was strong.  We have dived deeper into balancing and Jaryn and I put all expectations aside and just interacted with the students and it's what they love most. . Relationship.  We are working on following directions, challenging ourselves and being confident in what we do.  I saw an amazing difference in the students when we truly immersed ourselves in their learning. We have loved asking questions to challenge our students and encourage their risk taking.  To sum it all up, it has been a great week of connection and relationship building.   

Today we learned the terms fulcrum, load and effort as we worked on balancing.  My favorite way of teaching this, was by providing a tree stump as a fulcrum and a wooden support beam.  Learning right along with the students is the best way to learn.  The students LOVED making a see saw out of the items and had a blast.

Important Dates- 

October 30th- Class pictures

October 31st- Halloween Party

Fairy Garden

Writing and more writing!

A Fun Week!

 As a teacher of these sweet and wild little ones, I thank God for the gift of this job each day and how much I am blessed to be entrusted to each of them.  Even though our days can be loud and crazy, and I am often overstimulated, there is something so special about watching children grow, learn and discover the world around them.  The wonder in the eyes of children is one of the most precious gifts that God has given to me.  I love watching them grow in their love for nature, animals, friends, and learning.  I have witnessed so many "aha" moments this week and I am so proud of your children.  Thank you for being so supportive in their learning.

Jaryn and I are continuing our STEM class, All About Balance, and although we hate missing school, the learning and materials that we get to bring back to the classroom are so worth it. :) We are so excited to share more new materials in class and watch the discovery and wonder continue.

We finished our first round of State assessments, and we will be sharing these results with you during conferences in November.  (Sign up coming soon) 

If you have not signed up to help with our Halloween Party, feel free to check that out.  The link is in the last email I sent out.  Your child will come to preschool on October 31st in their costume and we will have a day full of games, crafts and a special visitor.  

Please continue to work on name writing as we begin transitioning to signing in by writing our names or part of our names each morning.  Working on gripping a pencil is such an important skill and works a lot better with very small writing utensils...a golf pencil, a broken crayon, etc.  Something that does not give the child a choice to hold it up too far.  

For the many students who are writing their names perfectly in all upper case, I will start to teach writing lowercase if they have strong fine motor skills.  Writing in all uppercase is a great way to begin and develop more confidence, as there are less curves, which can be tricky.  

Important Dates-

NO SCHOOL MONDAY OCTOBER 21st

HALLOWEEN PARTY- OCTOBER 31st(If you are helping, you can come right away in the morning or around 10:00.  I will still be allowing an hour of free play for the students before the games, crafts and visitor. We will not be going outside, as we don't want to damage our costumes.  

Last week we focused on the letters, Jj,Dd,Bb and Ff

This week will be focus on Kk, Ll, and Mm

Enjoy a sneak into our classroom with some fun pictures from the week.

Even balancing during snack time.  

Extreme dirt bike enduro...after watching some of my son's dirt bikes races on my phone.  This was so fun to watch them build and race their dirt bikes on. 

The best engineers.  Impressed daily by them!

Sensory table messes!

Name writing incorporated into play!

Sometimes we sit on friends...I may or may not have started this trend ;)

Counting bats in our "bat cave".

The bat cave!

Into the Woods.

Games invented by children that hold their attention spans and carry into the next several days are dreamy. 

Balance!

Cloud Dough messes and so much fun!

Old dirt bike tires are too much fun!  If anyone wants one to take home, just let me know.  :)

These tires have been so many things.  I love the creativity.  Less is truly more. 

Balancing!