There were lots outdoor birthday parties, games of chase and capture, sledding adventures, snow removal teams, and kitty cat caregivers.
Monday students strengthened their finger skills peeling the papers off crayons. It was quite a challenge! After selecting the colors they wanted, they placed them in a silicone heart mold. The crayons were slowly melted in the oven at 250 degrees until they were melted enough to reform but not blend all together into a murky brown. There were some really fun multicolored heart shaped crayons by the time they cooled.
The art table was busy with students finishing up their Jupiter projects and making Valentine mail bags.
The planets Saturn and Uranus were introduced. We read that Saturn, the second gas giant, has beautiful rings made of icy rocks and dust, and that Saturn has many moons, one of which is bigger than the planet Mercury. This moon is called Titan, which means giant. Uranus, the third gas giant, is the coldest planet in the solar system, and rotates clockwise, the opposite direction of all the other planets.
Susan shared the Greek myth of Saturn and Uranus, who have made appearances several times already. The children are really becoming familiar with the stories and chimed in about the different gods, particularly recalling that Saturn was selfish and wanted to rule all by himself, so he would eat his children until his son Jupiter, who had been hidden in a cave by his mother, drove him away.
Sign Language was a lot of fun! Rose told us a story using signs and spoken words. We knew many of the signs in the story and the children quickly began reading the signs to tell the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears along with Rose. It was so fun to put all those signs together to tell a story! We learned Valentine signs after the story. Rose taught us heart, Valentine, like, and two different ways to sign I love you.
We read the story Moses Goes to a Concert about a boy who attends a school for the deaf. He attends a concert with his classmates and teacher. Moses and his classmates were excited to learn that the percussionist of the orchestra was also deaf, and when she walked onto the stage she was shoeless so she could feel the vibrations through her feet. The teacher gave each child a balloon, which they held so they could feel the vibrations of the music as it passed through the air.
We took out the big drum to learn about sound waves and how they cause vibrations. We and placed pompoms on the top, then gradually played louder and louder, watching the vibrations bounce the pompoms higher and higher and higher until they went flying away.
We celebrated our second 6th birthday with tasty fruit kabobs. The birthday girl informed us that she was born in winter in the month of February then she zoomed her way around the sun so fast we thought maybe she was on Mercury rather than Earth!
Thursday we had so much fun celebrating Valentine’s Day! The children distributed their Valentine cards before we began morning meeting (thank you families for helping your children with this task)! We sang some valentine songs, including Skidamarink and A Tisket, A Tasket, then introduced all the various activities the children could choose to do. Children made glitter jars, played roll and color, did sight word color sheets, made heart chains, made Valentines for friends and family, and made paper dolls (thank you Michelle for making that happen). We then played a movement game. Children took turns picking a heart from the rug then everyone did the action written on the back, such as hop on one foot, wiggle like a worm, parade like elephants, sing the ABC’s, etc. They then enjoyed all the amazingly delicious snacks sent in by families. They enjoyed veggies & dip, fruit kabobs, homemade dehydrated fruit trail mix, raspberry muffins, cheese sticks, banana bread, homemade vegan peanutbutter cups & butterfingers, and Annie’s gummy bunnies. We are so grateful for our two parent volunteers who joined us for the day, Michelle and Laura!
Friday students explored the final sense – taste. We read some stories about taste, watched a brief clip about how we taste things and the five categories of taste, looked at the taste buds on our tongues, then had our very own tasting party where we sampled a variety of foods and determined whether they were sweet, sour, salty, bitter, or savory.
At the end of the morning we took out the mats and they had fun dancing, leaping, jumping, laughing, singing, being cheetahs, and showing off ninja moves. They made sure to take plenty of water breaks and were so sweaty they had to remove layers to cool down.
