Hippo Headlines: 2024-01-14

Hello Families,

We ended our "Winter" theme by talking about the much-loved "mitten" books, including a fun book called The Missing Mystery Mitten. We used these books to ask questions, recall information, sequence, predict what would happen and to discuss the feelings of the characters by looking at the pictures. We had many wonderful activities planned for the students that allowed for pretend play, graphing, comparing numbers, drawing, lacing, counting, identifying letters, matching, observing, predicting and painting. Other mitten activities included predicting how many objects such as blocks and would fit in a large mitten and a little mitten and then counting the objects. Our coffee shop continued with order forms, trays, cups, lids and stirrers. The sensory box was filled with beans, coffee cups, marshmallows (white pom poms) and tongs. The students used the tongs to put the beans and marshmallows in the cups.

This week we also learned about cardinal birds. We began by showing pictures of real cardinals and Fredbird, of course. We also learned the red cardinal is a boy and the brown cardinal is a girl. During centers we made a bird feeder for home and tore paper to make a cardinal's nest for our birds on our bulletin board. The students loved making our cardinal bird sing!

During our week we signed in by asking, "Do you wear mittens or gloves?" We counted and compared the numbers. We learned a finger play called MITTENS and spelled the word several times, which worked on letter identification. The hippos also listened to a book in which animals hid in a mitten. They had to guess which animal it was based on a part of each animal (i.e. a tail was sticking out of the mitten and the students guessed it was a mouse). After reading this book, we hid different items in a mitten and gave clues as to what it was. Everyone enjoyed guessing the objects! We later wrote in our journal what we would hide in our mitten. The hippos worked their hand muscles by hanging wet mittens (foam mittens) on a clothesline with clothespins! We continued to work on the letter of the week was B since it was a short week. We showed the students the lowercase b and pointed out how the upper and lowercase looked different. We then showed them an upper and lowercase S. These looked the same except for the size. We went over the sound, thought of items that begin with the B and how to make the letter B. In addition, when getting our jobs during our opening we have been working on learning their addresses.

Other centers included matching letters to a giant mitten on the easel, matching letters to a snowman using clothespins, decorating small snowflakes, practicing positional concepts with a real mitten and a partner, making a snow globe, sequencing the steps of making a snowman, pretending to dry mittens by shaking a box then matching them, using a sit and spin as a pretend dryer spinning the mittens dry, dot painting a mitten, dancing to the Freeze Dance by Jack Hartman, and making matching mitten by using a spoon to paint then folding the paper and opening it to see the matching mittens. During gym we followed several directions such as glide like an ice skater, jump like a ski jumper, stomp your boots in the snow, etc. Afterwards, we had our snowball fight with cotton balls!

Our 2nd Steps lesson involved steps to do when we have uncomfortable feelings. First, we place our hands on our tummy, then say stop. We learned the third thing to do, which is naming the feeling! In addition, we sorted feeling cards based on if they were comfortable feelings or uncomfortable feelings.

All of our learning activities focused on the following learning goals: fine and gross motor, letter and numbers, counting, sequencing, making predictions, building hand strength, name writing, contributing to a group, following 2 step directions, positional concepts, comparing numbers, drawing representational pictures, answering questions about our stories, sensory, safe behaviors, asking to take turns, using language, confident behaviors, voice volume, and respectful and responsible behavior!

Questions to ask your child:
1. What do you do to be generous?
2. What job did you have this week?
3. In The Missing Mystery Mitten book, di they find the mitten in the snow or was it the heart of the snowman? (it was the heart of the snowman, as it melted they could see the missing mitten) Why did the snow man melt?
4. What would you hide in a mitten?
5. What color is the boy cardinal? What color is the girl cardinal?
6. What is your address? (number and street)

Books

The Missing Mystery Mitten

The Mitten

Things To Do At Home:
As mentioned above, we hid a few classroom objects inside a giant mitten, described the object, and asked if students could guess what it was. It would be great practice if you could hide an object and describe it with your child at home. Take turns and have them try and describe what they are hiding.

Next week:

Penguins

Reminders:

Monday, January 22nd-Send in 2 facts about the penguin assigned to your child, picture too

Monday, February 5th -please send in a shoe box for your child to decorate and collect their class valentines at our party. The bags were used last year were too small.

Below are all the pictures of our winter fun!

Practicing writing our names.

We added objects to complete our snowman!

Everyone enjoyed picking up the snowballs with the grabbers.

We sang a letter mitten song in which we listening for our letter.

Snowflake song during music!

Each student got a turn following curves and making high and low
sounds depending on the high and low curves.

Freeze Dance!

How many blocks fit in these mittens?

Drying then matching the mittens/gloves.

Making our bird feeder!

We separated and named comfortable and uncomfortable feeling faces.

Each child tore paper to make our bird nest for our bulletin board!

Mitten dot painting.

The hippos liked decorating their own snowflake.

We practiced positional concepts with mittens/gloves and each other.

Hold your mitten/glove above your friend.

During art we made sculptures with paper, beads,
pipe cleaners and cardboard pieces. Ms. Tara displayed
them on her bulletin board. We will take them home later.