SHAPE BATS!

I really love to turn traditional shapes into these fun loving bats each year.

It never gets old. Just look closely at those two little circle eyes and the little squiggly lined mouth! Why is it that when a three-year-old makes two circles and a squiggly line, it is all of a sudden ADORABLE?

I love that he wanted to hold his upside down because that is how bats sleep.

He wanted a greeeeeeen bat:)

Diamond wings? Or triangles?

Doesn't really matter.

They are SCARY shape bats and they are as cute as their creators!

At the FIRE STATION!

  

We had such an enjoyable time touring the Evanston City Fire Station! The children were all really fabulous for their very first field trip of our preschool year. We had many moms on deck ready for anything, but really, the moms and I had just as much fun as the kids. Such well behaved little sweeties!

I was impressed that they were able to sit and listen to Fire Fighter Overy's detailed presentation about fire safety. They were so engaged and so fascinated with all the fire fighter gear and tools. The main points our fire fighter wanted to get across to our students were; never play with fire and if you are ever trapped in a house fire, don't panic and don't be afraid of the fire fighter. These preschoolers certainly know their stuff now!

Fire Fighters are so strong and so smart, they have found ways to rescue even the largest of unconscious adults. Luckily, tiny Jack volunteered to demonstrate letting us "grown up" moms off the hook:)

Each child got a chance to try on some of the gear themselves!

The best part though, was seeing the ins and outs of the REAL fire trucks! I think we have some future fire fighters on our hands!

Thanks to everyone who came and helped make this such a memorable field trip!

It's Beginning to Look a LOT Like PRESCHOOL!

This group of preschool students is one of the LIVELIEST I have had! A lot of strong personalities, a lot of FUN! I have been noticing some very sweet gestures and acts of kindness as we have been learning to get along and navigate our new surroundings together.

It is always fun to spend time working on a project with a friend.

Or tackle a difficult task all on his own.

I love to see imaginary friends come to preschool for an impromptu tea party.

Or when one of these cuties notices I am taking pictures and strikes the perfect pose!

More friends for tea!

And my FAVORITE of all, the day I caught the ENTIRE class playing happily together with two of our color games! What a GREAT group of kids!

Remember September

September was such a crazy blur! Between health issues and just trying to get used to the new groove, it was all a little nuts! Somehow we survived it though and looking back, we had a lot of fun preschool days! Here are a few pictures to jog our memories. . .

RED DAY! I remember we tried to squeeze Red Day AND Apple Day in together and it was a BIT much for the beginning of a new school year! The kids had fun, but I think Brook and I were exhausted!

We sort of carried on "Apple and Red" day the next day so we could fit everything in. The kids really enjoyed a daily parade (this picture features an apple tambourine parade) and spending as much time outside as POSSIBLE! I am glad we have these pictures of the warmer days (and my weeds) to remind me that we DID have some good times outdoors. Thanks to Camille for humoring those kids with the parachute OVER and OVER again! September was amazing!

Welcome, Welcome!

Hello to you! I have been teaching preschool for many years. It is one of my most favorite things to do! I have enjoyed each and every class of students whom I have had the pleasure of teaching. I used to teach preschool in my home in St. George, Utah, but we have since moved. I am excited to begin teaching preschool again in my new home. Until I have it up and running, I decided to put up this new post displaying my old preschool room to give you an idea of what I like to include in my preschool space. Check out the photos below (sorry for the poor quality:))

The above picture is the main hub of the room, the gathering area. I like to include a BIG, open rug space. We do a LOT of circle time activities and music and movement is a big part of that. A big roomy rug is a must! LOTS of learning takes place on that rug!!!

Here is the main craft and activities area. It is sort of like a little art bar. We did a lot of projects here and also ate lunch around this useful table.

