{Tt} Turkey Week

I love getting into the Thanksgiving season to talk about giving thanks. I think we can never be too thankful. Talli started the week off perfectly when she asked, “Did you know that when kids don’t get out of bed and do what they should, that moms still love them?” Is that not profound? I loved being reminded of that! Thanks, Talli!

We talked about letter Tt and how T “Ticks To Tell The Time”. We listened to a ticking clock and heard it sound just like letter T; tuh, tuh, tuh! We found lots of Tt words, time, tick, tell, and turkey! We talked about the pilgrims sailing to America. In the process, I told them about the hardships of arriving in a land without stores, houses or restaurants to go to. I said, “They were having trouble growing food in the new land, but someone was in the forest watching them. Do you know who?” Katelyn guessed, “A squirrel?” No. “A bear?” No. Talli asked, “A fly?” I busted up!!! These kids are so fun! They were so surprised to hear it was an Indian, named Squanto. Ben asked, “It was a man?” That is the fun with preschoolers. I get to tell true stories in history to be heard for the first time. I love that part! I love that they are little sponges and they listen in amazement. At the end of the day, as a recap, I asked if anyone could remember the name of the ship that brought the pilgrims across. Tanner guessed, “Flower!” Talli shouted, “It was the Flower Boat?” Ben guessed, “Grandflower!” What else do you remember about the feast? “Marshall said, “They feasted for 3 years!” Ha! Three years…three days…so close! Too cute!

Monday, we turned a toilet tube into a turkey. It was tricky, but it turned out terrific. Especially the tail! I’m loving these Tt words! Ha!

Wednesday, we turned a big paper bag into a turkey face and made a turkey tail hat. Oh, my goodness, were they cute, as they all lined up wearing that big bag on their chest perched all in a row! 

Here are a few fun pictures of our preschoolers working away on their turkeys.

Thursday, we constructed a turkey feather game, matching number words with numbered feathers. It was a lot of work but everyone managed to get them all done, thanks to Miss Kristen and all the older helpers that rallied around others after finishing their own. It will be a great game to play at home to practice those number words.

Monday, we will learn about letter Ii and work on our Indian costumes for the feast. Please remember to send 24 small, small somethings for our feast Tuesday. We look forward to that. We will not need backpacks on that day, just a paper plate or baggie with 24 somethings.

We want to tell all of you how very grateful we are for each one of you and your precious children that we have the opportunity to hang with and rub shoulders with, up close and personal, each school day. We love them and the amazing perfected state they are in at this age. I tell people all the time that I believe that this is the age that the bible talks about where Jesus Christ admonishes us all to become like children. These are them. This is the age of perfection. They are simply the very best people I know. Everyday, I wish I were more like them!

Bear {Bb} Week

Bear Week was great fun as we learned all about bears and letter Bb. We spent a lot of time finding Bb words. There were bunches of them. But, mostly we had fun with bears.

Monday, we colored a brown bear book as best we could (like a 5 year old!). That is the standard. “Try to color like a 5 year old, not a 2 year old!” or I say, “Wow! You are staying in the lines just like a 5 year old! Good job!” or, “Ah oh! I hope you’re not making that look like a 2 year old scribble job!” It is always a big insult for a preschooler to be compared a 2 year old. They always dig in and work harder to avoid that!

Wednesday was our PJ Day and teddy bear picnic. We had a lot of children wear pajamas and bring a teddy bear or stuffed animal. We named them and everyone welcomed each animal by name to our school. I told the children about the things bears like to eat. I told them we were going to try some bear food at our picnic. “Bears like to dig for beetles and worms under logs. We will eat some worms.” The smiles dropped to twisted, scrunched up faces. “Bears are great at scooping fish from a stream. We are going to try some fish today, too!” More scrunches. The children were all relieved when they found that Miss Kristen had loaded amoung other things, gummy worms and goldfish crackers in their bear bags. We did get to taste some real honey on a stick. (A pretzel stick, that is!) The weather was beautiful and we picnicked on blankets on the front lawn with our bears and enjoyed our snacks.

Thursday, we had great fun making a paper polar bear. He was kind of gluey, but so cute. Miss Kristen got a few pictures to post in our blog.

Next week is Tt Week and we will be talking about turkeys, tails, and telling the story of the first Thanksgiving.

Please remember the day before Thanksgiving, we will have a schedule change and have school on Tuesday. We will have a feast on that day and dress up as the 99 braves that came to the first Thanksgiving feast.

