Tot School: Week in Review

Well, Tot School this week enveloped a whole lot of chaos!! We did so much outdoor stuff, I think that I was so water-logged by the weekend I didn't want to see water for a week.



Here the "Big" kids are teaching the Tot's how to go down the slide into the water pool. A fun time was had by all.

Here Little M was looking for her toys... she has a cookie that the kids hide for her and she goes and finds it... She loves it and is surprised every time she finds it. The Tot's love it and laugh and laugh each time she has that surprised look on her face.

I have been wanting to do this activity for so long. I keep reading it on different blogs... not sure which ones, sorry, but I loved it. We didn't have the right heavy weight paper, but we loved it anyway. The Big's & Tot's worked together to make the Shaving Cream Prints and then they made them into cards to send home on the last day of Daycare for some of them. The Big's wrote for the Tot's and they all had a great time. They also loved playing with the Shaving Cream after the prints were done.

We walked to the Community Pool in our neighborhood this week each morning. We all did a great job, and the Big's were a lot of help with the Tot's while walking. Especially on the way home, when all the Tot's were tired and hungry. That pool really wiped them out and they slept through everything each afternoon.

We have a big pool and a kiddie pool, we used both. The Tot's tolerated the kiddie pool, but wanted to spend the whole time in the big pool. We had upward of 8 Tot's that day (To 2 adults and a 16 year old helper) so we were able to take them in the big pool for a little while, but not long enough. They had a great time regardless!!

We also took the crafts outside this week. We had a field day and thought that the play-doh table would give the kids a nice quiet area to relax if they wanted to. It was great. We had a lot of great creations and a lot of fun was had. We also made Chocolate Play-doh, recipe from Preschool Daze, and I can't believe how much fun they had with it. Even the Big's loved it and played with it for a long time on and off throughout the day.

Here is the creation that A (28mths) made. I was very proud of him. Playing with the dough was great enough, but making this "monster" was even better!!

Lastly, here is shot of part of our field day. We also had horse shoes, bowling, badminton, and the water activities. We had a field day picnic and the kids had a blast. I am sorry to see some of my kids leave for the summer (their Mom's are teacher's), but will enjoy the low number of kids I will have and the ability to take them on field trips to the park, museums, & pool this summer. Plus, I will be able to spend some quality time with my own children and give them some of my undivided attention :)

Have a Great Week!!!!

Michelle

Tot School: Week in Review

Tot School... Week in Review!!!

We have been very busy practicing our Spring Program this past week, so I didn't get to many photo's of work time... We actually didn't have a whole lot of work time time week now that I think about it. We just practiced and tried to go outside and run as much as possible. I wish I got photo's of the kids playing house, but I was to wiped out after practicing The Very Hungry Caterpillar with the 2's, 3's and 4's that I decided I would just push the swings and call it a week. I did manage to get some photo's though... enjoy!!!

Here we did a tempra paint picture with all sorts of tools... even a few winter stamps in there to I must admit... but they loved it and had fun experimenting with all the different tools. Some of the kids liked their hands and others didn't want a speck of paint on them... Curious, as when they are outside they all run for the nearest mud pit and love it :)



Here a 2yr 3m works with the Alphabet Zoo Animals... All the letters match an animal, and let me tell you the Newt was a hard one to figure out... even for me!!! Little S loves to take them out and try to match them up, but she gets a little overwhelmed by the shear number of them that she usually loses interest pretty fast and walks away. I always bring her back and we complete it together and then put it away... sometimes one of the late 3's or 4's likes to help her, but she can be very 2 sometimes and is hard to work with.

We borrowed the this toy from the lending library near my house. They sort by color and then from smallest to largest. We all get the hang of the color sorting, but the smallest to largest hasn't really come into play yet. I am trying to give them lots of exposure to small -vs- large, but since there is more than one they get confused. We'll keep working.

Ahhhh... here is my Dear A... he loves the dog. He is 2yr 3m also and is very gentle and wants to be near the dog all the time... I love this picture because it captures the two friends together... both very content in this world of theirs.

I live close to the Lowe's Motor Speedway, Concord, NC. This week was Speed Week due to the 2 races here the past two weekends... so we took a little time out for a quick field trip to see the race cars on Speed Street. Here R is pretending to be a race car driver... very cute.

The After-Schoolers brought home their "year books" and the little kids loved looking at all the pictures. They loved picking out the teacher's they have seen, older kids that live in their neighborhood (or mine), and especially their older siblings... it was very cute and the older kids felt very important.

Well, that was almost all we did this past week... it was a fun, exhausting week and I look forward to another. Hopefully the rain will stop and we can spend sometime outside and continue to practice our show. I really love this age and all the adventure we get into each week, sometimes I think... "Wow, it's Friday, what did we do all week?" and this blog let's me see how wonderful our weeks really are, and how much learning goes on, even in the daily mundane things we do... Have a Great Week Everyone!!!!