I have really enjoyed incorporating lunch into our daily agenda. It takes the place of snack (which I have learned is a bit of a hassle and not always nutritious). Lunch is the perfect way to spend some down time in class. The kids feel safe bringing a piece of their home with them to school and they feel satisfied and rejuvenated after their meal. A lot of other surprising perks come along with enjoying lunch at school. I have found that picky eaters begin to broaden their food spectrum, simply by watching their peers eat different varieties of foods. Children learn table skills and the responsibility of cleaning up after themselves. Not to mention that having lunch at school is down right fun!

Here is another view of the classroom showing our second activity table. It also has seen many days of fun activities and lunches!

Just behind this table, off to the left is the entrance to the bathroom. I loved having this bathroom attached to the preschool. It was so convenient. In my new home, the bathroom is just down the hall, but I have a feeling I will miss having it RIGHT inside our preschool room.

After you leave the bathroom and step just past the table, you arrive at the reading corner.

Lots of fun reading moments took place in that corner through the years. Some I hold very near and dear. Check out this photo of my two OLDEST boys when they were first able to enjoy the space.

Yep. They are both terribly old now (11 and 9) and back then, they were the VERY reason I started this preschool gig in the first place! I wanted to be home with them so badly, but I missed teaching desperately too (I had taught first grade and kindergarten). So, I devised the scheme of building a house with this room in the basement to do a preschool. It served our family VERY well, for many years.

Can you see those two cute little tables against the back wall? That was our little listening center. It worked very well and I am happy to say, I have room for it in my new preschool! YEAH! Look how cute it is when being used:

Now on to this next angle of the room. This is the preschool entrance. I loved having this separate entrance to my preschool in St. George. I am trying to make it all happen again here in my new home. It currently has an entrance leading to the side yard of my house, I am just not sure how functional it will be with all the snow! If budget allows, we might be able to add a "mud room" type space or other covering to help make it more usable, but this is my wishful dreaming. We still need to add fencing to our yard as well and that will be a pretty penny. But hopefully. . .

The kids had a pretty great cubby system too. Each day they kept their lunch boxes and work in their cubbies. We kept their back packs in the hallway in my basement. We will do something similar in my new preschool space.

Just around the corner from the cubbies is where I kept the main "work" activities for the kids to choose. The kids started each day by choosing from these shelves. I rotated the activities each month so there were always new and exciting things to choose from. I did the same thing with the books in the book corner too. It is all about keeping it fresh, accessible and orderly.

Well, at least that is what we strive to do! I feel that children should be given the opportunity to learn to keep spaces clean and orderly. Given a place for everything, clean up time was easy, even when lots of activities were being used during play time!

That little bald headed guy in front of those shelves is my NEW inspiration for beginning a preschool here in my new town. I have such magical memories of playing and laughing with my two older boys in preschool, I want the same for him.

CLEARLY, he was not quite ready for preschool just those two short years ago. But now...

He has grown some hair (and has had one or two hair cuts) and is ready to create, explore and hang his own hand prints on the wall, just like his brothers before him! He is stoked!!!!

And frankly, I am stoked too! Just looking at these pictures gets me giddy with anticipation!! Of course, I will be doing preschool on a much smaller scale now. I will only have room for eight cute little faces. But it will be a great experience nonetheless! Here's to September and Little Star Preschool!

Thanks for stopping by and reading through this post. I hope it was helpful for you to visit my "virtual" room since my real preschool space is still "under construction." I am trying very hard to incorporate all elements of my old space into my new preschool. It will be awesome!

Also, feel free to browse through past posts about this cute little group of St. George preschoolers. It might give you some idea about my curriculum and style too.

Enjoy!

