Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Joy of Sharing & Service - Day 3
Today was the third and last day of our unit, which will also include a field trip to a Board & Care facility to debut our Christmas play. During the opening, after welcome and calendar, I explained to everyone that on Thursday we were going to a Board and Care facility to put on our play and sing for the grandmas at the facility. They were all very curious about these "grandmas" that they would be singing for and this opened a lengthy discussion about these particular residents and their own grandmas of course. All of the children were also very excited about the upcoming holidays and what they would be doing for Christmas.
We missed Kai in the morning as he wasn't feeling well, but he was able to come later in the day for the Christmas play rehearsal.
Following a Christmas book, we proceeded to work on our craft project for the day. The craft was to paint with glitter paint on cinnamon-scented pine cones. I explained to the children that we would be giving these pine cones as gifts to the grandmas and employees at the Board & Care. I also told then that they could pick one pine cone to take home to their families. We also practiced the Christmas songs that would be part of the Christmas play.
Today, we also had the culmination of our "secret buddies" and each of the Joy Schoolers received a Christmas present book from their secret buddy. They were all very excited about this.
After snack and some outside play, Eve's mom came to help us with our Christmas play, which she had written for them. The children all chose parts. Emily was Mary, Joseph was Joseph, Grant and Kai were wise men, Eve was a Shepherdess and Isabel was an angel. The practice went really well and everyone seemed into their part.
We look forward to a big Christmas spectacular!
We missed Kai in the morning as he wasn't feeling well, but he was able to come later in the day for the Christmas play rehearsal.
Following a Christmas book, we proceeded to work on our craft project for the day. The craft was to paint with glitter paint on cinnamon-scented pine cones. I explained to the children that we would be giving these pine cones as gifts to the grandmas and employees at the Board & Care. I also told then that they could pick one pine cone to take home to their families. We also practiced the Christmas songs that would be part of the Christmas play.
Today, we also had the culmination of our "secret buddies" and each of the Joy Schoolers received a Christmas present book from their secret buddy. They were all very excited about this.
After snack and some outside play, Eve's mom came to help us with our Christmas play, which she had written for them. The children all chose parts. Emily was Mary, Joseph was Joseph, Grant and Kai were wise men, Eve was a Shepherdess and Isabel was an angel. The practice went really well and everyone seemed into their part.
We look forward to a big Christmas spectacular!
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Joy of Sharing & Service Day 2
Hi everyone.
Day two was another fun day with the all the children. Unlike Tuesday when most seemed pretty wiggly during circle time, today they were all pretty quite and attentive. We followed circle time with practicing our Christmas songs. Eve, Emily and Grant and especially good with the hand movements to "In a Little Stable" and Isabel seemed to be getting a little better with them.
After singing time, we read a story about how the tradition of the Christmas tree was started in the United States. According to the story, German immigrants to the US brought the tradition with them which was adopted by others. After the story and our discussion we had snack and recess (which is I think their favorite time). The boys seemed to be playing well together today. Everyone loved doing yard work in the backyard with Isabel's kid-size yard tool set. We also had a practice in sharing as their are only four tools which they had to take turns with.
For the lesson portion of the day, the children practiced writing the letter H. Eve and Emily were great with writing the letters. Grant did a great job with his letter H after I briefly showed him how to practice tracing the letter first. Joseph definitely tried hard to write the letters and got the concept of two lines down and joined in the middle, but just needs a little practice. (He's probably well ahead of his age group as he's still 3.) Kai wrote one good H to show me that he can do it. We also cut some chains on our chain of sharing and service ideas as we accomplished those certain tasks. We read from the lesson manual the story of Heather and Alice, which is a story of sharing and service. Everyone loved taping the story pictures to the board as a I read the story. We finished the lesson time with the book "The Giving Tree" which they all loved. Everyone was super quite listening to the story and had great answers to the questions I asked them during the story about service and sharing.
We followed the story about the giving tree and also incorporated our story about Christmas trees and boughs, with the craft project. I gave each child some decorations for the trees and they were to "share" their decorations with everyone else so that everyone's tree was beautiful.
Day two was another fun day with the all the children. Unlike Tuesday when most seemed pretty wiggly during circle time, today they were all pretty quite and attentive. We followed circle time with practicing our Christmas songs. Eve, Emily and Grant and especially good with the hand movements to "In a Little Stable" and Isabel seemed to be getting a little better with them.
After singing time, we read a story about how the tradition of the Christmas tree was started in the United States. According to the story, German immigrants to the US brought the tradition with them which was adopted by others. After the story and our discussion we had snack and recess (which is I think their favorite time). The boys seemed to be playing well together today. Everyone loved doing yard work in the backyard with Isabel's kid-size yard tool set. We also had a practice in sharing as their are only four tools which they had to take turns with.
For the lesson portion of the day, the children practiced writing the letter H. Eve and Emily were great with writing the letters. Grant did a great job with his letter H after I briefly showed him how to practice tracing the letter first. Joseph definitely tried hard to write the letters and got the concept of two lines down and joined in the middle, but just needs a little practice. (He's probably well ahead of his age group as he's still 3.) Kai wrote one good H to show me that he can do it. We also cut some chains on our chain of sharing and service ideas as we accomplished those certain tasks. We read from the lesson manual the story of Heather and Alice, which is a story of sharing and service. Everyone loved taping the story pictures to the board as a I read the story. We finished the lesson time with the book "The Giving Tree" which they all loved. Everyone was super quite listening to the story and had great answers to the questions I asked them during the story about service and sharing.
We followed the story about the giving tree and also incorporated our story about Christmas trees and boughs, with the craft project. I gave each child some decorations for the trees and they were to "share" their decorations with everyone else so that everyone's tree was beautiful.
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