Apple Week

We picked out of this apple and we retold the Very Hungry Caterpillar story.

This week we used this sheet as our guide.  I used a smelly green apple marker and the kids traced to make the letters. 

I used this one from HERE:

We worked on this sheet during small groups. Some groups didn't complete the sheet, and some did.

One of my smartie-frogs said that they should color the letter the color on the apple- BRILLIANT!

I love that idea and hope to remember that the next time!

At the end, I gave them a smiley face in green apple smelly marker. The children put their papers in their folders.

At the end of our week, we got out our 3 crayons to match the apple colors: red/green/yellow and made a graph of our favorite color apples based on the apple that each child brought.

Here is our apple-pie making station:

There are little cards on a ring for the kids to make different recipes.

This also tells me, I need more pom poms lol this was one bag each of red, green, and yellow from Discount School Supply.   I used small mini-pie plates.

Here is a magnetic apple board.

These were only some of the ideas we had this week.  I will see what else I can find :)

Blocks Area

We read several books over the course of exploring the blocks center.

One we might read 

We always of course read Pip Builds.

I have a binder with a cute cover from HERE.

Week 2 or sooner, in the blocks area, I intro build challenges.

One because then I take their photo and later display it on our smartboard.

Two because I print out the photos and pop them into a binder.

My plan is to print out at least 4 different pictures to each page.

I do want to send home their pages at the end,

so I will make a page for each child and personalize it.

So in the beginning, I used THESE posters to spark their interest.  

I intro those quickly at our morning meeting.

 

Play Dough Small Group

 I don't do small groups like I do in kindergarten. In my room, we go to school 4 days a week.  We have small groups three days. I try not to have them on Monday's.  I am usually introducing centers or adding something that takes time, so I want to get them moving on to centers quickly.

I wish that I could share my small group plans, but my computer crashed and I can't access those plans. :(

I do think that I printed out a hardcopy though lol maybe I can find that ASAP to share :)

The break down, after the first month our schedule is math/science, ELA, and fine motor/art.

The first 26 weeks for fine motor/art is easy as we use Pocket of Preschool's Letter Book.

Now back to the first month of school.  We have a small group to cover all the school supplies.  Some of my students have never held a pencil before.  We get Pip certified as well.

I read the Pip Play dough book as a whole group.  We practice what Pip does in the book.  Then we use these cards from Tara West. Yes, I make them too.  I let them use my smelly play dough during this center.  When we get Pip certified (which we can show that we can make the cards, clean up our messes, and put the lid back on) I put out their individual play dough containers.   I got these smelly dough from Dollar Tree.

Read about how we get Pip certified here.

Grab the cards HERE.

I do have an order but I don't know what that is now lol

I think we pinch first, maybe lol

I show them the card and we do it together.  
While they are working, I have them try to make at least their age. 

Making sure that everyone has at least made one.

Then when everyone has some, we stack them.

We take one off at a time and 

then we press our fingers in them.

Now we make logs.

Then we roll those logs into snakes.

Finally we cut them up.

You can use plastic knives, 

I used some long handled stampers as my knife.

Then we make a big bolder with the dough.

Sometimes, all of it is too much for their little hands.

Then we use rolling pins.

I borrow so I can have enough 

rollers for everyone to try.

We have many rollers but some have patterns and

I want these to be plain because what's next is

Time to use cookie cutters!

I try to grab everyone's initial.

When we're done,

I have them make a boulder and 

turn it into a cylinder to fit back

inside the container.

I remind them not to shove the dough

into the container because then it is difficult to get out.

I do teach them how to get it out with

that long handled stamp though.

Then we practice putting the lid on tight and

getting it open as well.

I put those cards on the ring in the play dough bin.

The following weeks, I add 

these cards from HERE.

Read all about Pip here!!!!

  

Beginning of the year centers

 I do a gradual release of our centers. Most of them start in our morning bins, which is free explore then continues with adding "something".  

Hop over here to check out our morning bins.

See the play dough sign in the white bin?

That is the same bin that I use to 

collect the play dough at my open house!

I used mini erasers in a bucket from Dollar Tree 

The cards came from here.

These are those large puzzle blocks from Target.

I don't add anything to these (yet)

After we have a small group to get Pip certified

we can explore at centers time.

Grab  mats  here.

Learning Resources Houses

Learning Resources people

t-shirts from here.

This is another small group.

We roll the number cubes and add that many chips

to the shirts. Check out her post here for the shirts.

counting bears

They are 50% off now!!! This is a better deal!!

Target puzzles from our morning bins.

Counting bears 

with sorting cups and a color dice

large buttons- I just let them explore.

You could have them sort by color or shape though!

These centers last about two weeks of school.

Polar Letters

To begin our polar unit I read 

a letter. Kids love getting letters.

This gets them excited about learning,

and that's a win for me!

All of my letters begin with an overview letter.

That can be all, sometimes there are more letters

to go with units, sometimes there is only one.

In this unit, there is an overview letter that gets delivered with word cards then 

each day we get a different letter from different animals from the Arctic.

My students really loved getting a passport with stickers when we did our

Holidays Around the World unit, so I added "stickers" that the

children can glue them on our ice scene.

Each day a new letter with an animal.

When I close up the letters, I want to keep track of

which animal is which.

So sometimes I write in cursive.

This cool printable and all the letters are... did you guess on my broken computer?

Well you'd be correct!! 

I did a rough cut for my class but older kids could do a super quick 

job of cutting around the animals.

Check out all of my in action ideas HERE.