Recent Field Trips

Washington County Library, St. George District-

This is a great field trip. Mrs. Mann is an AMAZING rug time teacher and quite the hidden gem of the library! She has so much patience with the kids and read them about a GABILLION stories! Her secret weapon for keeping their interest for nearly one hour??? She had them moving up and down a LOT. They would sit at the rug for a story than move up to the kiva for another and on and on. She is a genius! The kids also enjoyed the chance to look at some BRAN new Franklin books! They were the FIRST EVER to see them in the library! How privelaged they felt! She also sent them home with a little goody bag of wash cloth and soap, since all of her stories had to do with getting "dirty" or "messy" and then getting CLEAN! We had a fantastic time and learned a lot:)

Children's Dental-

WOW! This field trip was a winner AND, I am checking to see if my insurance is good here! What a PLACE! The kids felt almost TOOOOOO comfortable here! Had to remind some of them that we were guests and it was not just their personal playground! There really is a fun waiting room and then several little fun surprises in the "back" where most kids WOULD normally feel a little nervous for their dental appointments. The hygentists were very sweet girls that REALLY listened to the kids and got them TOTALLY excited about dental health! WOO HOO! How can you lose with a balloon and book on your way out the door too?! A great place!

The Letter Bb

Bb is for Brooklyn, buttons, bears (gummy and baby), and Baby Brayden in a basket! Bet you can think of some more!!!

We had a BEARY good time discovering Bb things and Bear things and having a BALL! Here is a peek at our Teddy Bear Day, which was CRAZIER than ever (thank you rain) but so much fun! It is always a blast to bring our bear friends to school with us and show them how AWESOME preschool can be!

Throughout the day, children were spotted singing, reading and even feeding their bear friends! We had our bears participate in all of the normal preschool activities with us such as, rug time, lunch time and story time, but we also did some special things too (since it was Winnie the Pooh's birthday and all)! Here is a little peek into our wild day:

Our INDOOR Teddy Bear Picnic was very quaint and sweet as we shared teddy grahams with our bear friends. We counted the bears to be sure that we were being fair with our sharing! Also, since it was so rainy outside, we opted to have an indoor TEDDY BEAR parade and those bears just LOVED it! It wore them out actually and so we put our bears to sleep for their long winter's nap (so we could squeeze in a few centers and activities). Over all, it was a full day and I must say, I was ready for a winter's nap by the time it was over too:)

Opposites - Black & White!

"Opposites are tricky, but opposites are FUN!
Someday we will know them, we'll learn them ONE by ONE!"

I hope you recognize these words from one of your child's "Smart Songs". I hope he/she has been listening to them and loving them. I know it is hard for adults to appreciate these types of songs, but if you could just sneak them into the car once in awhile and indulge your child a bit, they really can help him/her solidify some essential pre-reading skills.

This day in January we celebrated all things opposite! Like Up and Down, Stop and Go and Black and White! See if you can get your preschooler to think of any more?!

Look What I Can Do!

One fun new thing we have put into play this 2010 is the Superstar Sign In clipboards. This is my effort to encourage some of those preschoolers who have been a little leery of writing their own name, to GO FOR IT! It's a little bit of bribery that is really paying off. Here's how it works: Each day, your child signs his/her name on the Sign In Clipboard and then receives any one of three prizes (and they never know what it will be). It might be a sticker, a small treat (like an m&m) or a high five! I have already seen great progress in the few short weeks we have implemented this activity! Continue to encourage your child to write his/her name at home and also, encourage them to stretch themselves in their efforts. For instance, with the three year-olds, I am happy if I can get them to write some or all of their letters on the line. However, with the four and five year olds, I would like to see more legibility, and possibly all the letters in the correct order. And for our five-year-old (pre-kindergartners) I would like to encourage them to put the capital letter at the beginning and use lower case letters for the rest of their name. Once they have mastered that, you can encourage them to move on to their last name! This really is a great multi-level activity and we will continue to do it each day at preschool!

Back In the Groove!

We have gotten RIGHT back into the swing of things here at preschool! Our Christmas break was very relaxing and fun, but it has been great to get back into the groove! The kids were as eager and excited as I was this first day back. They were LOVING all the new books and January materials that were out on the shelves. They were so quiet, almost like the first day of school all over again! Of course, that didn't last too long. By the end of the day, they had all warmed right back into things. It is so good to have them back and ready to learn! Happy New Year!