Our schedule and the Feelings Theme week

We fill up our days with the regular events such as meals, snacks, nap, chores, outings and free play... but we also participate in about 6 activity periods that last anywhere from 2-3 minutes to as long as 30 or 60 minutes. Those activity periods consist of reading, learning, exploring, creating, moving and playing. Here's a sample of what we did today:

Reading time: We focused on three books about animals who live in different habitats, a zoo, the ocean and a farm. Each book consisted of a story that used rhyming as it's literary focus. We had to end story time with his current favorite though, Cruizer the Police Car Saves the Day (the book makes an actual siren sound! he almost bursts with excitement waiting for the part where it says "Cruizer sounds his siren"!).Learning time: We focused on counting today. We used our favorite colored counting bear cups (best $3 I've spent at Walmart :)) and talked about how many bears were in each cup and then added and subtracted them. We also counted Cheerios at breakfast and placed them in and out of the back of his favorite pickup truck matchbox car (at least his favorite for today). We also worked on counting using our fingers and did a numbers puzzle. Then we refreshed our memories on last week's theme of Who am I which included learning how to introduce ourselves, say where we live (LOVE the way he says Altus, Oklahoma!!!) and shake hands saying "so nice to meet you" and "how do you do". We practiced with puppets, which he loves. He made sure to help the puppets answer by adding, "you good Dudley?" (Dudley is a dragon puppet, a favorite for sure). Then of course, it quickly evolved into, "you need truck Dudley?" After a long break to play trucks, we resumed with this week's learning theme, feelings. We talked about the different faces we make depending on how we feel. Here is our feelings photo shoot :)

Happy Face

Angry Face

My favorite, the Surprised Face

Mommy with a Sad Face

And here's the I've Had Enough Face :)

Creating time included a little instrument playing and a very enthusiastic hokey pokey dance with his beloved Ella and her very fun mommy Miss Julie!

Exploring time: We played with hula hoops! Rolling them, jumping in and out of them, shaking them and of course trying to actually hula which resulting in much giggling.

Moving time: We raced up and down the halls (due to a rainstorm), splashed in puddles (after the rainstorm) and there was a very rowdy and rambunctious wrestling match with daddy!

Play time: We used our fire trucks to rescue the little people family from a fire in the doll house. We raced cars and we made a new track configuration for his wooden trains.

Today was a very full day... but I would be remiss not to mention those days that we throw the whole lesson plan out the window, somehow don't even manage to get fully dressed and just hide under a blanket from the bear on daddy's bear lamp while eating grapes and cheesy bunny crackers!

love,

The curriculum planner