Little Busy Bodies Preschool
Newsletter
November 14th, 16th, 18th 2011
Dear Preschool Parents,
Happy Thanksgiving!!
We had a jam-packed week here at preschool. On Monday, we finished up our segment on plants by reading “Tops & Bottoms,” by Janet Stevens. This is a fabulous book about a hare and his lazy neighbor, bear. Hare strikes a deal with bear where he gets to use bear’s land to plant crops. Hare will do all the planting, watering, and harvesting, but split the crops 50/50 with bear. He’ll even let bear choose which part of the plant he wants: tops or bottoms. First bear chooses tops so hare plants a root crop (carrots, radishes, and onions) leaving bear with a useless harvest. The story continues on in this humorous fashion, leaving a furious bear as he continues to get tricked by hare. After reading the book, we talked about how different vegetables grow and whether we’re eating the tops, middles, or bottoms of the plant.
With a few days left before the Thanksgiving holiday, I decided to read a fun book entitled “I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie,” by Alison Jackson. When an "old lady" comes to Thanksgiving dinner she swallows a pumpkin pie--whole. To wash down the pie (which was really too dry) she gulps some cider which "rumbles and mumbles and grumbles" inside her. The book carries on in this fashion until she’s gobbled the entire Thanksgiving feast! After reading this book, we talked about the First Thanksgiving and our purpose now in celebrating this holiday. We talked about the pilgrims in length and the children were very familiar with the details of the first Thanksgiving. However when I had the children complete a sheet about the details of their own Thanksgiving, none of them could tell me the real reason we celebrate Thanksgiving. I suppose the personal connection will come later. We also made pumpkin pudding. The kids had fun measuring and mixing ingredients, and most enjoyed eating it as well.
Finally, we ended our week with “A Turkey for Thanksgiving,” by Eve Bunting. Mr. and Mrs. Moose invite all their animal friends for Thanksgiving dinner and the only one missing is Turkey. When they set out to find him, Turkey is quaking with fear because he doesn't realize that his hosts want him at their table, not on it. After reading this book, we made our own classic hand turkeys.
Simply to keep you updated, we are now working on our next essential skill in developing phonological awareness… rhyme. Rhyming is the ability to identify words that have identical final sound segments.
REMINDER
*KING/ QUEEN OF THE WEEK Nov. 28th & 30th: AJ
MARK YOUR CALENDAR
*NOV 21 & 23-NO SCHOOL THANKSGIVING WEEK
*DEC19-JAN 2-NO SCHOOL WINTER BREAK
Have a wonderful and safe Thanksgiving vacation!!
Sincerely,
Amber
