Hi Everybody,
We started this week like we ended last week, finger painting. Finger
painting enables children to experience paint using two senses, touch and
sight. Many people noticed that red and yellow, red and blue, and yellow
and blue make new colors when mixed. The children used their fingers,
nails, palms, and sometimes arms to make circles and lines in the paint. It
is a great sensory activity that encourages prewriting skills. They begin
to notice the circles are O’s, the lines like L’s and I’s, and the
squiggles resemble S’s.
We made hand prints with paint and had our hands traced too. Some people
colored their tracings using crayons.
We sang Where Is Thumbkin? and Open Shut Them, both songs using our hands.
We forgot to sing The Itsy Bitsy Spider, but we will next week.
We read Hands Can, Wash Your Hands, and These Are My Hands. We examined the
titles of the books to see the same word, hands, on each cover. We wrote
“Hands Can...” and raised our hands to answer. Children answered: throw a
football, catch, cook, wave, clap, dig, put candy in your hair, and draw.
We used our hands and our sense of touch to feel a toy in the Feely Box. It
was challenging for some to not peek, but we all did it. The guesses were
mostly correct: a person, a connector, and a people.
Friday we played with a bean bag ball during circle. We sang a name song
and tossed the ball to our friends. We practiced hand-eye coordination,
listening, and remembering all our friends’ names. Everyone got two turns
to throw and catch the ball. We looked for patterns on the ball and
listened for patterns in the sound it made as we caught it. We saw black,
white, black, white, on the ball using our sense of sight. We heard 1, 2,
1, 2, using our sense of hearing.
We are spending as much time as possible in the yard each day swinging,
digging, running, hopping, climbing, and sliding. We return to the
classroom at the last possible minute for half-day and full-day pickup so
children can feel closure to the school day. It’s a helpful reminder that
school is over and it’s family time. It makes it easier to leave school. As
the year progresses, children increasingly don’t want to leave. That’s good
news!
Next week, we will use our feet to feel and paint.
Have a great weekend!