Our classroom is stitched together with love!

Every year near the beginning of the school year, I ask the families of my students to work together to make a family project with pictures of loved ones to help provide a home school connection. I keep them displayed all year so the child can look at the pictures anytime. Last year, we sent home a file folder cut into the shape of a t shirt and hung them on hangers from the ceiling.

You can see more of them here in the post, "I Like Me!".

This year, I sent home a piece of scrapbook paper and asked them to add photos and decorate the page as a family. For now, I've hung them on a bulletin board to resemble a quilt, with the caption, "Our classroom is stitched together with love!". (Thanks to all who sent in caption suggestions on Facebook!) We still have a few more to be sent in before our quilt is complete, but it's looking pretty good so far. We'll leave this up for a couple of weeks, but when we're ready to change the bulletin board, we'll place each square somewhere around the classroom, so the children can see them all year. Just like many of us have pictures of our families on/near our desks, children want to see pictures of themselves and their family.  It gives them a sense of both security and belonging. It's important for little ones to have that connection.

Do you have a way of helping the children make that connection while they are at school? I'd love for you to share it in the comments!

I Like ME!

 

A couple of weeks ago, was our  "All About Me" week. This is a unit that I usually spend 2 full weeks on, but in order to fit a few units that the children would like included this year, I pared this unit down to one week. That said, I didn't get to do a lot of the fun activities that I usually do, but we managed to pack a lot of fun into one week.

My assistant recently went to training and brought back this really cool idea she saw and we had to implement it. As a means to foster a home/school connection, we sent home a file folder cut into a t shirt shape and asked that they decorate it as a family to represent things important to the child.

These came out so much better than I could have imagined.

  

Many of them included photos of family members and pictures of things they like.

 We are going to showcase one each day and the children can take a minute to describe the meaning of the things on his/her t shirt. They will probably hang in our room all year so the children can see them whenever they want.

As an effort to get students to try new friendships, we asked them to pair up with someone they don't usually tend to play with and have that partner for the morning. They played games, and sat with each other and helped each other when needed. We made a friendship chart story.

We talked about similarities and differences between girls and boys and graphed our gender.

In small groups, we made paper bag puppets of ourselves. I always love the tones the children choose to represent themselves. I always encourage the children to compare the multicultural materials to their own skin and hair, but inevitably, they often choose whatever they want. As long as they are using language and telling me they have a reason for choosing a particular shade, I let them use what they wish.

We talked a lot about the things we can do. The children are accomplishing a lot that just, a few weeks ago, they weren't able to do. Even I was amazed at the cutting this friend did. Boy, was he proud!

They are surprised and proud as they become independent. Even managing to put their own sheet on the mat or putting the nap mat away is reason to be proud!

 

We made an "I Can" chart story.

We made fingerprints using pencil lead and packing tape. We made a fingerprint box that the children can use to store their fingerprint cards and examine them with the classroom microscope. It's been a sure way to get the kids exploring in Science Center! They love exploring with the microscope.

 

We did many of the old standards for this unit, like the Hokey Pokey, Tony Chestnut, Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes, measuring our height and weight. We talked about our body parts and had "Freaky Feet" day. I wish the pictures I took of the feet came out, but sometimes we're just having too much fun for the camera to catch it all!

We also read some great books. The Amazon carousel widget I usually use is acting wonky, so I'll try again to add them later, but for now, here are a few titles we enjoyed

     

       

     


     


     

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