Also, please remember to send 24 bite-sized somethings. We will feast on the lawn again. It will be great fun!

Christmas is just around the corner and we will not be having Show-N-Tell until after Christmas. We will use that extra time for music practice. The end of November and up into December, these weeks turn into an additional musical program preparation along with letter instruction and projects, leading up to our big Christmas Program. Every song has a prop or hat, coupled with dance steps and actions to get a bit of experience performing and being on stage. We love our musical programs and dressing up these little ones. It is one of my favorite things to do; a lot of work, but totally worth it. Watching them perform is the cherry on top! Be sure to calendar it in your schedules in December. It will be at a church building so we can use the stage and cultural hall. You will not want to miss it!

We had a few cute moments to record and share this week. Madden said he saw a dinosaur at the “New-see-’em!”

Yesterday, Quinn said, “Green caterpillars turn into frogs.” When I explained that caterpillars turn into butterflies, she said, “Well, then, the caterpillar would have to be pink, then, it can be a butterfly!” Ha! Quinn has it all figured out!

Thank you so much for all of your wonderful support and assistance, sending treats in and also the collection of items for our crafts. We love all the e-mails and positive feedback we continue to receive. If you have a concern or comment, we welcome your input. Thank you so much.

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Brown Week {Dd} Doggy Day

Our Halloween Party was great! Everyone looked so cute in their Halloween costumes and some, very scary; like Brody, the zombie guy. Yikes!

See the fun here!

We frosted a pumpkin shaped sugar cookie with orange frosting and added candy corn to make a jack-o-lantern face. And then, we gobbled him up as our treat for that day. We played a trick-or-treat game outside and it was a bit warm, but other than that, we had a great time.  We also had fun parading around the cul-de-sac singing Halloween songs.

Wednesday was the first day to celebrate brown and letter Dd. Tallin said mud was brown. Gracelyn said tree stumps. Nixon said wood. Marshall said bear’s fur, Trey said wolf-es and Ammon said tarantulas!

We found lots of Dd words. Madden said dinosaurs. Kensi said dog. Isla said door and Drew said donuts. I love the way you think, Drew! D-d-delicious! We also did the Letter Dd dance. Duh, duh!

We traced our footprint and turned it into a dog. Then, we made an adorable Dalmatian dog. Thursday, we turned all the children into dogs and sang some great dog songs. My favorite was when we sang, “I wanna be a dog…I wanna have dog breath, I wanna learn to growl! Scratch fleas and sticks, run after sticks…the moon’s gunna make me howl!” I wish you could have seen all the scratching, howling, panting dogs crawling around that day. So fun! It was perfect because Brig brought some Scooby snack cookies shaped like bones and we fed them to those hungry dogs! Ha!
As I was sizing Ethan’s doggy hat, I said to him, “Let’s see how big your brains are! Do you have any brains?” He answered, “I only have two!”
 

Navy couldn’t seem to get the Bingo song out of her head, or ours!  She kept singing it throughout the day, while threading loops for her doggy collar, “P-I-N-G-O, P-I-N-G-O, P-I-N-G-O, and Pingo was his name-o”, over and over again! Miss Kristen and I kept hearing it and tried desperately to keep it check, burying our lips inside our teeth. When we looked at one another, we both just busted up! Dang! She was so dog-gone cute! We ended by reading one of my favorite dog stories, The Diggingest Dog! So fun!

We look forward to this Thankful time and are reminded of how very thankful we are for each one of these precious little people we get to spend so much time with. It is truly a great blessing for us. Thank you, thank you!

See you on Monday!
Much love to all,
Mrs. McClure
And Miss Kristen, too!

Purple Week and October Halloween Video!

Dear Parents,

I have been gone all week and Miss Kristen and her sister Julie, who was my sweet little helper last year, came back to help and together, they both took over for me. I heard they did a wonderful job and the children were p-p-practically p-p-perfect for them! Thank you, girls, so very much!

The children puffed to form letter Pp sounds, pretending to portray popcorn popping! They found lots of Pp words, especially as they sang the Purple Pickle song, picking out Purple Penny, Purple Pie and Purple Pepperoni!

Purple Song: (To the tune of This Old Man)

P-U-R-P-L-E 

Purple has two P's you see?
For the grapes on a vine,
Or a plum in a tree. 

P-U-R-P-L-E

Quinton said purple was a P word. Bradley said, panda. Marshall and Niki said, popcorn. Navy and Bria said plum. Emily named pizza!  Brig, pumpkins! Kensi, pig! Mason E, pirate.

