Week 15 Young Samuel

Even 3 year olds can be good listeners! We read the story about Young Samuel, and how he listened to God. The kids did a great job today listening to the story and following directions. I think the rather large ears probably helped! 

Annebelle and Addison sure look cute! 

For the letter J, the kids created jellyfish! They probably have never seen one, but they sure had fun making it. I cut a paper plate in half, and had the kids color the plate, then they glued on eyes, and tissue paper. 

 Noah is really proud of his Jelly fish.

A bit of Magic

The kids got to pick a spoon and see what magic happens! The cups are filled with vinegar, and the spoons are filled with food coloring and baking soda. It made a mess, but the kids loved the magic!

We ended the day with playing outside! J was a success! 

Learning to Serve

It's week 12 already, and we only had one official school day this week (Monday) because we planned a special "service project" for the kids during our normal Thursday school time. More about that later :)

We started out like we usually do with calendar time, our Bible story (The story of Gideon this week), and we talked about our new letter (H) and number (6). We traced the letters and numbers using our tactile letters. The kids were a little bit squirly :)

 

 

Next we did our dot-to-dot worksheets from the curriculum. The kids did GREAT connecting 1, 2, 3, and 4 to form the diamond!

Such concentration!

 

 

The star, on the other hand, proved to be a bit of a challenge.

 

 

 

Then it was story and snack time. We read The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

Of course we needed a caterpillar snack to go along with the story.

 

And a very special guest made her appearance to read to the kiddos.

This is "Coco" (named after Addison's imaginary friend). My sister made her for Addison for her 3rd birthday.

 

Turns out she's a great story teller :)

 

Next we moved on to our craft. We made foam door hangers for Thanksgiving to decorate the nursing home where Addison and Doc's Great Grandma lives. It's a facility for Alzheimer's patients. I thought this would be a good way for the kids to learn about serving others.

 

 

 

 

The kids (and the moms) made 48 door hangers! Then Thursday, we met at the nursing home to do some decorating.

 

The kiddos posed for a quick picture in the entry way of the home before they got to work.

 

We kept the door hangers in a basket and the kids would come grab one then scatter and run to find an empty door. It was organized chaos! They actually did a GREAT job of using inside voices, and of listening to instructions.

 

 

 

Doc did a good job helping to push "Maga" (that's what Addison calls her Great Gram).

 

Then we took a little break to have some cookies!

 

And Maga got her baby fix! She will be 90 years old next month!

 

I think the experience was great for the kids and for the residents. I hope we can go back and do something similar in the future.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Week 11: The Battle of Jello!

Week 11: The Battle of Jericho.

The week started with Letter G and Number 5. The kids worked on writing and tracing Letter G and Number 5. They were given lined paper, and concentrating on staying in the lines. 

 The Battle of Jello - the kids used cookie cutters of Number 5 and Letter G, and worked on cutting out the jello. It was really hard, and the jello won! But the kids sure did love eating it!!

 Even the babies had a Battle of Jello, where I think, the jello won too! Doc would agree! 

Isn't he the cutest!?!

The snack for the week was bagels, cream cheese, and raisins. The kids got to spread the green cream cheese on their (circle) bagel and then count out 5 raisins to place on bagel. Eisley did an awesome job creating her bagel sandwich!

For the Letter and Number Activity, each kid had a different task: Shape Sorter, Tracing Letter G, Number Puzzle, and Rice Tracing. Concentration and focus, Addison did a great job with the shape sorter! 

 Noah traced the letter G, and even smiled for a picture! Two in one, wow! 

 Jack did a great job sorting the shapes. We focused on squares and circles this week. 

 The kids listened very well to the story of Joshua and the Battle of Jericho.  

 A fun game of Twister that even the babies got into. The kids did a great job matching their hands or feet to the color called out. Even Ellie was wanting to get into the game!

 For the Battle of Jericho, the kids made tambourines which were two plates, filled with beans. The kids had to lace the plate with yarn, and they got to paint and decorate their instruments.

Then, we all went outside and the kids got to march around the Wall of Jericho and make as much noise as they can! It was super loud, but super fun!

 We ended the week with a Veggie Tales movie, and everyone, especially the mommy's were excited!

Week 10: the 10 Commandments meet Halloween

The anticipation for Halloween has been steadily building over the last 30 days, so during Halloween week we had a little holiday celebrating to do. The kids all wore their costumes to school on Monday.

Check out (from left to right) Batman (Noah), a "worker" (Jack, who was tired of wearing his Buzz Lightyear costume), Woody (Doc), Princess Annabelle (Annabelle), Rapunzel (Eisley), Pirate Girl (Juliette), Sad Pirate Boy (CJ) and Belle (Addison).

This week's curriculum focused on the story of the 10 commandments, the letter "f" and the number 5.

To memorize ten rules in the correct order is probably too much to ask of three and four year olds, so we spent the first days focusing on the five that I felt would be easiest to understand. Each student was assigned one rule, and over the course of our circle time we talked about each of the five rules and reminded each other of the rule each was assigned. I found a great list of kid-friendly interpretations of the 10 Commandments online here.

Jack was assigned the 6th Commandment: never hurt anyone.

After a few books we got down to the important business: decorating cookies with tons of sugary candy and frosting. Thanks to my mother and father-in-law for sending us a box of awesome Halloween cookie decorating goodies, including candy eyeballs. Awesome.

Nothing like a little sugar to whet the appetite for a week full of...more sugar.

On day two of week 10 we got serious about our letter and numbers of the week (f and 5). We read both of Moncure's books (My F Book, My Five Book) and practiced making the "f" sound, putting our hand in front of our mouths as we do to "feel" the sound as well. 

I set up a four workstations:

Do-a-Dot for upper-case and lower-case "f"

Trace the letter "f" (this is a bag of paint)

Letter "f" hunt/maze

Build the letter "f" with foam blocks

Number match (add the correct number of blocks in each column)

The kids did really well at these activities. The three year olds struggled with the number match (I think they would have done better with a bit more time on this one), but Eisley was a pro.

We moved outside for some free art time. I asked the kids to paint a picture of the silliest or coolest thing they'd seen the night before, which was Halloween.

It was fun hearing their stories and I think the kids enjoyed an art activity without any rules. Here are the end products:

After 10 weeks I've feeling extremely thankful for this amazing group of kids and moms. Our kids are wonderful, but the friendships and support we share as moms is a true gift. It's been a great 10 weeks.