Tot School

This weeks Tot School was Great!! We were outside a lot enjoying the weather and summer temperatures, to bad it has been freezing this week. We have been working on our outside play space a lot this Spring and finally things are coming together. We have our sandbox up and running and the Stumps one of my families donated are a huge hit.

We have also been practicing for our Spring Program, where our parents can see what has been happening at Tot School since Christmas. We had a cute Christmas Program that the parents loved, so I decided to do one for Spring too.





Here are some outside shots of the kids climbing, jumping, and exercising both those large muscle groups and their little minds. They had to concentrate because some of the stumps were a little wobbly. Some of the kids decided to crawl on them, sit on them, and my braver ones jumped or walked from on to the other.

Here one of my 3yr 1m girls was very brave, especially with flip-flops, and trying to walk to each one. She eventually crawled the end of the way, but I was proud of her for trying.

We got the water/sensory table out. We like to bring a lot of our work outside, but I always kept it to sensory table, balls, catch etc... but after reading Carisa's blog @ 1+1+1=1 I have started to take out puzzles, tray work, and mostly work that can't blow away. The kids love it and it provides a whole nother dimension to their work.

Here is a shot of the sandbox being used. We have kids in there from 24m to 38m. They really love it and since I have added the tree blocks, cars, trucks, and the ability to access water... the sandbox has taken on a life of it's own. Many great worlds are made up and played out in there and much discussion goes on.

Here 24m old takes out tray of water colors. She has gotten very competent at taking the work out, setting it up, and putting away. The actual "doing" of the work isn't really important to her right now. She enjoys it, but will do one or two strokes of the brush and then say, "Cween up, right Shell" I think she likes that best :)

Our magnetic "Paper" dolls from Melissa & Doug were a huge hit this week. I bought the ballerina a long time ago on clearance at TJ Maxx, but couldn't find another one. I felt there should be two so the kids could play together or alone (but the dolls would have someone to dress up for). I found the princess (huge hit with the girls) at a little country store in Boone, NC for $8.99. I grabbed it up wishing there were more.

We also did some traditional learning trays... color sorting & counting.

Here a 3yr 4m old tries to put the number blocks and pegs in correct order, she couldn't find the self correcting paper (which is a large narrow paper with the correct boxes for the blocks, the kids put the block on the corolating box by matching the number on the block to the number on the paper... but we couldn't find the paper... must scout out my 8yr olds room) We fixed it together, but I forgot to take a picture of the corrected work... Sorry :)

Another popular work was this Brio Construction Set I picked up at a consignment sale. The kids love it and the boys (3y 5m, 2y 4m, 3y & 4y) played with just that for one whole work period... about an hour.

Here a 3y 7m is using the painting tray. I found a variation of this on Laura's blog, My Montessori Journey. The kids have the ability to do painting whenever they want. I provide 2 colors to use, and everything they need is on the tray. They again enjoy cleaning the little paint pots and brushes at the end almost as much as the painting itself. I found these brushes at the education store near my home... I thought they looked fun and the kids love them.

We also did bubbles outside, practiced our Spring songs and stories for the Spring Program, cooked special goodies for snack, and had our circle time... Oh and our "butterfly" came out of it's cacoon finally:

We were very excited to see that our butterfly came out of it's cocoon on Wednesday. One of the kids found him stuck to the side of his habitat and started yelling that he hatched... It was very cute. We watched him for a few hours then brought the habitat outside and set it up so he could fly away when he was ready. We checked on him on Thursday and he had flown away. We talked about how he got out, what he was doing, what bushes he may have visited, and what he may be doing right now. It was a great impromptu lesson... we all loved it!!!

Tot School

We had a fun filled week this week. We have begun practicing for our Spring Program (as none of my daycare kids will go off to Kindergarten, we won't have a "Graduation" until next year.)
We also did a lot of fun activities, where the "big" kids had fun "teaching" the smaller kids. It was fun to watch and really goes a long with our Montessori philosophy.




A little fun with play-doh. We have been trying to make snakes with the play-doh in preparation for play-doh alphabet mats. I got the idea from Handwriting Without Tears and Making Learning Fun. We still have a tough time making the snakes to form the letters so we will continue to practice... and what fun we will have!!!






One of our favorite toys is the Leap Frog Letter Factory. The kids choose a letter and put it in to hear the letter name and sound of the letter. They like it and use it often.







Another favorite... opening and closing containers. I thought this work would get boring fast for the kids, especially the older 3's and 4's, but I was wrong. They continue to take it out and I will add beads to it or small pom-poms and it is like a whole new activity for them.





