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JANUARY NEWS From Susan and Kathleen's Room: CCP 2 visited Africa in the month of January! We read an alphabet book about Africa called A is for Africa. We made a KWL chart about Africa. We made African masks. We beaded with wooden beads. We made colorful painted paper. We cut it into strips and did some African weaving with it. We talked about the continent of Africa. We looked at several maps and a topographical globe. We also made maps of Africa. We used a key to make different designs that represented items on our maps. We made sand dough. We learned about lions. The female lions do all the hunting for the pride (a family of lions). The male protects the pride and the female raises all the cubs. We made a pride of lions from paper plates and different shapes. The male lions had manes and the females did not. We used two shapes, rhombus and trapezoid, to create colorful patterns on an African shirt. We painted a cardboard box. We collected sticks from the woods. We secured the sticks to the top of the box to create an African hut for our Dramatic Play area. We added L to our big letter gallery. It is a lion. We added Z to our big letter gallery. It is a zebra. We tried plantains, an African food. Most of the children loved them! We made African Mandazi bread. It was delicious! We have enjoyed learning about the culture in Africa and the beauty of the land. We said goodbye to our friends Arianna and Sophia. They have moved. We will miss them very much! Next month, the kids have decided to learn about pets! From Judy and Jodie's Room: CCP 1 January 2012 Newsletter The children had a wonderful time with our theme ìThe Oceanî. Here are some highlights of the past month: We read lots of beautifully illustrated books about the sea and its many creatures. We learned what a compound word was, and took apart many ocean themed words such as seaweed, starfish, seashell, saltwater, seashore, jellyfish, seahorse and more! We added 4 more letters to our BIG letter gallery: W~water, J~jellyfish, O~ocean and X~x-ray. We made ocean animal patterns, and counted & sorted all type of sea creatures. In the Science and Sensory area we made salt dough, did saltwater sink & float experiments, played with different types of sand, weighed shells and used senses besides our sight to guess ocean items in the ìCans of Mysteryî. We learned that æ of the earth is covered with water and only º with land. The kids each made a marbled earth painting to illustrate that fact. We made gorgeous salt watercolor paintings and tissue paper fish. We learned many interesting facts about jellyfish and created unique paper plate renditions of these fascinating creatures that are hanging all over the classroom. We made our own sand by hammering rocks at the woodworking table. We enjoyed playing with puppets from the Springfield Library: a baby seal, a hermit crab and a cool pirate. We all made maps and went on a fun treasure hunt. We took many trips to the Dramatic Play ìSeashoreî complete with beach chairs, towels, a cooler, beach bag, sunscreen, beach balls and all sorts of sand toys! We enjoyed a visit from Mr. Gray, the new principal at CAES! It was a busy month full of fun and learning. Next month our theme will be 'Elephants', and we look forward to BIG fun with that! DECEMBER NEWS From Judy and Jodie's Room: CCP1 ~ Ms. Judy and Ms. Jodie ~December 2011 Our theme this month was 'Cooking Up Some Fun', and we had such a good time playing and learning! We began with a mini unit on Pizza, and then spent a week on Gingerbread and finally a week on Soup. *We wrote a funny class book called "If you Give a Preschooler a Pizza" inspired by Laura Numeroffís many stories. * We added 3 letters to our big letter gallery: V made with vegetable prints, G made with glue, glitter and gumdrops, L made with fingerprint lights. * In the sensory table we played with real pizza dough, mixed up batches of bubbles with wire whisks and old fashioned beaters, and made 'soup' with plastic vegetables and colored, scented water. Rolling pizza dough in the sensory table. * We made a huge paper collage pizza ~ and everyone got to take a giant slice home! * We made our own gingerbread play dough, painted with cinnamon, ginger, clove and nutmeg scented paints, and glued our own faces onto gingerbread cutouts after reading Gingerbread Friends by Jan Brett. *We cooked personal pizzas and gingerbread cupcakes. Personal pizzas. * We made 'stone soup' after reading that story, and invited families in to enjoy it with us for lunch. * We asked each family to submit a favorite recipe and put them together for each student to take home. * We made cookie cutter patterns, and counted gumdrop buttons to put on gingerbread people. * Our dramatic play area was transformed from a pizza place, into a gingerbread bakery and finally into a post office where many packages were wrapped, addressed and shipped all over the classroom! From Susan and Kathleen's Room: In December, CCP2 was 'Cooking Up Some Fun!' We talked about nutrition and played a game about what foods belong in each food group. We painted with scented paint. There were cinnamon, nutmeg and clove scented paints. They smelled delicious. We made corn muffins. They were scrumptious! Many children wanted to make the muffins at home with their families. We also made our own butter for the muffins by shaking heavy cream in a jar until it turned from a liquid (cream) into a solid (butter). It was both fascinating and delicious. The kids added Allspice to the classroom playdough and made it smell delightful. It was fun kneading the spices into it. We added C to our big letter gallery. We voted on whether to make it a cat or a cookie. Cat received more votes.  