It's Autumn Time!

Pumpkins & Jack O' Lanterns

Daily Question:  Do pumpkins float? (The class was divided over this one!*)

Toys: FP Village and Foam blocks.

Snack: Pumpkin cookies and milk.

"F" is for feathery friends!  We had fun gluing our "F the flamingos" down to paper and giving them colorful feathers.

Exploring a pumpkin!  How does it smell, feel, taste, sound, look?

Today we had an enrichment lesson on Pumpkins.

Daily Question: Do pumpkins float? 

(Answer: *yes, pumpkins of all sizes float in water because pumpkins are made up of 80% water.)

We enjoyed opening up a sugar pumpkin (smaller and sweeter than a "normal" pumpkin). Students saw inside, smelled, touched, and tasted, if they wanted to, the fresh pumpkin.  

We noticed the differences and tasted the canned pumpkin we used in our recipe.  (I was proud of Zakai, Eva, Anna, Maelo, and Raegan who all tried cooked pumpkin).

Today's number is 3.  We had fun learning a new recipe for Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies that only uses three ingredients. Try it! This became our snack with milk. Yum!

  

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 box spice cake mix
15 oz. (1/2 a large can) Pumpkin
1 C. chocolate chips
Mix above ingredients together and drop by spoonful onto greased cookie sheet. Bake at 375 degrees for 12-16 minutes.

 

 We took turns adding the ingredients and stirring our cookies!

Pumpkin Books :

The Pumpkin Patch by Elizabeth King (Picture Puffins).
The Tiniest Pumpkin (A First Start Easy Reader) Troll
Pumpkin Time by Kathleen Weidner Zoehfeld, Ill. by Christopher Santoro
This is the Pumpkin by Abby Levine, Ill. by Paige Billin-Frye
Pumpkin Jack by Will Hubbell *(Jack-O-Lanterns to plant to pumpkin, sharing, cycles).
The Stubborn Pumpkin (HelloReader! Lvl 3, Gr. 1 &2) by Laura Geringer and Holly Berry

Song Story: 5 Little Pumpkins

Five Little Pumpkins   (Tune: “Five Little Ducks”)
Five little pumpkins sitting on the gate. (Hold up 5 fingers.)
The first one said, “Oh, my it’s getting late.” (Hold up thumb.)
The second one said, “There are witches in the air.” (Hold up index finger.)
The third one said, “But I don’t care.” (Hold up middle finger.)
The fourth one said, “Let’s run and run and run.” (Hold up ring finger.)
The fifth one said, “I’m ready for some fun.” (Hold up pinky.)
Ooooo! Went the wind, and out went the light. (Blow through hands, then clap.)
And the five little pumpkins rolled out of sight! (Roll hands behind back.)

Autumn Extension Activities:         

Songs: Today we gathered leaves and then sang this action song--
 It's Autumn Time (See Youtube link to song)
“It’s Autumntime,” Children’s Songbook of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 246
Brightly
1. It’s autumntime. It’s autumntime.
The leaves are falling down.
It’s autumntime. It’s autumntime.
It’s all around the town.
2. It’s autumntime. It’s autumntime.
There’s yellow, red, and brown.
It’s autumntime. It’s autumntime.
Bright colors can be found.
Words: Rita Mae Olsen, b. 1932. © 1966 IRI

Autumn Harvest Books:
I See a Leaf (Scholastic Reader, 1) by Grace Maccarone, Ill. by Laura Freeman
Sam the Scarecrow (A First Start Easy Reader) Troll
October Smiled Back by Lisa Westerberg Peters, Ill. by Ed Young (Months)
The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams,Megan Lloyd*
Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf by Lois Ehlert
What Happens in the Autumn; Books for Young Explorers, The National Geographic Society.

Feathery Bird Friends

Feathery Bird Friends

Daily Question: Do you like bird feathers?

Toys: Foam blocks, ABC floor puzzle, farm floor puzzle, Fireman and feather boa dress ups, and fabric tents.

Snacks: French fries, french toast sticks and "fruit" (red grapes).

F is a foolish flamingo who follows a Falcon far away up North where it is freezing. She sings (f f f ) (fa fa fa) as she rubs her arms up and down trying to get warm.

We listened to the letter "F" song and danced around as if we had Feathers and were Flying. We practiced flying Fast and slow. 

