Happy St. Paddy's Day

We woke this morning to this in the playroom. We set up a trap for those tricky leprechauns. We even put a chocolate kiss, with it's shiny foil wrapping, we knew it would tempt those pesky little fellows. We couldn't wait to check it out... well there was nothing in our pot!! Not even the chocolate kiss. One of those green men, jumped into our pot and left only leprechaun dust in it's wake!!

We got out our magnifying glass to see if we could find some clues as to that leprechauns where abouts!! Following it's dust.

But to no avail. We were left with an empty pot, and not even an extra chocolate kiss to share.

Thankfully Miss Michelle had some green dinosaur oatmeal for breakfast. It made the kids very happy. They were especially glad the leprechauns didn't find it, for they surely would have taken that too.

After our yummy, green breakfast, we painted some more shamrocks. We used tempera paint, water colors and glitter paint. The kids love the choices and they can really make their art their own. It brings a little process into a purely product craft.

After Little Man's morning nap we decided that those leprechauns couldn't have gone to far, so we got out the big guns!! Our brand new Jumbo Magnifying Glasses, from Discount School Supply!!! This is just one of the many new things we purchased from Discount School Supply. I can't wait to steadily bring more things out.

We didn't find to many leprechauns, though we looked everywhere for them. We did find this little wormy guy slipping along the sidewalk on the way to the neighborhood park. I had to make sure they didn't fry the poor guy, these magnifiers really work well.

Little Man had a ball, as usual, at the park. He enjoyed crawling around, eating, I mean investigating the mulch.

Throwing it up in the air seems to be a new favorite thing to do, with a lot of his toys. Cause and effect learning going on right here in front of my eyes.

Have a Happy St. Patrick's Day!!

Games, Gold & Rainbows

It started off a rather damp, yucky day. We thought we would have to put our mud boots and rain jackets on again (not that the kids would have minded) to go outside again... but instead during our Quiet Work Time, it cleared up and the sun began to shine!!

This is what I found after cleaning up from breakfast... these two found our Trouble game and got it out all by themselves. I played a modified version with them last week, and Princess wanted to play the "real" way today. They did good for a little while, but the long time it takes to play wore D-Man out and he wandered away after a little bit.

Sprout was a busy girl today... we love this Lock Box House from Melissa & Doug. You can ring the doorbell, use a key to open each door, and inside (usually) there is a little doll that wear something that coordinates in color with the door you opened. They really love it. The Toddlers have a hard time working the keys, but as you can see Sprout is determined (hence the little tongue sticking out, too cute!!) to get the door open. She worked on it for a good 7 or 8 minutes, but she finally opened it. She decided that it didn't need to be locked up again and quickly walked away after she opened the door :)

Sprout really enjoys the Practical Life shelf, I feel bad because it is lacking some good work trays right now. She is getting very proficient in using the spoon to transfer the beans, only dropping a few each time. Not pictured is her using the rice pouring tray, she really loves that one and will get it off the shelf many times throughout the morning. She also loves pouring in the water table. Sprout is even trying to pour at the lunch table, with help, but she is starting to gain more control over her pouring technique. How cool to watch the progression and varying degrees of success a Toddler goes through as they grow and learn.

We also talked about the letter Rr today. R for Rainbow, which so happened to go right along with our St. Paddy's Day & Leprechaun theme. We completed a rainbow pot of gold craft. It was a fun, no nonsense kind of project. Not to much process, but they liked the product. We also talked about our Leprechaun trap and decided to use an old black Halloween plastic pot I had lying around and turn that into the trap. I hope we catch him, because I could really use that pot of gold!!!

A Partial Floor & Other Stuff

I didn't put up a photo of the whole room, I want to save the before and after until it is complete, but if you look you can see a strip of carpet under the shelves. That is where the wood is missing. I have to say, today went much better than expected. I set up the other side, our messy area, with some toys on the shelf, books, and the old sensory table. Then I put all of Little Man's toys in our Family Room and we just used those rooms instead. We didn't get to have our regular circle time, but we did have one in the Family Room and the novelty of having it in there made it seem like an adventure. Little Man actually sat with us and listened to some of our story. We read, The Night Before St. Patrick's Day, by Natasha Wing. We love all her books and this one was no exception. We have decided that tomorrow we will make a couple of Leprechaun traps and see if we can trap one of those pesky leprechauns. We are all excited about that. So, as much as I am annoyed that my floor isn't finished, my kids and I made the best of it and had an adventure anyway!!!

