Friday - November 13th, 2009

We are beginning to slowly wrap up our study of fall, leaves and the forest.

Today, we used guided imagery to imagine ourselves as small seedlings buried in the ground. We pushed through the ground to become small saplings.




When we moved into the world, we felt the sun on our faces and felt the cool air.


As the seasons changed, so did we! We grew stronger and stronger and eventually grew apples on our branches.

Along came some children. The children picked our apples and enjoyed the fruit. When that happened, we felt happy, because we knew that we would one day grow fruit again.

We had music with Ms. Shelley. We sang fall songs and pretended to be squirrels, scampering and gathering our nuts to nibble on.


We also explored the sounds that leaves make when they fall, and animals sounds that one might hear in a forest!




We also got to use special musical instruments (shakers).

In Creative Play, we put the tissue paper leaves we had made last Thursday on our forest trees. The trees are looking full now, and provide protection, shade and a home for us as we pretended to be squirrels and other forest creatures. We also made a birthday card for Orion.

In Atelier, we practiced our fine motor skills and further studied the shapes of leaves and what trees they represented by sewing burlap leaves with large needles and yarn.

We learned to thread our needles....

and make small stitches, pulling the thread all the way through.


We went up and down with our needles.

After rest time, we took the real leaves we sorted on Tuesday and organized them into a pictograph. We made observations such as how many leaves we had all together, how many more fir branches we had than maple leaves, if any amount was equal to another amount etc. We talked about the concepts of more than and less than, as well as discussed what the amount of leaves in our graph could tell us about how common certain trees are in our community.




We also celebrated Orion's birthday and had a dance party!

November 12th, 2009

We are beginning to slowly wrap up our study of fall, leaves and the forest.

Today, we used guided imagery to imagine ourselves as small seedlings buried in the ground. We pushed through the ground to become small saplings. Some of the trees thought pushing up through the ground was difficult, because the ground they were planted in was frozen, and some of us found it easy to sprout, as the ground they were planted in had been muddied and softened by rain. "It felt good under ground. It was funner. I could feel the dirt. It was easy (to come out of the ground) because it was muddy and the snow was on it for a long time and there were a whole lot of animals. The animals helped me dig out of the hole." -Jacob



When we moved into the world, we felt the sun on our faces and felt the cool air.



As the seasons changed, so did we! We grew stronger and stronger and eventually grew apples on our branches.


Along came some children. The children picked our apples and enjoyed the fruit. When that happened, we felt happy, because we knew that we would one day grow fruit again.

"It felt dangerous for me underground, it didn't feel good for me. I was going to die. The ground was so sticky for me because it was covered with mud. Then I scrubbed the mud off and I stretched out more. Then I dumped the apples. My arms was hurting. When the kids picked the apples it felt good. My arms were starting to break. Then I was feeling much better." -Lhitzy

In Creative Play, we put the tissue paper leaves we had made last Thursday on our forest trees. The trees are looking full now, and provide protection, shade and a home for us as we pretended to be squirrels and other forest creatures.


In Atelier, we practiced our fine motor skills and further studied the shapes of leaves and what trees they represented by sewing burlap leaves with large needles and yarn. Every child was able to identify maple, oak and poplar leaves just by their shape!

We learned to thread our needles....

and make small stitches, pulling the thread all the way through.

We went up and down with our needles.

Here is Iris sharing what sewing means to her:

After rest time, we took the real leaves we sorted on Tuesday and organized them into a pictograph. We made observations such as how many leaves we had all together, how many more fir branches we had than maple leaves, if any amount was equal to another amount etc. We talked about the concepts of more than and less than, as well as discussed what the amount of leaves in our graph could tell us about how common certain trees are in our community.



Some of us were wondering earlier about alligators and crocodiles. Jacob hypothesized that alligators never ate people, but crocodiles did. We decided to research that hypothesis on Google. We thought of a question ("Do alligators eat people?"), and used the internet to find the answer.


We found out that while alligators do eat people once in a while, they are less aggressive than crocodiles and won't eat people unless provoked. Crocodiles are more likely to eat larger mammals, such as people. We were surprised that our hypothesis wasn't entirely correct!

Monday, November 9th

Today we acted as scientists and mathematicians! First, we sorted the many leaves we found on our nature walks. We observed the shape of the leaves and compared them to pictures of different types of leaves found around Oregon.

Does it fit here?

I found a match!

Maple leaf.

Fir leaf.

Each scientist picked a leaf (or several) and sorted it according to leaf identification sheets. We observed how many points the leaves had, whether their sides were bumpy or smooth, and whether they were wide or thin. Here are two videos showing some of some of our decision making and thought processes!

On Friday, we will use our sorted leaves and place them in a pictograph! We hope to figure out the most common type of leaf found around our community!

We also had treasured buddy reading time. We always begin our special time reading and discussing books with our buddies, and then we usually enjoy a different learning activity such as building with the blocks or using puzzles.




We are also writers in the Dolphin classroom! Today, we started using new alphabet sheets to help us write the sounds we hear in the words we write. We have the most wonderful, creative stories, and we are excited to get them down on paper!

Wrapping Up Fall and Forests

Hello parents! Did you notice the new newsletter in your school mail box today (Monday and Tuesday)? In the right hand column, I offered some extension activities for you to try with your budding scientist at home should you be searching for a way to reinforce classroom learning! Here are links to the sites I suggested. Each time I offer links in the newsletter, I will try to also provide them on the blog, as to make it easier for you to navigate.

Find forest or fall links that your child loved?! Please post them under comments! Thanks so much!

Arbor Day site - Tree Identification
Bill Nye the Science Guy Video on Forests - Scroll down to where it says "Forest Video 1/3." There are three parts to this video. (P.S. Don't fret if Bill Nye doesn't hold your child's rapt attention. It is a tad bit challenging for preschoolers, but I thought some might enjoy it! Let me know if videos like this are beneficial or not!)