I Spy Fs Around our Room: Feathers, friends, fun, fat, family, Frozen, flamingo, freezing

F the Flamingo Activity: Listened to the story song and colored and cut out our foolish, freezing flamingos.

Today we learned the difference between Fur and Feathers by reading the book Fur and Feathers. We learned that birds are the only animals that have feathers. They use them to fly, to be camp floured, or to look pretty for a boy or girl bird. We touched a Feather boa to see what a feather feels like. 

We then read Ten Fat Turkeys which counts down from 10 to none. We had fun putting down a finger each time a turkey did something silly and went away. 

F Circle Time/Show N' Teach:

Lena: fishing pole, fish

Anna: fried egg, fishing pole

Tanner: fresh strawberry hand sanitizer

Maelo: bird with feathers

Lukas: duck with feathers

Harris: bluey the blanket to keep him warm when fffreezing!

At the end of preschool we read Firefighters. We each got a red Firefighter hat to take home!

Feathery Friend Books:
Rosie's Walk by Pat Hutchins
Have You Seen My Duckling? by Nancy Tafuri
Nature Club:Birds by Peter Gill
Little Quack by Lauren Thompson and Derek Anderson* (Early Math Concepts)
Fur and Feathers (Head to Tail) by Theresa Greenaway
Friends of a Feather by Arlen Cohn and Don Sullivan
First Song & Action Rhymes by Jenny Wood, Ill. by Chris McEwan
Bird: Eyewitness Books by Knopf
The Wild Swans by Hans Christen Anderson, Retold by Amy Ehrlich, Ill. by Susan Jeffers
The Little Red Hen by Paul Galdone (audio)
The Little Red Hen Pictures by Lucinda McQueen (Scholastic audio CD)
"If I was a little Bird" Learning Rhymes: First Songs & Action Rhymes by Jenny Wood, (46-47)
Feathers for Lunch by Louis Ehlert 
Bird Count and Bird Color by Alison Hill Spencer 
Firefighter

Elephants at the Circus

Daily Question: Have you seen an elephant? 

Toys: Dress ups, Circus Tents, ABC Wooden Puzzles, Colored foam blocks.

Snacks: Pretzel sticks, carrots, celery and Ranch dip.

Elephant Activity: During snack time we reviewed A-D with the songs/stories and actions.  Then introduce letter E.  E the Elephant exercises in the evening lifting 80 pound weights and says "e e e" (eh, eh, eh). E also says it's own name (long e sound).

 

Circle Time

I Spy E words: Encyclopedia, Explorers Book, Eggs, elephant toy, Eva, Elsa, ear , excited (for Halloween)?!

The Art Reinforcement Activity was an ABC dot-to-dot (a new skill for most of the students). It was fun to sing the ABC song while doing the activity several times.  I hold children’s pencil and we sing the ABC song over and over as I help each child and then they color E the Elephant.

 Circus Books:  Sidewalk Circus and Olivia Saves the Circus. We read books about the circus. Sidewalk Circus showed us how we can find circus participants all around us! Such as a squirrel walking across a "tight rope" (phone line) or a Strong Strong man.

Recess: We are loving this sunny Fall weather!  The children drew lines on the sidewalk and practiced tight rope walking.  The students enjoyed flying on the teeter totter to a circus or Egypt or to a Saharan plain to see an elephant. 

Zakai's Birthday!

Yesterday Zakai turned 5! He got to wear the birthday crown today and we all sang "Happy Birthday." We then each asked him a question!

Maelo: What is your favorite toy? 

      Choo Choo Train

Eva: What is your favorite color?

     Orange

Anna: What are your favorite clothes to wear?

    The Birthday Crown

Raegan: Do you like pumpkins?

     Yes

Tanner: Do you like Spiderman?

   Yes

Lena: Do you like the Birthday Crown?

   Yes

Ben: What is your favorite cake?

   Pumpkin

Harris: Do you like rainbows?

   Yes

Lukas: Do you like cars and trains?

  Yes 

Thank you Zakai (and Mom Sara) for the orange balloons, and presents.  Our students loved the silly shaped straw and Silly Putty!

We reviewed some words that can be made with three letters, as well as, "Ee" words on the dry erase board. Parents, this is a fun time to begin to point out words that are one, two, or three letters long (A-E) throughout the day. Examples of words you child might read at this point are: a, add, cab, dab, bed, etc.

