We had a busy week! This week we traveled to Costa Rica, Mexico and Germany to study their Christmas traditions. During Spanish on Tuesday Zeanny explained how her family in Costa Rica has a tradition of making and eating tamales during the holidays. On Wednesday we found Mexico on our world map and read about Christmas traditions in Mexico. We learned that the poinsettia flower is a symbol of Christmas in Mexico. The children were then able to  make their own poinsettia flowers.

On Thursday we read a book about Christmas in Germany and learned that advent wreaths and Christmas trees are an important Christmas symbols in Germany. Our afternoon children enjoyed painting their own Christmas trees and the morning children will get a chance to this week. We found it interesting that children in Mexico and Germany leave their shoes out for Santa Claus instead of stockings. We are also enjoying noting the different names children have for Santa Claus around the world. The children have also been eager to share their own Christmas traditions at circle.

We enjoyed learning a little bit about the 5 senses on Tuesday afternoon. We talked about the sense of touch and the children took turns walking over sticky contact paper without their slippers on. It was lots of fun to watch their reaction. We then did some sensory play with shaving cream, which the morning students also took part in on Wednesday morning.

Some of our students made dinosaur “fossils” with air dry clay and pasta. We added them to the sand table with brushes and magnifying glasses. Everyone has enjoyed playing paleontologist this week.

During music/movement time we’ve been working on yoga poses and practicing for our Holiday Event. The children are doing a great job learning the songs and seem excited about sharing them on Friday!

The older children have been very engaged learning about the Nutcracker story this week. We read through all of our versions and have been listening to the CD. Favorite tracks include, “March”, “Waltz of the Snowflakes” and “The Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy.” On Friday we learned about Tchaikovsky, made some nutcrackers out of paper towel rolls (although some of them turned in Santa Claus) and went to the library to watch The Nutcracker video which was a big hit.

Reminders for the week:

We will be walking to the library on Thursday @ 10:30 for rehearsal. Thursday is also Pajama Day!

Holiday Event:  Friday, December 16th @ 5 pm. Please have children arrive by 4:45 pm.