“Welcome, welcome, everyone, now we’re here let’s have some fun!” Songs are sung throughout our day as we learn the importance of cleaning up, the order of the alphabet, and how to hold our crayons. One of our goals is to make learning so much fun that the students don’t think of it as work, but as an extension of play. Our room is filled with toys and manipulative that encourage exploration and sharing while building our vocabulary, fine motor skills, and friendships.
During September, our class focused on learning the letters A and B, their sounds and clue words (apple, boots), learning the shapes triangle, circle and rectangle, as well as the number 1. This month the students have created the letter crafts A is for apple and B is for butterfly.
The students are also working to recognize the initial letter and the letters in their name. We will spend time this year “building” our names using letter tags.
In math, the students practice counting daily and have learned one to one correspondence by completing activities such as setting the table and matching socks to shoes. The students have enjoyed sorting items by color. We began exploring size and compared different sized items and used comparison vocabulary to describe two items.
During language and literacy, the students learn to discriminate between letters and pictures. We continued by exploring books and discovered how books have authors and illustrators, how we read from top to bottom, and left to right.
In preparation of writing, the students learned a song to teach crayon grip. The students practice proper crayon grip daily, and we are working to build hand strength by rolling out and manipulating Play doh, building with toys, and practicing scissor skills. We are working to recognize letters and will focus on forming those letters correctly.
During PATHS (Promoting Alternate THinking Strategies), the students met Twiggle, a turtle puppet, and his friends, who are helping the students to discover all about emotions and appropriate responses.
Amanda Rabolli
Carole Cleary