  We ended by reading The Little Old Lady Who Wasn't Afraid of Anything. In this book, a little old lady is followed home by shoes that go "clomp clomp," pants that "wiggle wiggle," a shirt that "shakes shakes," etc. In the end it turns out to be a scary pumpkin man! She tells it she is not afraid and sends it out to the field to be a scarecrow. We talked about how during Halloween time there are a lot of fake scary things around, but we do not have to be afraid. We can be like the Little Old Lady! 

Elephant and Circus Books:
Circles at the Circus; My First Book of Shapes (Gymboree)
Eleanor's Enormous Ears (Scholastic, Jumpstart Pre-K Readers)
The Travels of Babar by Jean De Brunhoff (Random House)
Horton Hears a Who! by Dr. Seuss Horton Hatches an Egg by Dr. Seuss If I Ran the Circus by Dr. Seuss
It's Circus Time, Dear Dragon by Margaret Hillert
Lowly Worm Joins the Circus by Richard Scarry (Read-to-Read, Level 2)
Olivia Saves the Circus by Ian Falconer
Sidewalk Circus by Paul Fleischman and Kevin Hawker 

 Halloween Books: 

The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda D. Williams and Megan Lloyd.

 

Our Dinosaur Museum Field Trip!

Our Dinosaur Museum Adventures!

We had a great time at the BYU Paleontology Museum.  

Some Fun Facts: This museum was built in 1976 to display the collection of Dr. James A. Jensen and his crews.  Over many years, Dr. Jensen has collected fossils and dinosaur bones from Utah, Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana.  Many of the fossil were kept in unprepared molds and housed under the BYU Cougar Stadium until they found a home in the museum.  The museum has many fossils from the Jurassic Period (210-140 million years ago) and is one of the top five collections from this period in the world.  See this link to learn more about the museum:  BYU Museum of Paleontology

We learned that a Dinosaur Hunter is called a Paleontologist*.  He/she sometimes wears a hard hat, jacket, goggles, and works with tools at his/her job.

We also saw a simple pictorial definition of a dinosaur and plant fossil*: a dead dinosaur and an old tree had fallen into mud.  Mud covered the dino and tree.  Layers formed over the bones over the years and then wind and water erode the earth and the dino and plant are uncovered and found again as fossils.

We learned and then guessed what a dinosaur may have eaten according to the type of teeth it has.  Sharp teeth are for ripping meat and are called Carnivores.  Flat, wide teeth are for grinding and chewing plants and are called Herbivores.

 We saw dinosaurs that swam in the sea, walked on land, and flew in the sky.  Come and see some of what we saw!

 

Leaves, shells, trilobytes (cockroach looking animal), and other small fossils.

Example of a dinosaur fossil

A favorite mural of various dinosaurs as they may have lived and roamed.

 The children are all sitting on a replica of an Dinosaur thigh (Apatosaurus femur)  bone.
We have our dinosaur faces on.


 Some dinosaur skeletons are quite small (like the one in the box) and are overshadowed by sharped toothed larger dinosaurs!

 Our legs look small compared to this dinosaur

 

 Armor Plates protected some dinosaurs, called scutes.

This Triceratops "Three horned face"was a flat toothed (plant eater, herbivore) with armour that may have helped defend it against a T-Rex.

Some dinosaur flew or had wings.

 Students also were able to see BYU Students working on removing a fossil replica from a plaster casting with a small drill.

Our feet are small next to these Dinosaur footprints.

There were many places to touch and feel.  

This is a petrified turtle shell.

 We went to the restroom, washed our hands, and 

enjoyed a snack back at school

*Vocabulary Words discussed today: Very simply defined...
Paleontology:Paleontology is the study of the fossil forms of all life, animals and plants.
Paleontologist: "Dinosaur Hunter;" A person who studies about fossils and the life of animals and plants as left by their bones.
Fossil: Plants or animals that become stuck in the mud, die, are covered with earth, uncovered years later and found.  "Fossils are the naturally preserved remains or traces of ancient life that lived in the geological past.
Carnivore: Sharp toothed "meat eaters." Example would be a Tyrannosaurus Rex
Herbivore: Flat or ridged toothed "plant eaters" that grind and crush the foods they eat.  Example from the museum the Great Ground Sloth.
Omnivore: An animal that eats both plants and animals (sharp and flat teeth).

 

 Back at school, we had a "run around"recess outside where we pretended to be Paleontologists and dug in the sand piles to discover "fossils."  We then worked on gluing our D the Dinosaur pages and putting on "dots."