Our C is a calico cat. We added S also. It is made of snowflakes. We counted chocolate chips for our paper cookies that are hanging in the classroom. We also measured ourselves with gingerbread people to find out how many gingerbread tall we are. We played with oatmeal in our sensory table and old fashioned egg beaters in our water table. We had Vaydaís mom in to make a yummy olive and cream cheese spread with us. Aidenís nana came in to make veggies and hummus with us. We also made latkes and tortilla snowflakes. Gingerbread Fred visited every family. His adventures at each home were written on a special page and put into a book for all to read. We read and compared many gingerbread stories, such as The Gingerbread Boy, The Gingerbread Man, The Gingerbread Girl, The Gingerbread Cowboy, and The Gingerbread Kid. We compiled recipes sent in from our families into a CCP2 Cookbook. The kids said that they would like to learn more about tigers, lions, rhinos, giraffes and zebras. Next month we are excited to "visit" Africa to explore these animals and more!                    NOVEMBER NEWS From Susan and Kathleen's Room: In November, CCP2 learned all about BEARS! We made a KWL chart about bears. We made Textured Black Bears with coffee grounds. We talked about what a great sense of smell bears have and then we played 'Sniff-A-Snack' with our bear noses. We had many interesting responses to sniffing grass, blueberries, honey and tuna fish! We added B to our big letter gallery. It is a black bear. We made Bear Track patterns and made tracking stories with stamps of animal footprints. We made and enjoyed a yummy sleepy bear snack. We learned about Polar Bears. They have black skin and hollow fur. We did an experiment with blubber (We substituted Crisco). We learned how polar bears have a layer of blubber that keeps them warm. We learned about Grizzly Bears. We tried salmon, a grizzly's favorite food! We added G to our big letter gallery. It is grass. We learned about Panda Bears. We made a panda bear sequence. We explored bamboo, a panda's favorite food! We made a class book about where we found Corduroy's button after reading the book by Don Freeman. We used lots of positional words. We did some categorization with real bears and pretend bears. We also categorized omnivores, herbivores and carnivores. We enjoyed a Teddy Bear Breakfast with our families and our Teddy Bears from home!   Next month Gingerbread Fred is coming to visit us for our unit of "Cooking Up Some Fun!" From Judy and Jodie's Room: November 2011 CCP1 ~ FARM The children loved studying farms this past month! We were very busy: playing farmers market and milking our cow in dramatic play. building elaborate farms in the block area. learning numbers with Chicken Little. making tractor tracks in paint and in shaving cream. making corn bread and butter. making and tasting milkshakes. playing with cracked corn in the sensory table. adding the letters B (barn), H (hay and horses), T(tractor) and U (udder) to our BIG letter gallery. visiting the Jersey Girl Farm to meet real cows and chickens! acting out 'Farmer in the Dell'. singing and dancing to 'Farmer's Market'. comparing store-bought eggs to farm fresh eggs. writing a funny class book about where Tillie laid her eggs in our classroom! sorting animals by whether they lived on a farm, off a farm or maybe both. celebrating our full heart jar with pajama day. making lots of cute farm craft Stay tuned to find out if will choose Pizza or  Ocean for our theme next month! (at the Farmer's Market) (making Tractor Track art) OCTOBER NEWS From Susan and Kathleen's Room: In October, CCP2 learned about Community Helpers That Keep Us Safe. Buckle Bear came to talk about Pedestrian Safety. We had Bike Safety Week and participated in the Muscular Dystrophy Trike-a-Thon. Our Dramatic Play Area became a doctorís office and then a school. Dr. Paul, Sophia's dad, came to visit to talk about his job at the hospital. Carly's grandmother brought in one of her therapy dogs. We learned about how therapy dogs help people. The Chester Fire department came to visit and they brought their equipment and their fire truck. Linsey's mom came in to tell us about her job as a nurse. We made yummy traffic light snacks with fruit and graham crackers. We made fire trucks using different shaped paper. We did patterning with different community buildings. We filled our heart jar and celebrated with a long hike in the woods. Thank you so much to all our friends and family that come in to share with us. We had a great time visiting with and learning about all our community helpers and how they keep us safe and healthy! Next month we will be investigating bears from around the world. Bears are amazing creatures and we will be exploring how they live and get ready for winter. From Judy and Jodie's Room: October was a busy month in CCP 1. We were learning about Safety. One week we focused on Pedestrian safety, and had a fun, informative visit from Rick Ethier and Buckle Bear. We learned a bit about bike and trike safety the week we held our Trike-a-Thon. While some kids were riding tricycles to raise money for St. Judeís Childrenís Hospital, others took turns completing a fun obstacle course! October is fire safety month, so we were pleased to have the firefighters visit and teach us how to prevent fires and stay safe incase of a fire! We also learned about personal safety, the difference between safe and unsafe touches, and talked about stranger danger as well. These lessons need to be repeated often for preschoolers, so try to create opportunities to continue the discussions at home. Our room is decorated with ìPedestrian Printsî, autumn leaves, vehicle tracks, and more! Weíve been pounding pumpkins at the woodworking table; estimating, weighing, and measuring apples and pumpkins in the math and science centers. We held an Open House Breakfast for families on October 18. We had a healthy fruit salad, and delicious pumpkin muffins made by the students. Next month, the children have chosen 'Farm' for our learning theme. We look forward to lots of fun with this unit! SEPTEMBER NEWS From Judy and Jodie's Room: Welcome to Chester Community Preschool Room 1!