Scarecrows & Feelings

Hi Mom!
It's a new month! November is here and we celebrated by reading Cynthia Rylant's In November, which tells, in a beautiful way, how the earth tucks in all of her friends and loved ones for the cold weather ahead. We discussed what changes we've seen so far here, even though overall we don't get as many as other places do in Autumn time.

This week, to continue our fall topics of study, we met Jessie, Ms. Marianne's scarecrow. Ms. Marianne and her daughter made Jessie last year during her daughter's Fall Celebration at school. Jessie stayed with us for all of our class time this week, and now waves 'hello' on Ms. Marianne's front stoop.

With Jessie as our guest of honor, we talked all about scarecrows- what their purpose is, how they're created and what they do all day. :) In conjunction with this, we discussed our feelings. We shared times that we were scared (getting stiches at the doctor's office, when Mommy went to the hospital to have a baby sister, getting lost) and brainstormed other words that mean being scared (worried, upset, afraid). We talked about other feelings that we have too- Mad, Sad and Happy. We brainstormed other words for those feelings and talked about times when we've been mad, sad and happy in our lives. Most of us shared that we feel happy when we get to play outside with our friends- and most especially when our Moms give us new bikes! :D

To practice matching and remembering, we played a game with cards printed with pictures of scarecrows showing the different emotions we discussed. Taking turns, we found matches in the cards. Interestingly enough, it was a chance to see some emotions come out when some friends who really wanted to 'win' felt upset when they didn't get enough cards to do so. This was a perfect chance to discuss being mad and what we do when we are feeling that way. Everything ended on a happy note. :)

Our letter of the week was Ff (for feelings!). We decorated our Letter of the Week wall with /f/ words (fish, flower, fall, French fries, fan. fruit...) and practiced the /f/ sound. We also used shaving cream ("foam") all over our desks to practice writing Ff and all the other letters we've learned. Ms. Marianne was so impressed that all she had to do was call out a letter and we'd write it. Well, we did need a little help on some of them, but overall, we're improving and she can tell we've really been practicing. The shaving cream was so fun! Some of us were a little hesitant at first, but once we realized we could get messy and it would almost clean itself up, we really went to town writing out letters with our index fingers.

For math time, we rolled dice and copied the dots onto a 9- box paper to help us count, recognize and replicate the number representations on the die. This is a skill (well, many skills really) that will help us to be able to count quickly by recognizing almost immediately how many items are in a picture- in this case, dots. This skill is called subitizing. It will help us in higher grades with visualization, estimation, counting on, and composing numbers from other numbers. It's an important foundational skill for all the math we'll work with later on in life.

 We also worked on patterning again this week. We recognized and extended patterns (AB; ABC and AABB) using a scarecrow worksheet. Ms. Marianne helped us individually chant the pattern and be able to determine what came next. Our class just loves patterns!

Our hand coordination & fine motor skills are getting much better. We took turns with Ms. Marianne this week drawing shapes to fill our papers. It was fun to try and be the last one to draw. When we took our turn, we had to stay as close to her shape drawing as we could so that we didn't take up extra space around it. This activity helps us to practice tracing and replicating shapes in different sizes, and especially helps us to manipulate a writing tool- awesome handwriting, here we come!



Each of us created our own scarecrow heads (complete with "straw"!) for an art project this week. We hung them on the wall in a 'field' that we'll fill next week with Autumn Harvest things. :) We've got to keep those crows away!


Most of you heard us perform "I'm a Little Scarecrow" this week when you came to pick us up from school. It is sung to the tune of "I'm a Little Teapot" and goes like this:

I'm a little scarecrow, stuffed with hay. (pat tummy, like it's stuffed with hay)
Here I stand in the field all day. (arms out, swaying back and forth in the wind)
When the crows come out, they'll hear me shout- (flap arms like a crow)
HEY! You crows, you'd better GET OUT! (cup hands around mouth to shout, then shake finger to the beat / for each word yelled)

Ask me to sing it for you!

Next week will be filled with more fall fun... all leading up to Thanksgiving celebrations! For homework the next few weeks, can we please talk at home about our family's Thanksgiving traditions? What do we do that is unique? What things make the holiday special for us? We'll be talking about these specifically in 2 weeks.

Also, please let Ms. Marianne know if we'll be here for the preschool week of Thanksgiving (Nov. 26-27) because she has a fun, interactive class activity that will require us all to bring something from home to contribute. :)

Love,

Your Child

and

Ms. Marianne