Room A

Thursday, August 15, 2013

Welcome Back to school was the theme for most of our students today!  It was so great to have so many returning faces and to welcome in some new faces to our program as well.  It was so exciting to see how much my friends have grown over the summer and WOW some of them really have grown!  We had an awesome first day with very few tears which was great to see.  

For those of you who are new to Zion and as reminder for returning parents this blog is a great resource to see what your child did at school all day.  I will do my best to have the blog posted each day by 5:00 if not before.  The blog will also contain important reminders and important dates.  If at any time you have any questions at all please do not hesitate to contact me at hhorn@zionharvester.org I will return your email within a 24 hour period.  

Please be sure to check your child's folder for important information today as well as their first art project they did!  Not everything will be coming home that we do during the school day.  You will receive at the beginning of each month all of their classwork from the previous month.  I will hold some things out that you will receive at the end of the year in the form of a portfolio.  

Please remember that drop off time is from 7:45-8:15 and pickup is at 12:30 unless your child is staying for rest time and then pick up is at 3:00.  Please do your best to have your child here at time above so that are able to participate fully in all the activities and centers that will be done for the day.  

Enjoy our first day of school through pictures below!  

We started out our day playing in the kitchen area and making up some yummy food to eat!

Some of us were excited to be back and to have our first circle of the day. 

We had fun exploring new toys and seeing what toys made noise.

We had a great time playing with new toys and seeing how they worked. 

We got to know new friends. 

And even had time to stop and have a little tea. 

We even had time to catch up on our laundry. 

Our first activity of the day was picking a color to put our thumbprint on our tree be sure to check out our class tree in the weeks to come to see all of Mrs. Horn's friends on it!

We then decided no time like the present to get messy in PDO!  So we painted our hands with our color of the month BLUE

It felt cold and wet but we had lots of fun doing it!

We all did a great job of getting both of our hands painted to put on a special paper 

Be sure to check out your folder for this special activity we did it is a great keepsake of the first day of school!

Some were not sure of what to think

Others did not know what to do

But we all had a great time

Some were ready and others were curious

All in all a great way to start out our fantastic school year 

Some were not sure of what to think but went with the flow

Others were all ready to go!

It was cold ticklish as wet but we made it through and they all turned out great!

We then began our morning circle where Mr. WeatherFrog made is appearance and was so happy to be dressed for this beautiful first day of school 

We worked on our color of the month the color blue and had a great time singing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and the B-I-B-L-E and Jesus Loves Me. 

We then met another new friend his name is Morris the Monkey and he was happy to join our class

We then read a story about a bear and the New Friend he met

We were hungry and ready to eat 

So we had a yummy treat!

After our snack we colored a picture to help us remember that we are going to be learning about Jesus and God from a special book called the Bible

We worked our fine motor skills with creating with bristle blocks

Coloring is a great fine motor skill and something that will be done every day your child attends school. 

While coloring we are able to talk about the different colors they are using

How many different colors they are using 

We also will work on how they hold their crayon so when the time comes they are able to hold a pencil correctly. 

Coloring is also a great way to show self control by staying inside the lines

We did a great job with coloring the cross and the Bible today

We also will be working on how to work as a group and how it is important to shared and take turns with our friends 

Puzzles are a great problem solving skill that we also will work on in the weeks and months to come.  

Learning to work together will take some time but we are off to an awesome start. 

Some of us worked very hard on coloring our picture

from choosing where to start 

to which color we wanted to use

We then head outside to enjoy this beautiful weather God has graced us with 

The rock pit is a great attraction for the children and this is why it is so important to wear closed toed shoes

We had fun riding on bikes

jumping

and checking out all kinds of new things

We are being adventurous this year in trying to climb!

Or taking a stroll on the worm

No matter what we were doing outside

we had a great time

playing with friends 

and teachers

using our imaginations 

and not being to terribly hot

We enjoyed playing with our new friends if it meant getting dirty

or reaching new heights!

we practiced our counting skills as we counted to one 

We practiced our gluing skills as we glued one blue square on the number one

We had fun making a blue bird 

Gluing is a great fine motor skill as well

We also got to work with blue tissue paper which is something different to work with 

Using glue can also be a sensory activity as some of our students do not like how the glue feels on their hands

It was fun to see how their birds turned out

Some of us had help from our teachers to show us what to do 

and others did a great job all on their own

This class had a blast with Music and Movement 

as we clapped our hands 

stomped our feet 

and turned into different types of animals

Imagination is so important at this age and is highly encouraged in our classroom 

So is having a good time with our friends!

We ended our day with a great time at lunch and a goodbye song to our friend Morris the Monkey and read a book about Duck and his Friends

We could not have asked for a better start to our school year and my prayer that each of my students have a wonderful and happy school year.  Have a great weekend and hope you are able to get out and enjoy the beautiful weather with your family.  God's Blessings to you all!