A Piece of My Heart

Actually, Pizza My Heart! 

We had a couple field trips for the month of Febuary.  The most recent one was Pizza My Heart in Saratoga.  It was so adorable to watch the excitement in their eyes as we put on our "FREE" tshirts.  We discussed how important rules were for safety.  No running, yelling, touching and always listen to our tour guide Kelly.

Kelly shares all about the business of pizza.

Exploring the refrigerator, known as the "walk-in".  Brrrr, it was a cold spot.

My mommy's oven isn't that big!

How does a big pizza look with a smiley face?

We wash our hands before we touch any foods.

Group pizza making.

We color as we patiently wait for our yummy pizza to cook.

Pizza Has Arrived!

After the best pizza tour ever, we go out to the park to run off all the pizza we ate.  We share this fun time with our friends from Tanya's Daycare.  Our bestest of friends.

The spider climb was one of our favorites.

Just before we leave, we go for a walk on the "cat-walk" and get the trucks to beep their really loud horns.  What a great day I had with my friends.

Until our next fieldtrip with PattyKakesKidz.

Wrapping Up the Fairy Gardens

If you've been following our blogs, you will remember the beginning of our fairy gardens.  We started off with a large 3 foot branch, spray painted and mounted on a wood base.  

 

We painted it, and added nests. We also made necklaces with the pictures of our fairies.

We then made toadstools so our fairies would have chairs.

We read stories, watched a movie and named our fairies.  The children all participated in making a fairy poster too.

We wrapped up our garden by making mini take-home gardens with each child. 

We also made our own take-home fairies to live in our gardens.

The children loved this unit study.  They loved making their own personal fairies to take home, which wasn't that difficult to make with this age group.  Now to get creative with another unit with PattyKakesKidz.

Ring Security to Wild Dancer

Someone is taking his job very serious!

Riley patiently waited just shy of a year to be the ring bearer at his aunt's wedding.  He took his job very seriously and was "ring security" during the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner.  Riley decided that he wanted daddy to walk down the aisle with him with mommy right behind as the Maid of Honor.  He was so proud the day of the wedding and got a big round of applause after the ceremony was over.  At the reception, he really let loose and Mild Riley was replaced by Dancing Riley dancing all night long!

 

See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil

Ok, gotcha!  This email is really about our 5 Senses and the fun we had learning about them.

Our week started of with discussions on what we do with particular objects.  We "taste" icecream.  We "touch" furry bunnies.  We "see" beautiful butterflies.  We "hear" drums.  We "smell" stinky skunks.  

This discussion continued for about 20 minutes with full participation from all the children. We then made 3 dimensional faces to enhance our learning.  This included looking at each other's eyes and sharing what eye colors each child had.  We then used glue with colored sand to make our eyes. 

Another fun activity was to "feel" the texture of sand in shaving cream rubbed all over the tables then adding deep water colors to "see" the mixtures blend.  We took the final product and pressed construction paper onto the foam to make beautiful and unique pictures. When dry, we could "feel" the sandy texture.

We explored our world as a whole and one of the favorites was pressing a large shell against our ears to "hear" the airy sounds of our oceans.  This too brought about new discussions.  What lived in this shell?  How come we can hear noises?  Why is it pink?  The questions went on for quite a while.    We also used this week to try new foods to "taste" and we had a table full of flowers to "smell" the beautiful smells.

This was a great week exploring our five senses which brought about so much curiosity about themselves and their world.  Until next week's learning with PattyKakesKidz.

Transportation Week

Sharing about our week dedicated to transportation. 

We started off with a discussion on what "transportation" meant to the children.  While snacking the kids were discussing ways to get around: trains, cars, trucks, boats, planes, helicopters, rockets and more.  The kids were so eager to share what they knew about transportation.  Some shared about airplane trips to Disneyland, long car trips, seeing a firetruck by their home, and wanting to grow up and fly in a rocketship.  

We discovered that different size vehicles needed different types of wheels.  We made tracks then matched pictures of the cars that made the original tracks.   

 

We sought out vehicles in the classroom and raced them all around.

 

We made airplanes to fly around the classroom.

We told felt boards stories.

We made colorful trains.

We read stories related to transportation.  A favorite here is Thomas the Train.




We spent outdoors with sand vehicles.  We worked on worksheets to show which vehicles were smaller or larger. We learned about road signs and what it meant to them.

This all happened even with our big Wednesday field trip to Emma Prush Farm Park, our Monday park days, our Thursday library trips and all the other learning taking place.  We have a busy group here and we all love learning everyday no matter what.  Until next week's learning.  Follow us weekly and learn along with us.

January's Field Trip

Emma Prusch Farm Park

Once again we had an amazing field trip planned for our children.  Chickens, Roosters, Pigs, Farm Cat, Turkeys, Peacocks, Ducks, Geese, Cows, Goats and Sheep.  The kids were screaming so excitedly everytime they turned.  What a great day. See how much fun they had below.

Driving up, the kids were yelling when they saw chickens on the road.  I noticed their intense excitement, so we began taking a couple "posed" pictures before they ran around.

Here chick, chick, chick.  Imagine those words in the cute voices of little children. 
It's amazing how animals and nature will always be the most beautiful form of entertainment for any age.

Get that tractor going guys.  Hang on....

Ducks are so cool too.  Kids were a little apprehensive in feeding them but they finally gained the confidence to attempt a pet.

Please can we have some more quarters to buy more food for the animals? 

 Oh darn, how could I resist.

Hey Teacher Patty, these aren't pigs.  Yes they are, they are potbelly pigs.  Nooooo, pigs are supposed to be pink.  Ah, um, oo,?? Well, pigs are pink when they are babies and as they grow they change colors and get hairy?    

Hey Teacher Patty, did you see those cool cows?  Yes I did, did you?  Yeah ha ha ha.

Come on buddies, we get to head over to the playground now.

Wait, stop for another pose.  Now that's a big barn as you can see compared to our kids.  Also, we were not alone.  We were joined by Miss Tanya's preschool too.  It was so much fun having our friends join us again.

And now, the infamous playground.

A little break for lunch to refuel followed by a good run in the field.   

Until our next field trip with PattyKakesKidz.  Peace everyone from our friends to you.