Londynn said pie and Tanner said pee pee!

Then, Miss Kristen asked what was purple. Walter said grapes were purple. Katelyn said plums were. Bradley said cats were purple and Brody said, monsters. Drew said crayons.

Miss Kristen showed them how to make a pirate, a purple polka-dot pet puppet, and color a pumpkin book. Great job, girls!

We enjoyed our Halloween month so much! We hope you loved all the little crafts that trickled into your homes! We definitely have been hearing our fun Halloween songs being hummed in class! Enjoy this little mashup video of all our fun crafts and our October month!! Off we go to Thanksgiving! 

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Preschool Orange Week {Frankenstein, spiders, and scarecrows, Aaaaaaah!}

We had a great week with Letter A. We made lots of scary things to scare him. It wasn’t too hard, because Letter A is afraid of everything. The children pretended to be letter A. Everything I picked up to show to them, they would yell, “Ahhh!” I picked up a stapler, “Ahhh!” A crayon, “Ahhh!” A book, “Ahhh!” We found words like apple and alligator, ant and appaloosa! We yelled the whole day!!!

We also celebrated orange. We sang and danced and twirled and strutted our orange. We spelled it and found lots of orange, pumpkins, carrots, and even oranges. Madden said, “Num-nums are orange. I asked, “What are num-nums?” He pointed to the bag of Skittles on my shelf. Oh! Good job, Madden. Num-nums are orange! Ha!

ORANGE SONG: (The Wheels On the Bus)

O-R-A-N-G-E,

O-R-A-N-G-E,

O-R-A-N-G-E

Orange is what that spells.

Jack-O-Lanterns are always orange

Carrots are always orange

Oranges are always orange.

O-r-a-n-g-------e!

Monday, we made a scary Frankenstein mask to scare letter A. Brody said, “Letter A is going to scream like a girl!” Lena said, “My mom has a Frankensti-nan stamp! Drew said, “I’m gunna scare my mom with this!”

During Girl’s Show-N-Tell, Navy told us about her toy phone. Sometimes, I ask the children where they got the thing they are showing and talking about. If they say, they don’t know, I have asked them, “Did it just fly in through the window one day?” They always laugh and say, “NO!” Monday, when I asked Navy where she got her phone, she told us, “It just flew in my room!” I love that fun girl!

Wednesday, we cut out 8 spiders for a counting game. The children did a great job cutting all of their spiders ‘right on the line’! I told them, “This is a contest to see if you can cut exactly on the line!” They are becoming such great cutters. Tolson loved the contest. He asked the next day, “Can we have a contest again?”

Thursday, we made a scarecrow. That would surely scare letter A! The children had to rip a lot of paper to make a scarecrow face. 

Miss Kristin was amazed by the number of children that did not know how to rip up a sheet of paper. Some children are so well behaved; they possibly have never ripped up a thing in their lives. On the other hand, some took to that sheet like water! Ha! All of the scarecrows each had a unique look and personality. They were adorable! One of them even glued the hand print hair on top of the hat! Too cute! Something for your Halloween wall! Ask your child what letter A says. They should be able to tell you, “Ahhh!”

Miss Kristin caught this conversation:

Quinn: I’m gunna grow up a mommy!

Sam: I’m gunna grow up a daddy!

Brody: I’m gunna grow up a daddy with a beard!

And while waiting outside:

Walter: Mrs. McClure, I’m so embarrassed that I called you Grandma!

“That’s Okay! I am a Grandma!

Benjamin: I will call you Miss Fantastic!

You can call me that everyday!!!

Congratulations go out to Rondy, for bringing a new little baby brother for Bradley into the world this past week! We hope all went well. We pray for a speedy recovery! We look forward to Jaxson getting a new sister very soon, too! Good luck, Kelsey!

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Ghouls and Ghosts and White Week!

