Hello Parents! We had a wonderful first week! It truly was so great to start to get to know your littles, and I’m excited to learn more. The first week is always a little crazy and hectic as we all get the hang of new routines and schedules. This week was focusing on welcoming the kids to school.
Tuesday was our first day, and it was so great to welcome everyone to our class. We started the day with a first day coloring sheet which we sent home. After a break for bathrooms and dancing in big room, we started with circle time where we began with the Pledge of Allegiance and learning our classroom number. We talked about our classroom jobs, took attendance and learned about our routines. After, we moved to our centers where the kids rotated between four centers. They played with peg boards and rubber bands and used PlayDoh with letter and shape cutouts which are all great fine motor exercises. The kids also matched colors and upper/lowercase letters using a popsicle game. We painted hands for a super cute first day of school handprint craft which was sent home. We ended our day with treasure box! It was a great day!
On to Wednesday! We started the day playing with our classroom toys with our new friends. Every Wednesday we will have Art. The kids enjoyed getting out of the room to use our art area. We did a pencil craft with a lot of steps to follow like writing their name, coloring, cutting and gluing it all together to make a pencil. They are so adorable and are hanging in our hallway. Since we worked so hard on our craft it was time to go outside to the playground. The kids were so exited to play together! While outside with took a few pictures by the big welcome sign. After, it was time for circle time where I had each child come up to the front, and we talked about the All About Me sheets that were sent in. This really makes it easier for the kids to get to know each other. At the end of the day, I read them one of my favorite books, A Letter From Your Teacher, and they got a little gift from me to go home.
We made it to Thursday! The kids started the day with a Our Class is a Family coloring sheet. Today we celebrated Margaret’s birthday! More kids presented their All About Me sheets. In centers today the kids drew a picture of themselves at school and started to trace lines in a pencil control booklet which will be sent home next week. Tracing is a great way to begin to get those fine motor writing skills going. The kids also got to play on the floor with Duplo blocks. At the end of the day we read How Do Dinosaurs Go to School?
I have noticed a couple of things which are normal at this point in the year. If you are able it would be great for the kids to practice writing their names and cutting with scissors. Fine motor skills are one of the things we will be working on a lot. Also in a couple weeks , I will be sending home a dry erase name sheet for practicing at home. And snipping paper is a good way to start working those cutting muscles.
It was an awesome week! Next weeks theme is All About Me. Thank you for sending your littles to us!
See you next week!
Kim