We received these sandpaper letters in a Morning Circle Time Center I purchased from Lake Shore Learning, they are so not true Montessori, but since it is all I have right now we use them a lot. We are practicing the sounds and then the kids each had a turn to do a crayon rubbing. We then stapled their "books" together and wrote words on the back of the page that coincided with the letter. We look forward to next September when we have more of our Montessori materials at hand.

Well, that is all the photo's I got this week, although we did have fun with Dot Markers, the Magnetic Maze, Tree blocks, Transferring Beans & the Sensory Table. But I must have not been able to find my camera, or was so engrossed in helping the kids, that I didn't get photo's of those. I will try harder next week.

Bye for now... have a great week!!!!

Mother's Day

Well, the kids and I have been busy trying to complete our Mother's Day gifts by Friday. We have made the cutest fingerprint vases I found from Kaboose, it was tricky to keep the enamel paint off the little ones clothes, but it was worth it. We then made tissue paper flowers to put in them. I remember making them from when I was a kid, I think we made them everyday it seemed like.

We then made our stick photo frames with some pictures we had taken during our Tot School time. The kids had fun with the decorating... and they loved gluing the frames together, but that was a little nerve racking for me. I had to keep straightening them. In the end, I think they came out pretty good.

We also spent time practicing our writing. We wrote our cards out... each child got to decorate with some die cut flowers, color their vase (which most of the kids punched out, with exception of our littlest kids) and then they each got to write their names, and I Love You Mom. They did a great job. I don't think you can see the writing on the side of the vase, it is in pencil so it is a little hard to see.

Lastly, we made calendars for each of our parents. The kids got to help position the pictures and pick out their favorite ones. We rushed to get them all finished and when we went to spiral them to make them into the books, the store was closed until Saturday!!! ARGH!!!! So, now I need to run to the store on Saturday morning and then drop each calendar off to the families that are closest to me. I don't want them to not have them for Mother's Day... the kids worked to hard on them. I will try to post a picture of the calendars when they are complete.

Now, I must get off the computer and clean up the kitchen for tomorrow and sterilize the playroom so no one gets sick. Something that occupies a lot of my time lately.

Last Weeks Tot School

This week's Tot School was busy... we spent a lot of time outside exploring Springtime!! We got some old stumps from one of our families and they were a big hit, even before we got them in place. Here is some photo's of them being "tried" out by some of the kids. Now we need to decided where to put them... It took us a week to decide where the sandbox would go... I am sure it will take a while to make this decision.











Don't ask why my son is wearing mittens, but he is!!!

We worked with the magnetic maze, a real popular work with all the kids.

We love working with water of any kind, but colored water is the best!! We were working on mixing blue and red. The fine motor exercise squeezing the dropper was just an added bonus. It is nice when they don't even realize they are learning and getting ready for writing at the same time.

Another pincer grasp activity. We found this activity from Laura at My Montessori Journey. Every time I go to the Thrift Store or Dollar General I try to find material to make up some of the trays Laura makes for her Montessori Classroom. She is very imaginative and we love her ideas.

We spent some time outside since we had beautiful weather. The kids love the new sandbox and spent a lot of time digging, playing and just hanging out with each other. I didn't realize it would be a quiet time spot, but the girls love just sitting with their feet in the sand.

We also checked on our Butterfly. We are anxiously awaiting its arrival. We check it each day during our Tot Time. We are hoping it makes its way out during the week and not on the weekend, as I may have to let it go before some of the kids get here on Monday. We will keep praying it waits for us all to be here.

Well, I have found that I took about 100 photos this week and want to show them all, but don't want to bore everyone. We have such fun and now love to spend our Tot School Time together. The kids also love asking for their picture's to be taken. So it's not hard to get photo's for my blog. I love it.

This Week's Tot School

This week our Home Daycare Tot School enjoyed learning about The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. We read the book, had fun putting up the felt pieces on the felt board, and made our own books to go with it... and an added bonus we found our very own caterpillar in the back yard that we caught and put in our bug catcher for the afternoon. To my surprise, when I went to let him go that evening it had wrapped itself in a cocoon!!!! Now, we are eagerly awaiting its arrival!!! I will hopefully be able to get some pictures of it when it makes its way out.

We also enjoyed our new Baby Washing Work. We had a fun time deciding who would go first and then deciding how to choose who would be next. We decided on making a list and each child could cross their name off after they had their turn.

We also got some great Tree Branch Blocks from one of our families... Thanks Andy!!! We loved the way they could be stacked even though they were different sizes and shapes.

Lastly, the weather finally became warm enough this week to get out in the dirt. We loved digging in the dirt pile and moving the dirt with our trucks and tractors. We did a great job sharing our shovels, since this is an area we work on daily. We lined up the trucks to find the one with the biggest load, and the one with the least (littlest, well... wittwest).

I am getting the hang of having my camera around when we do our Tot School, so hopefully next week I will have more to show. I also hope my little group of kids is OK to post on, since we range from 10 months to 48 months.