We're Back!

 It's been a LONNNNNGGGG time since I've added any posts to our blog.  A lot has changed since then.  

A little over a year ago we moved from M ST. location to a commercial building.  We increased our capacity from 40 to 165! (We have about doubled our enrollment.  In terms of capacity. we are not full.) 

We also started a new adventure of caring for infants.   We have more than doubled our staff as well.  As with any new adventure there are hiccups.  We have some awesome teachers and staff that give their all and then some! 

My goal is to add posts more frequently.  I just don't know how regularly that will happen. 

While you're here be sure to read the post on our Christmas activity using Star from Afar. 

Thanks for reading!

Linda

Christmas Star from Afar Ideas for Preschoolers

For a few years we participated in the Elf on the Shelf craze with our Preschoolers.  It was fun, but it was also a lot of work.  Since I opened at 5:30 am and closed at 6 PM the responsibility usually fell on me to move the elf (we named him Jingle), and come up with new exciting antics for him.  

A couple years ago we were introduced to A Christmas Star From Afar.  This was a nativity set with a book and some ideas to go with it.  It is probably most suited for a family rather than a classroom. The book tells the Christmas story and how the wisemen/kings follow the star to find Baby Jesus. The idea behind it is that the star from the nativity sets gets hidden/moved every night.  The child/children then move the 3 wise men/kings to where they find the star.  Each day the star moves closer to the Nativity set.

The first couple years I struggled finding meaningful lessons that my Pre-K kids would understand.  It was also hard to make sure all 20 kids got a turn to find the star and move a king.    This year (2023) last minute inspiration hit me and I came up with an interactive way to use Star from Afar in my Pre-K classroom.  I wanted to share it in hopes that may help someone searching for ideas. 

To begin we read the book to the children. Throughout the season we read different versions of the Christmas Story.   As we set up the Nativity set we talked about about piece--Mary, Joseph, Jesus, shepherds, animals, angel, star and kings.   We decided to display our Nativity set on the piano out in our activity room at the front of our building.  Rather than moving the star and kings from the  Star From Afar set we laminated a bigger star and each child made their own king.  To make the king we used a paper tube and covered it with silver or gold wrapping paper. The children added eyes, faces, and crowns.  

Each day I moved the star to different areas of our building outside of our classroom.   We took small groups of our Pre-Kers out of the room to look for the star. When they found it, they placed their kings by it. Each day I moved the star closer to the Nativity set.  

On our last day of Preschool before Christmas Break we 'repaired' all our kings (gluing eyes and crowns back on).  One of our games we played at our party was "Follow the Star."  We put rows of stars on the tables.  Each child rolled a die and moved their king along the stars to make it to the end.  After completing the game we moved the kings to the star which was over the Nativity set. 

Next year maybe I can incorporate some kind of a treat or activity for them each time they find the Star.     

Happy Birthday Baby Jesus!    

Merry Christmas! 

The Marker Doesn't Have a Lid by Dustin

This had to be the most unique title I've ever heard of.  Dustin's book is a series of pictures. He didn't dictate a story for me to write down. It wasn't until I was taking the pictures that I realized he hadn't shared his story with me. I think I can make out the word 'markers' on the last page. I would guess this story changes each time he 'reads' it.  Love the creativity!  

The Potato Monster Runs Away by Hudson

This is a cute story. Hudson drew the pictures and then dictated to me what was happening in the story. Towards the end I'm not sure if he ran out of ideas or if he was just ready to  move on to something else.  Either way he created a great story! 

Kitty Princess is Mean to Pete the Cat by Ava

Here is the first of the Authors and Illustrators books the children worked on today.  Ava is an awesome artist. I think I need to frame some of her art work!  Her story is just as impressive!

Authors and Illustrators

It's a cold cold Tuesday. Normally we go to the local Library on Tuesdays but with staff out sick and the cold Temps we chose to stay put.
After talking about where the library gets their books we thought about WHO makes the books to begin with.
We already know that Authors write the words and Illustrators draw the pictures. Today it was our turn to be Authors and Illustrators.  After choosing the paper they wanted, the preschoolers quickly got to work. Surprisingly everyone had a unique idea for a story.
Everyone chose a title (name) for their story. Some children drew all the pictures first then dictated their story page by page. Others dictated each page and then drew the pictures to go with it.
No matter how they did it, the all ended up with great stories! I normally put pictures of such activities on Facebook but these were so neat I felt the whole stories should be shared.
I wrote what the children dictated to me with very little prompting. I asked leading questions to help them along such as "What happened next?"   I helped one little boy in drawing his picture but he was very specific about how he wanted it drawn.

I will post each child's book as a separate blog so you can easily access each one. If you look on the right hand side of the page you should see links to the other stories.  I hope you enjoy them as much as I did.  I kind of wondered if I should have made copies of these stories in  case one of them becomes a world famous author someday and I can say "I knew him/her at the very beginning of his/her career!"
ENJOY!

What's your Super Power?

It's Super Hero Week at Preschool.  Each of the children decorated a cape.

 and chose a Super Hero name:

Lightening Man

Lightening Boy

Batman 

Batman (black)

Batman (green)

Cheetah Girl

Capt. Kaboom

Super Cooper

Super Girl

Super Girl

Super Girl

(Yes, there are 3 of them)

Super Cinderella

Pink Princess

Spiderman

The Hulk

Super Cat

Caterpillar Girl

We had a couple special missions. Capt. Chaos hid a bunch of our toys outside which we were able to rescue.  He also hid some of our ingredients to make our pizzas, but we followed the clues and found all of them. 

Finally we talked about the Super Powers our Heroes have. We had the usual flying, strength, running fast and shooting out spider webs.
Then we learned about the most famous hero of all...JESUS! We learned about his Super Power---performing "miracles" (a new word for us).  We learned how he made 2 fish and 5 loaves enough for lots of people to eat.  We thought is was cool that he could walk on water, calm a storm, and help his friends catch lots of fish, and healing people who were hurt or sick.  When learning about the wedding where he turned water into wine.   (We discussed that it would be like if we ran out of punch at our birthday party and Jesus changed water into punch. )

The greatest Super Power Jesus had was rising from the dead.