White Week was wonderful. And why wouldn’t it be, with so many wonderfully white things to talk about? I just kept writing furiously, recording everything I heard and each day, your children seemed to find more and more white in the world. The list was lengthy, but watching their little minds at work, thinking of more and more white things to say, was adorable. Rudger said bathtubs, Brooklyn and Sam said snow. Gracelyn said pillows. Marshall and Karina said clouds. Katelyn said milk. Madden said ghosts. Walter, soap bubbles. Trey, skeletons. Talli, stars. Embree, Santa’s beard. Davis said spiderwebs, Quintin, marshmallows, Mason D, sheep, Jaxson and Emmett said polar bears, Niki, glue, Benjamin, sidewalks. Bria said goose feathers, Tallin said eagle feathers, and Drew added, “or a white duck!” Scarlett said a whiteboard. Kensi said chickens, Brody said eggs, Jacob said mummies, Mason E. said the stuff inside of coconuts and Quinn said the face on a clown like the one on ‘Tangled’! Don’t you just love the amazing minds of these children? I love to see them think and then express themselves. When I say, “Oooh! That’s a good one!” They beam, validating their brilliancy!

Of course, we sang our white song, twirled in our white clothes and memorized our # 8 poem. Then, we sang our fun Halloween songs and pulled some more hair! We learned about letter Gg and found lots of Gg words, green grapes, girls, gorillas, ghosts!

Number 8 Poem

Monday, we made a fun ghostly puppet. I have gotta say, the hands on that ghost were very difficult to cut, but everyone of those children did an outstanding job of weaving in and out, around each finger in an amazing fashion! I kept picking them up to show Miss Kristen, “Look at this one!” “And even this one!” I was so delighted! I told the children they could color their ghost eyes any color they wished. That was enough to excite Brody, “Can I even color my ghost eyes black?” Tallin said, “Black is the spookiest color in the whole world!”

Wednesday, we created a very fun skull and Thursday, we made a happy ghost with streamers. Jace was funny. He smelled the streamers before gluing them on, “Is this toilet paper?” Miss Kristen and I cracked up! Too funny. He was also funny at the carpet squares as he noticed someone picking their nose, “Don’t pick your nose! Don’t! Don’t do it! Stop picking your nose!” I love when someone else takes the reins as boss for a time, making my job easier. Thanks for keeping us in line, Jace. 

I also noticed Marshall as he squeezed glue out in a cute little happy face on the back of his ghost face just before gluing it on. I asked him, “Did you just draw a happy face with your glue?” He looked as if I had just discovered an inner secret by mistake. He dropped his head in embarrassment, “Yes.” “Good job! I love that! It’s so cute!” Then, I watched him turn it over and smile as he pressed it to the plate. I adore that quiet little Marshall. He has completely stolen my heart with his sweet quiet ways! It is remarkable how something, no matter how small, that I get an opportunity to see or hear from one of these little ones at school, can bring such a smile to my face and burn such a sweet impression upon my soul as to endear them to my heart. These are the rewards of being allowed to hang with the most perfectly aged people on the planet. They are priceless. Thank you for entrusting them to me. I love them so.

Niki was full of information for us this week. She told us she watched a movie of a really ugly, ugly girl. We laughed and laughed. The next day she told us that her chicken, Alice died. “She got an egg stuck in her.” Then she asked me, “How does a chicken get an egg up her?” Ummm…My goodness! The questions I have to field at preschool! Ha!

We had a chance to hear what each had plans to dress up as for Halloween. The holiday excitement is building. Plan for your child to wear a costume on Halloween day to school. We are planning a festive time together ending in a parade around the cul-de-sac. We look forward to that.

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Preschool Black Week Bat Tutorial

This was such a fun project for our preschool to do. We practiced all sorts of skills like cutting, and gluing. We began the day by tracing everyone's hand on a piece of black construction paper that we folded in half and stapled, giving us two of each. These will be the bats wings.

 In the center you will see a white circle. This is stapled onto a black piece of construction paper the same size. That way the children can have a nice thick black line to see when they cut the circle. Throw the white one away, and keep the black on for the bats body. Glue one of each of the hand print cut outs to either side of the body.

 

Above is the pre painted version of the eyes. We recommend the cardboard egg cartons with the long pointed centers. They make the perfect bat noses!

Below you can see that but cutting a little extra, you can give your bat cute little ears to go with his long pointy nose. 

 Glue his face on the body and your bat should be coming together! 

We love seeing how each child adds a little bit of their own touch to each of their bats. For the moon, we pre-tied strings to yellow circles and let the children cut out the rest of the way. We also happened to be learning about the letter Cc this week so they each finished it off by cutting out their "C's". 

Finally, for the best part! The red spooky eyes. Just add a some glue dots and shake in the red glitter!

Aren't they the cutest little spooky bats?! Comment below with how your preschool does black week! We'd love to see! Thanks for stopping by the Bearly Ready for Threeschool Preschool Blog!