Little Man loves his freedom (as all mobile babies do). He loves to move around and explore the environment thoroughly, so I try to strategically place toys, equipment or boxes, I think might interest him, or rather KEEP his interest for more than a millisecond. We have this little froggy table that seems to be the PERFECT height for him when he stands up. It is sturdy enough that he can pull himself up on, and then play with whatever I have put up there for him. Of course, most everything gets swiped off the table quickly, but thankfully I have enough little helpers that find this game, of swipe & pick up, to be fun. Lately though, Little Man has been very interested in this lock puzzle from Melissa & Doug. He hasn't figured any of the locks out yet, and he even has a hard time opening the little doors, but that doesn't stop him from trying!! He concentrates for a long time, looking at the locks, touching them, and closing the doors (that one of us has opened for him). I am excited to watch this process of learning, and can't wait until he succeeds.

(Don't You Just Love the Haircut)

I put out the easel today with a shamrock penciled on it. The kids enjoyed painting it. The shamrock led to a discussion on shamrocks and where they come from and why they are significant for St. Patrick's Day. We took out our trusty laptop and Googled "St. Patrick's Day Shamrock" and read about the history of the shamrock. It was a fun learning experience, I just wish I had a nice big screen, because even with just 3 little ones plus me crowded around this laptop was to much. Oh well, that will be on my wish list for some day :)

Happy St. Paddy's Day!!!

Since I have been writing about the Early Childhood Conference this week, I haven't really been posting about what we have been up to in the classroom. Well, we have been learning about St. Patrick's Day!! We found Ireland on the Map, I have some photo's from a trip there so I showed them to the kids (they really got a kick out of me kissing the Blarney Stone) and read some story books about St. Patrick's Day... our favorite being, The Night Before St. Patrick's Day by Natasha Wing. They absolutely loved the little traps for the leprechaun, and made me read every thing the kids wrote on them. I also added their names into the story as much as possible and that brought on a fit of laughter every time they heard their names or their friends name :)

We had some friends over today to help us celebrate and do some special crafts. We had a lot of fun and even got to play outside in the beautiful sunshine!!!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!!

Cheese!!! Don't I look grand with my hat on??

This is how I made it!!!

We had the easel set up with green, blue & yellow paint... the murals came out wonderful. Does anyone have any suggestions on what to do with all the easel paintings?? I allow them to paint until they don't want to paint anymore, sometimes that means 2 pieces of paper or 15 pieces... some I keep, others I send home, and still others I throw out. I was thinking of using it for wrapping paper for our Mother's Day and Father's Day gifts... now finding a place to store it :)

I put out 3 shades of green paint and some small heart shaped boxes. I showed the kids how, if they connected the hearts they would look like a Shamrock.

Some got it... other's just liked the stamping with the hearts.... Process over Product right :)

We had Green Eggs again today... I thought it doesn't have to be just for Dr. Seuss' Birthday right!!! What would be more fitting then green eggs and toast for breakfast on St. Patrick's Day. The kids really enjoyed "painting" their toast. I got the idea from Teaching 2 and 3 Year Olds. But, note to self... use a toaster oven not a toaster to toast the bread. The side painted with the milk didn't toast as quick as the opposite side... so our first attempts were a little soggy. On our second attempt I just toasted the bread and then let the kids paint the toasted bread. It was a little messier, but it was fun.

I love these mystery type works. I hid gold coins in the Easter grass and the kids had to find a coin and put it on the numbers/space. The coins had numbers on them for the older kids to match, but the younger kids just put them on a circle.

Here the kids have to put the correct number of shamrocks into the hats. The little ones just put them in and take them out, which is a great fine motor activity for them.

In the Sensory Table I put some magnetic wands, magnetic chips, gold coins & shamrocks (not magnetic) and cups to place the items in. They enjoyed figuring out which ones would stick to their wands and then sorting them into the cups. Others just loved the feel of waving the wand, getting the chips and then taking their hand and pushing them all off the wand. One little girl did this over and over and over again. She enjoyed it very much.

Below are the pictures from our Lion and Lamb Theme!! I keep forgetting to post the finished product and the kids keep asking why they haven't seen THEIR work on the blog. So here they are...

What a busy week...