The highlight each year during our gingerbread unit is to make gingerbread cookies. I make sure we've heard the story before we make the cookies, so it's more meaningful.
The whole time we were making these cookies, the children were talking about how the fox ate the gingerbread boy, but he wasn't going to eat their cookies!
We made up our own versions of the story. Instead of a fox, it was a mama or daddy or surely that older brother. Or a dog.
We made sure he had lots of chocolate chips, raisins and sprinkles.
And we wondered as we put them in the oven if one would get out. Where would it go? Who would catch it?
And then today we read The Gingerbread Girl. And were relieved when she outsmarted the fox. And that none of our cookies escaped the oven.
Since many of our families have already started putting up their Christmas trees, I thought I'd add a touch of holiday to our block corner. I took our mirror, a rope light, blocks and wooden trees and set up a scene. I love using mirrors with lights because of the reflection. I turned off one set of lights in the room so it could be seen a bit better (you can't tell by these pictures, though). What I loved most about this was the conversations that were overheard, about Christmas trees, Christmas lights, Jingle Bells, and birthday parties. (Because, well, birthday parties seem to make their way into any conversation with 3 year olds!) Next week I will add some twinkling lights - not sure how yet. The wheels are still turning on that one.
Wow! I am truly honored to be nominated for a couple of awards!
A huge thank you to Karen over at Pre-Kinders for nominating me in the Edublog Awards 2011 for Best Class Blog. I am honored! You may begin voting for your favorite Edubloggers on Friday, December 2nd.
I received the Kreativ Blogger Award from Pre-K Pages. Thank you, Vanessa!
**How the Kreative Blogger Award process works:
List seven things about myself and give the award to ten other bloggers.**
Seven things about myself:
I've been teaching for over 12 years.
I have 3 children, ages 16 - 22.
My favorite flower is the daisy.
I love listening to jazz on a rainy day.
I got a new Cannondale road bike last winter and love to ride with my husband.
I take too many pictures.
I love a nice sunset.
I am nominating the following bloggers for the Kreative Blogger Award. I am so inspired by the time these bloggers put into their posts and all the creativity that goes with them.
There are SO many wonderful preschool blogs out there. Each day I am stumbling across another new one! Thank you to EVERYONE who shares their blogs with others. You are appreciated!
We always start our Christmas season with a Gingerbread Unit. I've been searching the web for gingerbread ideas and thought I'd share some here, including my own.
I got inspired from Laura over at Art for Little Hands with her Play Dough Faces.
I placed a tray of Potato Head pieces (I didn't realize how many we have accumulated over the years!) and play dough at the table and let them create.
These pictures are from my 2 Year Old class.
And yes, we had ears for noses and feet for hair, and upside down glasses. And laughter. But also some good conversation about where our facial features are.
Another favorite special event: Our Thanksgiving Program and Feast! During the last hour of our morning, our families meet us in the sanctuary of the church we reside in. I love watching the children's faces as they enter that big room to see all these faces smiling at them. We stand up on our "stage" with the Pre-K 4's class and we sing 4 songs. Then, each child has a feather reading what he/she is thankful for. One by one, each feather is read and placed on the turkey. Everyone then moves over to the Fellowship Hall, where we eat the delicious food that ever family has brought. We have about 20 round tables set up with our table runners and our artwork adorns the walls. I love to stop and watch the families as they eat and mingle. A great time for fellowship!
Now, I am getting ready to host Thanksgiving at our home with 17 family members. Yesterday our son came home from college and we celebrated his 19th birthday. Today, we celebrate my sister's birthday along with our turkey dinner.
Hello, Thankful Turkeys! This is the second Thanksgiving that we made these turkeys. We got inspired by Kristin's turkeys over at preschool daze!
I cut out 3 different-sized circles and the preschoolers started with the largest, gluing it onto a piece of paper, then the medium, then the small, followed by the head and all its features.
I love asking 3 year olds what they are thankful for....
macaroni
butterflies
bubbles
my clothes
my mama's and my dada's eyes
my toys
the color pink
my mommy
Teacher Sheryl (yes, that brought a tear to my eye!)
mama and daddy
.........
Tomorrow we will share what we are thankful for at our Thanksgiving Feast.
While cruising the aisles of our local drug store last week, I squealed when I saw these packages of plastic shot glasses. Fortunately my husband knows me well enough that he smiles rather than roll his eyes. He knows I've found something exciting for preschool. Yep, plastic shot glasses. I've seen colored plastic cups being used on light tables, but when I saw the shot glasses, I thought they'd fit our preschoolers' hands better than regular sized cups.
These are the ones I used, but I provided a link at the end of this post from Amazon for some other possibilities.
I added glass gems (I included those in the Amazon link below as well).
The children loved stacking the cups, and I noticed they were trying to stack them either by color, or in a pattern.
I provided a 1 gallon container that sat at the side of the table to store the gems. The children loved scooping the gems out of the container with the cups, pouring the gems from cup to cup, and then dumping the gems back into the container. This area was never empty of children the entire time!
Make sure to provide a small broom and dust pan for easy clean up ifwhen the gems fall on the floor.