   The Students' Favorite part:

Raegan: the jewels at the beginning

Eva: touching the dinosaurs mouth

Anna: seeing the moose

Ben: the brachiosaurus 

Maelo: the fossil poop

Harris: the elk that looked like a deer

Zakai: the crystals

D is for Dancing Dinosaur 10/9

Daily Question: "Dd" Do you like Dinosaurs?

Toys: Dinosaurs, Dinosaur puzzles, Dolls, Doll Clothes, Dominoes, and Play Doh.

Snacks: Pretzel sticks and apple slices. We read How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food?

We listened about D the Dinosaur dancing disco in her father's diner until she is called to dinner. "D d d" is the sound her foot makes dancing.  Students tap heel on the ground and say, "D(ah) d(ah), d(ah)."

The children shouted out "D" words, such as Duck (Ben), Daisy (Eva), Doll (Anna), Dino (Zakai), and Do (Lena). They had fun putting the sound "duh duh duh" and coming up with words that began with that sound.

I am excited that the children now know the long and short A sounds, B, C, and D sounds which will help them to sound out simple words like: D-a-d, b-a-d, c-a-b, a-d-d, etc.

We looked through the fun pop-up book, Encyclopedia Prehistorica Dinosaurs  and talked about the characteristics of the different dinosaurs we saw. After, we talked about how the bones and shape of the dinosaurs teeth help us to know if they are flesh or plant eaters. (Pointed teeth are for ripping and tearing flesh, flat teeth are for grinding and chewing plants).  Fun to see children feel their canine teeth and their molars and guess what the different shaped teeth are for.

We then pondered the question, "What happened to the dinosaurs?" We read the book Whatever happened to the Dinosaurs and talked about how dinosaurs are now extinct. We looked at a picture of dinosaur bones and learned about fossils. 

Recess: Leaf Hunt!
Miss Julie took us on a leaf hunt for recess. We found all kinds of different sizes and shapes of leaves! We Cut them off the trees, just like "C the Caterpillar." We then came inside and did a leaf rubbing!

Circle Time/ D Show N' Teach:  

Anna: Dancing shoes

Ben: "D"esigner Watch

Eva:

Harris:

Lena: Dolly

Lukas: Bug Jar to discover things

Maelo: Duckie
Raegan:
Tanner: Drinking backpack

Zakai:

Recess: Our Leaf Hunt and finishing up C the Caterpillar Leaf Rubbing Page.



D the Dinosaur Activity Page:  Today we colored the big letter D and cut it out.  Tuesday, we will put "dots" on her and glue her onto a favorite color page.  (*An important skill at this age is using scissors. This helps the students practice fine motor skills.  Several students seemed to not know how to hold and cut with scissors, please practice at home.)




Miss Julie brought in a new class pet. A pet tarantula! The kids were very interested and asked all sorts of questions. 

Dinosaur Books:

Ten Little Dinosaurs by Pattie Schnetzler, Ill. by Jim Harris (An Eyeball Animation Book)
My Tall Book of Dinosaurs (Preschool Press)

Encylopedia Prehistorica Dinosaurs by Robert Sabuda and Matthew Reinhart (Pop-up Book)How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food? by Jane Yolen and Mark Teague
How Do Dinosaurs Say Good Night? By Jane Yolen and Mark Teague
Time Flies by Eric Rohmann (Caldecott Honor Book) Illustrated (no words)
Happy Holidaysaurus! by Bernard Most
Dinosaurs, Learn About Books by Brimax, 4-7 years
A Book to Begin on Dinosaurs by Eunice Holsaert and Robert Gartland
Dinosaurs; Over 100 Questions and Answers to Things You Want to Know by Dan Abnett and Nik Vincent
Dinosaurs Are Different by Aliki, Let's-Read-And-Find-Out-Science (Harper Collins)
Dinosaurs Magazine; Made for Kids! (World Color Press) Sept./Oct. 1997.
Dinosaur Dream by Dennis Nolan
James Gurney's Dinotopia Pop-up Book (Turner Publishing)
Dinotopia by James Gurney
Dinotopia; The World Beneath by James Gurney
Dinosaur Time by Peggy Parish and Arnold Lobel (An I Can Read Book)*
The Berenstain Bears and the Missing Dinosaur Bone by Stan and Jan Berenstain
Dinosailors by Deb Lund and Howard Fine
Whatever Happened to the Dinosaurs? By Bernhard Most