A Pet-Filled Wednesday With The Fours

Being that it is pet week we had some surprises for the kids.

First, we introduced them to the Class Pet ... Ollie. He is a mouse. A fancy mouse to be exact. Boy is he ever cute ... but stinky. They all were so excited to meet him. I think he was happy to see them, too. Mrs. Eastman carried him around and let the kids see his sweet face (she's not a huge mouse/rat fan so this was big time!). We briefly discussed how to care for him and why that is important (food, shelter, etc. ... great social studies lesson).

Also, we surprised the kids by making some people-edible puppy chow at the end of the day. Everyone got to take a little bit home after mixing and tasting. Earlier in the day, we did a matching game of sorts with real, live dog bones. I think a few kids thought maybe they were people treats and not dog treats cuz they asked if they could eat some! Incidentally, the kids did great at matching their dog bones with the card they had (pictures of dog bones arranged in different ways). This is a super math lesson in that the kids must focus on various attributes (color, arrangement, etc.) to create the "set-up" on their own.

The kids got to visit with our Music Lady (Grandma Becky) today. She is quite the acclaimed musician/teacher in our area. She works with many famous Columbus musicians to create music, etc. She teaches at our school as well as some others. Her name is Becky Ogden. You might want to google search her to learn more about our Music Lady. The kids stay very entertained when she comes. Today, she let them play with various instruments (drums, shakers, and xylophones).

Our sight word this week is "he". The kids listened to our "He Song". It's very cute. If you all would like a copy of our sight word songs to sing at home, bring in a blank cd and put your child's name on it and Mrs. Sapp will copy for you. They are fun and the kids only get to hear them several times a week then we move on to the next one.

We made a fun little "pet book" (accordian style). The kids got to color, cut and paste. All did very well. These should have come home with you today.

Our number of the day was three. Our helper got to "work the number machine" and then we all selected that number of wooden cube blocks and made a tower. We do this to help them with number identification as well as one-to-one correspondence. And, speaking of math, you should have also gotten a note from your teachers about spatial relationships (which is what we have been focusing on thus far). Next month we will talk "classification".

Have a nice Thursday off!