Pumpkin Patch Field Trip

 

 We had our first Busy Bees field trip - {Bishop's Pumpkin Patch}

The day was full of lot of fun things: Farm and Petting Zoo, Hay jumping, Train ride, Yummy food, Hay Ride, and of course, picking out our pumpkins.

Duck in the Truck

This week we read Duck in the Truck. The kids loved reading the story. On Monday we learned about helping others and did a little role playing. Then we sorted and counted ducks, frogs, boats, and sheep. The Busy Bees enjoyed making their own Ducks!!

The Busy Bees loved centers- Bronwen and Paige working with money.

Calli and Sydney working with the letter magnets.

On Wednesday we worked on rhymes. I had the Busy Bees look for all the rhymes in the book and then we played a matching game with rhymes. Next we counted out the colored bears and worked on writing our numbers. Everyone had a lot of fun with the sheep puppet.

Again the fun centers- Ryder and Noah working on a puzzle.

Paige and Bronwen using the play-do.

We had a great week.

Field Trip - Bishop's Pumpkin Farm - 10/21/11

Our first field trip will be on Friday, October 21, 2011 at Bishop's Pumpkin Farm in Wheatland. I have been there many times and it is so much fun. You can take a hayride out to the pumpkin patch, visit the free petting zoo, and walk around and to see the farm. I highly recommend the train ride, but it is $2.80 plus tax. I think we can use the preschool fund for this expense. There are other attractions that cost money, but I have never done them and I think the train ride is plenty. There is also a "cafe" where you can buy apple cider, lunch, or even a pumpkin pie. Make sure you bring money to buy your pumpkin. The pumpkins range in price from $1-$40. They do accept Visa/MasterCard. I would plan on about two hours.

Wheatland is 30 minutes from Roseville. You can either carpool at 9:00 or just plan on meeting at Bishops at 9:30. I promised to help my friend Naomie move to Nevada City that day, so I will not be able to go :( Has anyone else been to Bishop's that can show everyone the ropes?

Here is the web link: http://www.bishopspumpkinfarm.com/

Week 3

This week we read My Many Colored Days. The kids talked about feelings and emotions. Emily and I asked the kids to act out some of the emotions in the book.

They are jumping like pink flamingos and then buzzing around like busy bees.

After jumping, running, buzzing, kicking feet, and howling, the kids had a great time playing outside in the sand box. At one point there were five kids in at one time.

Next we made patterns with the colored bears.

The kids had fun making their own many colored day picture.

We had a great time going on an expedition looking for E's.

E for Emily - I think Emily found all of the E pictures!

Wednesday we had just as much fun, but we don't have the pictures to prove it :) The kids talked about emotions and colors again. They used water colors to illustrate their feelings. The highlight of the day was decorating Franny's Fantastic Frame with feathers, fish, fences, frogs, and lots of flowers. We had to be very careful because if we put something on the frame that did not start with an F, Franny freaked out! The kids had fun testing her to see if she would notice.

What's in a name?-Week 4

(The kiddos finding letters on crackers during snack time.)

This week it was all about the name as we read Chrysanthemum by Kevin Henkes. In the story Chrysanthemum loves her name until she goes to school where she finds it is "too long" and some girls tease her for being named after a flower. Chrysanthemum struggles with this until the whole class meets their very cool music teacher, Delphinium Twinkle, who tells everyone that she also has a long name and is named after a flower! And guess what? Mrs. Twinkle is expecting a baby girl and has been considering Chrysanthemum as a name! This causes Chrysanthemum to "bloom" and all the girls to realize how wonderful a long name can be.

After the reading story, we talked about how everyone is special and was named something special by their parents just for them. We talked about being accepting of others and how to be a good friend. We looked in a baby name book to see the meaning of every one's names-- some were silly and some were spot on. When then headed to the table to find our names and count the letters in each one.

We put the names in order from smallest number of letters to largest. The children did well counting the letters, using one-to-one correspondence and showing the meaning of less and more. We repeated this activity on Wednesday, but with the names of characters of the story-- Jo, Rita, Victoria, Delphinium and Chrysanthemum.

For the craft, we did sponge painting with letters trying to make our names. Here is Ryder's.

After reading the story on Wednesday we found all the references to different kind of flowers in the book-- marigold, lily, carnation, daisy, delphinium and chrysanthemum. We looked at photographs of these finding similarities and differences in appearance. We also talked about the parts of the flower. The children picked a favorite flower to paint and then off to the table they went to make their masterpieces.

I was impressed with how well they did painting the stem, leaves and petals. They really worked hard basing their work off of the pictures.

I was so impressed with how much the Busy Bees have matured in a year. The did well listening, lining up and sharing. They shared well during free play.

Calli and Lincoln with blocks...

Bronwen and Sydney with play dough...

And everyone seemed to love the magnets!

Centers were fun too. Bronwen and Sydney sort money, Paige and Calli work with linking cubes and the boys to Dot-to-Dot art.

I'm excited for what this year holds! The children really did well. Especially as I worked with them during writer's workshop and phonics. They are hearing the sounds and getting it! It is fun to see their progress.