Month: February 2011

School News: Special Helper Day

Today, I went to class with Isabel to be the Mommy helper on her special helper day, which was also her BIRTHDAY!

After opening with prayer and thanking Jesus for our special friends, Nevan (whose birthday was yesterday) and Isabel. The class sang a few songs and then Mrs. Calvert read to us a story about hibernation and animals that hibernate. Afterward, everyone headed over to the tables to do a few projects before heading to the gym for recess.

Today the class worked on the number 5. Great job Makayla and Isabel.

Afterward, we got painting shirts on and painted a hibernating animal… a bear.

Makayla and Isabel were so cute together at the special helper table, whispering to one another but when I approached the table would fall silent. So funny!

After everyone painted their bear  and clean-up was complete, we headed into the gym (since it was raining outside) to play a few games.

Here all the kids are acting like crabs but later they acted liked like other animals too…a frog was one of them!

After acting like animals the kids sat down to play duck-duck-goose. Since Isabel was the birthday girl, she got to go first and picked Makayla as the goose.
It was really interesting to see the interaction with the kids before, during, and after the game of duck-duck-goose. After playing duck-duck-goose we split up, headed to the bathrooms and washed hands and took a potty break if we had to.

While I waited for the girls to finish, I watched them make moose faces in the mirror. Isabel didn’t want to do it but it was great to watch the others do it!

Back in the classroom, we had cupcakes and milk for snack to celebrate Isabel’s birthday. When snack time was over, the kids went right into “free-play”.

They gather at the sensory table to explore with dyed lentils, magnets, and alphabet letters.

Later I found the birthday girl, hibernating in the bear cave. Just a few minutes after I took this picture, Aiden, Zackary, and Isabel were asked to keep the noise down. They had been playing in the bear cave and were growling like bears at each other. The noise level went from minimal to very loud very quickly. Mrs. Calvert got to them quickly and reminded them to use inside voices. I guess, it’s to be expected when you’ve talking about bears (and other animals that growl) and theres a cave in the classroom.

After getting asked to keep the noise down, Isabel put on a mask and played “Narnia” by herself.

When Isabel rang the clean-up bell, everyone pitched in to get the room back into order before show and tell and closing prayer. Everyone gathered back on the circle-time rug, while Isabel shared with the class her show and tell. For show and tell, she took her LeapFrog: Tag™ and her Fancy Nancy Explorer Extraordinaire book! Isabel gave the closing prayer and then it was time to go! So fun to see the kids interact with each other! Love it.

Soccer Shots: Day 1

Today was Isabel’s first day of Soccer Shots. I was very disappointed when we arrived and realized that the majority of her class is made up of 3-year olds! I had hoped it would be all or mostly 4/5 year-olds. Out of about 20 kids in class, only 3 of them are 4/5 year-olds and that includes Isabel! We’ll see how it goes… the class was a bit hectic/chaotic with the 3 year-olds running around chasing their balls all over the room and not listening to the instructors. Focus was taken off the group as a whole to get the other kids back into the group. Despite that however Isabel listened very well, to both instructors, and did exactly what they told the class to do. She even scored 3 goals and got a t-shirt!

Practicing how to stop the ball with their foot… remember NO HANDS!

Practicing dribbling and controlling the ball.

More practice…she went out of bounds a bit but got right back in again. Way to go!

Taking a break, before they break up into 2 groups.

Isabel was on the red team…

…and their off. Dribbling down to the other net to score a goal. Then they had to run back to where they started and get a new ball to dribble back to the goal. Isabel did this 3 times before class ended.

The look of determination on her face… she got it in the net!

3 for 3 shots… this last one was just before class was over. Great job Isabel!

School News: Full Day And Letter O

Today was Kindergarten Move-Up Day, Groundhog Day, and they worked on the letter “O” as well! Talk about a full day today for our little preschooler (a preview of next year as a kindergardener)!

During Kindergarten Move-Up Day, the class got to visit the kindergarten room, the library, and meet the music teacher!

Isabel with her friends from school visiting one of the kindergarten classrooms!

In the kindergarten room, they visited with the teacher, got to explore the room, and heard the story about, “Mrs. Wishy Washy“.

Listening to the music teacher play his guitar and later they sang “Father Abraham“.
Isabel LOVED this part of the tour, it’s all she talked about!

In the library they got to see all the books and heard the story of the “The Very Hungry Caterpillar“.

Back in the their classroom, they hear another story about Groundhog day and then worked on a groundhog day project.

Now you see see “Phil“…

… now you don’t!

Punxsutawney Phil predicted an early spring this year!… Oh how I hope it’s true!

The letter “O” is for Olive, Octopus, On/Off.

The special helper today was Rebecca. For show and tell Rebecca brought 2 Strawberry Shortcake dolls. One was purple and smelled like plum and one was red and smelled like strawberry. For snack Rebecca shared with the class animal crackers and milk. Isabel really liked dipping her crackers in her milk!

Tumbling Tykes: Day 1

Today was Isabel’s first day of tumbling/gymnastics and she had fun! There are 5 children (2 of which are in her class at school!) in her class and her teacher’s name is Ms. Mo. The line leader today was Presley.

Today was a bit more of an introduction but they did get up and move and tumble! To begin the class Ms. Mo had each child say “here” in Spanish, which is “aquí”. Then Ms. Mo handed out her magic “I can do” dust, to be used during class when they think they can’t do something. Ms. Mo then had the class stand up, they checked their hearts, and then they did stretching exercise to get their hearts warmed up!

Touching our toes…need to remember to keep our legs straight!

Stretching up on our tippy-toes.

Stretching to the side.

And a nice good stretch for our back…
notice Isabel, she’s stretching the wrong way. Silly girl!
Then it was time to get out and tumble and move!

Running and jumping over Ms. Mo’s stick.

Isabel doing the monkey roll! She did a perfect job and kept her bottom off the mat!
(BTW – the kids along the side, sitting down are NOT part of the class)

High jump… I was a bit worried about this one…
I didn’t think she would do it but she did it!!!

Nice landing, Isabel!

Put your toes to the mat, slap your hands on the wedge, bend your knees,
tuck your chin and roll!

A bit of help from Ms. Mo.

She took a tumble but that’s what the class is about! Great job!

The last moving exercise for the day was the slalom run and log jump. They ran the course while the cones were on “fire”!

After the slalom, Ms. Mo had them return to the circles and she rewarded them, with colored marshmallows, for listening very well and for forming great lines! The marker color smell was grape!

Then she told them a body-action story about a boy named, Elliott.

Elliott was outside playing when his mother called him into the house to take a nap. Elliott didn’t want to take a nap because he wasn’t tired but he knew that he had to obey his mother. Elliott’s bedroom was at the very tippy top of the house and he had to run up many flights of stairs to get there. Elliott got to his room and jumped into bed when he heard a knock and his mother said, “Elliott are you taking your nap?” Elliott said “Yes.” but he really wasn’t sleepy. So Elliott crawled under his bed and jumped into a big ocean. Elliott swam and swam around and finally decided to swim to the very bottom of the ocean. So he swam and swam, kicking and swimming all the way to the bottom. When he got to the bottom of the ocean, he saw a BIG squiggly squirmy octopus and he didn’t like that. So Elliott swam away and he swam and he swam. Until a BIG scary shark started to chase Elliott. So Elliott swam really hard and really fast to get away from the shark and then he heard a knock. Knock. Knock. Knock. “Elliott are you taking your nap?” Elliott’s mother said. Elliott swam to the top and jumped out of the ocean and jumped into bed, he pulled the covers up over his head, and he said, “Yes.” and he laid down and fell asleep.