First week of Preschool!

 What a wonderful first week of preschool!  Our theme for the month is “I Belong.”  Each week we have a sub-theme and this week’s was “I Belong at School.”  We played get-to-know-you games, sung songs with our names and learned the rules of our preschool.  We also learned the letter “I” this week!

We start each day with centers.  This is a great chance for the children to independently choose which center they would like to do.  It is also a wonderful time to work on social skills like sharing and taking turns as well as role-playing.

 For our small group project on the first day of school, the children got to trace their hand and then color it to show their parents just how big they are! 

One of our helper jobs is the calendar.  This is when we learn numbers and practice counting.  It is also a great opportunity for the helper to speak in front of the class to tell everyone the date.

 Music is a big part of our preschool!  Getting-to-know-you songs were really fun to help the kids feel loved, known, and accepted at school!

 Our Prekindergarten classes got a special visitor–Franklin the turtle!  We read a story about Franklin’s first day of school and talked about how we were feeling on the first day.  Some kids felt nervous like Franklin and were able to see that just like Franklin’s experience, they too would soon feel confident at school!

  We also had a REAL visitor this week in our preschool!  Suzy Safari comes to each class once a month to share with us what she’s learned about animals on her latest adventures!  This week we got to see how big a baby elephant is when it is just born!  We love when Suzy Safari comes to sing songs, read stories, and teach us little rhymes!

We go outside to play each day!  This is such an important time for these young minds to get a chance to be loud, run around, and get some wiggles out ready to go back in and continue learning!  What looks like mere playing to adults is actually great hands-on-learning as well as a time to develop social skills and large-motor skills!  Their little minds are still learning physical coordination and confidence!

  

As part of our “School” theme, we learned how to use water colors at school so whenever we paint later in the year the children will know just what to do!  It was also a fun way for them to explore with colors and have the opportunity to be creative and paint however and whatever they choose!

Once a week, we have a favorite books time.  The children all really enjoy being able to choose the books that the assistant teacher reads!  

Like I said, we had a fabulous first week!  And what a great group of students! : )  I absolutely love them already!