SPRING FLING LESSON PLAN

HI, I apologize for not getting this posted sooner.
I am actually going to start using the SPRING FLING plan.
BEES and Butterflies
We had our opening songs-Good morning to you-Hello everybody-Here we are together
I brought out my box and the kids got to guess what was inside of it.
It was the letter B and a book
For the Butterfly section we read a little book "Caterpillar to Butterfly"
Then we talked a little bit about Butterflies and caterpillars and the stages of there development.
We then ran a little race where each child got a turn crawling like a Caterpillar to a blanket on the floor where we then rolled them up into a little cocoon and then back out again and then they were Butterflies (we used silkies as wings) and we flew all around the room tasting flowers with our feet. And we drank juice boxes disguised as flowers to gather nectar.
Next we became butterfly researchers and we had to catch some butterflies. We used the "ELLA-Fun" game and with our nets collected many fine butterflies.

BEE time was a lot of fun too. Once again the children had to guess what was in the box, this time it was a jar of honey, the letter "B" and a book about "busy bees"
We read the book and ten made our own "BEE' costumes. We used large paper bags with holes cut for arms and head. We then taped (glue would have been better) black and yellow stripes on the bags to make a 'Bee body". {originally the plan was to have wings and antennae but I was unprepared}
The children then had a great time being bees and gathering pollen from the flowers on the wall ( the pollen was little crumpled pieces of tissue paper) and taking it and sticking it in the hive(just a little beehive on the wall next to them)
I had them all go and have honey and crackers next so that they could taste all of their hard work. This was fun...but sticky:)
We ended with our closing song and off we all went.
I hope the kids enjoyed it!

Spring Fling Lesson Correction!

Thanks for your help today everyone!
I will post my lesson plan soon, but first I need to make a little correction...sorry about this.

Butterflies rest with their wings CLOSED not OPEN.

I must have been tired as I was looking up my facts. I'm sorry.
Today was fun anyway.

Spring Fling was postponed to Friday--it didn't look much like spring with all the snow anyway. Clara, Gretchen, Tate, Norah, Natalie, Sean and Liam were in attendance as well as Kristen and Becci--Thank you for all your help! The theme for the day was Night Time. Following is the LP:

• Opening song--"Here we are Together"
• Language Arts: Showed a picture of a night scene and introduced Mr Star. "S" was the letter of the day and when ever we heard the "S" sound at the beginning of a word as we discussed what happens at night, I held up the letter "S" and we all said "Ssssssssssss." I held up pictures of things that happen at night, like eating dinner, brushing teeth, sleeping...
• Read Goodnight Moon during snack. Thanks to Becci and Kristin for bringing in delicious snacks.
• Science: Nocturnal animals. We listened to night sounds and talked about how some animals are active at night. I had pictures of some of the animals that made the sounds and we played a game. They acted like the animal featured in each picture that I presented.
• Math: Passed out star cutouts. We all counted how many points on the star
• We sang "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star"
• Art: Stars and moons were glued on purple or black construction paper to make a night scene.
• Song with actions: "Moon, Moon, Moon"
• Game: We went to the gym and played "Goodmorning, Goodnight" When we turned off the lights and said good night, everyone laid down and pretended to sleep. When we turned on the lights and said good morning, everyone woke up and ran around. This was a hit and we played for quite a while.

That's about it!

Friday, March 28, 2008

Hey everyone. We had a small but really fun day on Friday. I was the MIC. My mom was here still and she helped out as well as Kristin and Jessica. We just had my two hoodlums (Tate & Norah) and also Gretchen and Natalie. We decided that since my mom was still in town we would talk all about families. We started off the day with our opening song. Then I showed a picture of some of my family members. We talked about what a family was and who was in a family (mom, dad, sister, brother, grandma, grandpa, etc.). I read a cute book called "Just Like Mommy" by Megan E. Bryant. Then we did a family tree activity. We had premade the trees and had precut out pictures of moms, dads, grandmas, grandpas, sisters and brothers. Each child was allowed to pick out whichever picture they wanted of each family member and then they glued them to their trees. It was really cute. We had a yummy, healthy snack. Thanks to Jessica for bringing that in!! Later we sang songs about family members. We sang "A Happy Family", "It's always fun when grandpa comes", and "I'm so glad when Daddy comes home". They loved that. Then we talked about their specific families. We counted out how many family members each student had. We counted them out on our fingers and then we made a poster of the number with each family member inside the number. That was about it. We closed with our closing song and the jump up and down song. It was a lot of fun. Thanks to Kristin and Jessica for the help and a big thanks to my mom for helping out too. We had a blast. Hopefully I'll be able to figure out how to post pictures too...

APRIL SCHEDULE

Here it is!!!
Ariane is gone this month so we need to fill in a bit. It looks like this may happen to at least two of us a Month so it may be a good idea to rotate. If there is a time that works better for someone please let me know and we will work it out.

March 29th- Melissa S. / Gretchen
March 31st- "Spring Fling" - Everyone bring a treat, and I will bring the games. Dress for spring!!

APRIL
M.I.C/H.M.
4 -Gretchen/ Melissa S.
7- Kristen/Jessica
11-Jessica/Kristen
14-Gretchen/Becci
18-Becci/Gretchen
21-Melissa M./Melissa S.
25-Melissa S./ Melissa M.
28- Any volunteers?

Monday March 24th

We had a Really fun day at preschool today! Melissa M. was the M.I.C and she did a great job!
I don't have the lesson plan in full, but I was there and can give a summery of our class.
The theme of the day was emotions or feelings.
Each child was asked how they were feeling and then they got a strip of tape with their name and a little drawing of how they were feeling that day. The strips of tape were put on the floor to show each child where their "spot" was to sit. Melissa had them in a semi circle on the floor with her own "spot" in the front.
We did our opening songs and then talked about different emotions that we each have. (happy, sad, shy, silly and so on) Melissa used pictures of cute little faces for each feeling.
We read a story about a tricky little pig, I need to get the name and author from Melissa. It was a good story that I remember from when I was little.
Next we all gathered around the table and made little Pizza faces. Each child got their own dough to shape and toppings to make into little faces. We baked them and the kids ate and ate and ate! While they ate they got markers to color on the table cloth. They loved every second of it!
Much happier on full tummies, each child got a balloon with picture of how they were feeling on it! This was great because once again the children had to think about how they were feeling and try to identify it.
We had more songs, including "jump up and down!", and ended with our closing song "the more we get together".
I'm sure I got the order a little off, and possibly left a few things out. Sorry, my memory is a little fried. It was a really fun day though so thanks to Melissa for a great lesson! I did not have my camera with me, I really wish I had.

Notes:
We did use "time out" for our little escapees. It worked great.
Class was held in the Relief Society Room to be close to the kitchen.
I was not there for Becci's class or Jessica's class but I know that they were really good. I caught part of Becci's and it was very cute. I would love to have a little outline of your lessons.

Talk to you all very soon!
Gretchen