Busy before Vacation
The image of the stick ponies that accompanies this post is from the Big Room. The children had never seen them before and all enjoyed riding the ponies. I kept thinking “Vacation is coming and they are riding out of town.” Our class packed in a lot of activities during this week before February vacation. Almost all of our classmates have returned, resulting in a busy classroom and increased noise volume. The children were very happy to have their friends back. Though we still have more weeks of winter, the children did two last projects with a cold weather theme.
Cardinals and Birch Trees
The children used different materials to make pictures with dots or circles:
Music and Movement Classes each brought new activities to the children.
With almost all of the children back in the classroom, getting the rug area ready for Circle Time became challenging. The toys need to be cleaned up, carpet squares need to be placed on the rug, chairs need to be placed around the outside of the rug. And the children were racing for their favorite seat. Some prefer the carpet, some prefer the chairs. Some insist on sitting next to a particular classmate. It was time to use classroom management skills to avoid an accident or disagreements about the seating. Now, when the rug is cleared of toys, the children line up on the blue squares that we use for lining up to leave the classroom. This gives me the space needed to lay out the carpet squares and the chairs without falling over any children. When the seating is ready, I hold up a picture of each child one at a time. That person may choose any seat. This is done for every child. Miraculously, there has not been any fuss about where to sit using this method. Each day I hold up the pictures in a different order.
Last but not least, this week our Circle Time visitor was a moose. I had to look at youtube videos to find out how to sing to a moose. See if your child is able to tell you how.