Sunnybrook Montessori School

Montessori preschool & kindergarten in New Hampshire's North Country

Water Wonders

king of the hill

king of the hill

The snow is melting, which meant lots of wet, messy, water play!  It was such a great week to be outside, so we took advantage as much as possible.  The warmth made the snow perfect for molding, so for the first time since December we were able to pack it and manipulate it into snowballs, snowmen, and snow castles.

WATER!

WATER!

missing mitten?  missing boy?

missing mitten? missing boy?

cooperative snowman

cooperative snowman

relaxing

relaxing

snowman

snowman

wheeee!

wheeee!

paper marbling

paper marbling

On Monday we used special marbling paints that we dropped onto a paper dot on top of water, then swirled the paints around before carefully laying a piece of paper on top.  The paint adhered to the paper, making our very own marbled paper patterns.  The children were quite enthralled, trying different techniques and watching the paints pool, swirl, and make patterns.

marbling

marbling

clay

clay

color cube

color cube

cylinder towers

cylinder towers

Asia continent map puzzle

Asia continent map puzzle

dice addition

dice addition

drawing

drawing

We continued with our fish unit, focusing more specifically on sea horses, sharks, and food chains.  We read a book about seahorses which compared the various seahorse parts to those of different animals, such as seahorse and horse head shape, seahorse and monkey tails, seahorse and lizard eyes, seahorse and insect skin, and seahorse and kangaroo pouches.  We then read the story Mr. Seahorse by Eric Carle, about a father seahorse who carries around the baby seahorse eggs until they hatch and swim away, and some of the other fish fathers that he meets who help care for the eggs.

In the book, National Geographic Readers: Sharks, we read some interesting information about sharks.  We learned that some shark eggs are surrounded by an egg case called a mermaid’s purse, that shark skeletons are made of cartilage rather than bone, and that sharks were on the earth before dinosaurs.  We listened to the entertaining story, The Great White Man Eating Shark, by Margaret Mahy, about a boy who pretends to be a shark so he can have the beach all to himself.

We also read the book Who Eats What? and learned a new song about an ocean food chain.  We found out that plants are the only living things that produce their own food, and that they are the foundation of every food chain.

afternoon floor work

afternoon floor work

fish sorting

fish sorting

sound work

sound work

writing stories

writing stories

story time with Tammy

story time with Tammy

table work

table work

walking the line

walking the line

water transfer

water transfer

water work

water work

a fish story

a fish story

The sensory table was filled with water and fish, and the children continued to swim them around and examine them, even taking them out to find them in the fish books at the science table.

fish fins

fish fins

letter sound sort

letter sound sort

nesting dolls

nesting dolls

clay numbers

clay numbers

oo words

oo words

rhyming match

rhyming match

reading about sharks with Kelly

reading about sharks with Kelly

coloring the ocean

coloring the ocean

For art the children used permanent markers to color an ocean on a clear shower curtain.  At the end of the week we hung it on the wall, then moved it to hang from the ceiling to create an ocean room for a submarine.

yellow submarine

yellow submarine

The Friday students had an eventful day.  They spent some time in the morning playing in and painting the submarine before science, which caused them to all be covered in yellow paint.

sink or float

sink or float

For science we did a sink or float experiment, selecting and testing different objects, then recording our observations.  We discovered three items that originally floated, but then something caused them to sink.  Ask your child why the bottle, sponge, and brass bowl floated at first and then sank.

The Polish Princess Bakery

The Polish Princess Bakery

Before recess we decided to take a field trip into town.  We walked down to the Polish Princess Bakery and everyone chose one item for an after lunch snack.  After we returned the children had great fun sledding and playing a make-believe game together before heading in for the afternoon.

Comments are closed.