January in Room 102

Where do we start? January has been packed with some amazing stuff already, and we still have one week left! Everyone came back to school after the holiday break ready to jump right in. Sometimes we have difficult transitions after a long time away from school, but that really wasn't the case, and both the three and the four-year-old classes were ready to be busy.

Our threes had several firsts this month. We met Miss Martha for our Movement is Fun class. Movement for the three year olds starts in January, when we've had a chance to become acclimated to school and new faces. In movement class, all of the children have opportunities to work on balance and coordination skills, as well as spatial awareness. One of the first things we do in each movement class is to "find our own space". The children are expected to find a place in the large room where they can sit without touching another child. You'd be surprised how hard this is! At the end of each class, the children find their own space again, and have a few minutes to "cool down" and breathe deeply. So far, movement has been a big hit! During movement, all of the children are asked to take their shoes and socks off, so that they may feel the carpet on their feet. We would ask that in the coming weeks, you encourage your children to try to get their own shoes and socks on and off at home. We are always there to help, of course, but this is one of those skills that we often do for our children (mostly for the sake of time!) and they really are able to do this for themselves.

When it was VERY cold outside, the 4s did yoga to keep moving!

At the end of Movement is Fun, the 3s find their "own space" and try to lay quietly...easier said than done!

Another first for the threes was meeting Stacey Elattar for the first time. Stacey comes to our classroom for Snacks With Stacey, where the children learn about healthy foods. Both the threes and fours love when Stacey comes to play the stop light game - ask your child what a red, yellow, or green light food might be. During SWS this month for both threes and fours, Stacey talked with the children about birthday parties. Because we are celebrating Village Preschool's 40th birthday this month, the children learned about healthy snacks to eat at parties, too!

Stacey reads Whopper Cake to the children and talks about birthday parties

Both of our classes have been busy exploring building with different materials. We brought in a marble run at the beginning of the month, and it has been really fantastic to watch what has happened with it. They first began to build without giving much thought to how the marble run actually works. Then, their play began to really take shape as they had to work together to figure out how the marble run really works. We helped to scaffold the play for the older children by adding different materials to the block area: blocks, tubes, and ramps helped further the play that was already happening with the marbles. One day, we gave the children straws and ping pong balls and asked them to figure out how to build a structure that the balls could go in - a bigger version of the marble run! When children work together to build, they are working on social skills, negotiation, cooperation, compromise, and initiative just to name a few. Building structures gives children opportunities to work on patterns, measuring, estimating, gravity, balance, and spatial awareness. This list could go on and on. And surprise! They probably didn't realize they were even working on all of those skills!

Finally, as always, we like to incorporate literacy throughout our day, and have added many books about building to our bookshelf. Be sure to look at the "what we're reading" link to your right to keep up with what we are reading in class. Whew! It seems like this post could keep on going - we really have been so very busy! Thank you, as always, for sharing your amazing children with us. It really is a joy to watch how much they've grown and changed already this year, and how each class is becoming its own little community of learners.