Apples and Applesauce

Daily Question:  Have you ever made applesauce? About half the class has and half have not.

Toys: Apple Memory Game, FP Village, Train Table, and color puzzles.

We found the "A's" in our names!

 

 Fun peeling apples.

 






 
APPLES!

Science:  Do apples float?  Initially, our apples sank to the bottom of the sink (with little water) and many students guessed that an apple would NOT float.  As the water rose, so did the apples!  Apples FLOAT in water!  The principle behind this is that anything that is less dense than water will float and apples contain about 25% air and are less dense that water and so they float--leading to a fun game in the Fall,  Bobbing for Apples.

Applesauce activity: We had so much fun peeling the stickers off our apples; giving them a bath/rinse in hot, soapy, water and then taking turns using an Apple Peeler/Corer/Slicer to help us make our very own applesauce!  An abstract recipe:

 Homemade Apple Sauce

Peel several apples (different varieties make it especially sweet.  Great for older "grumpy" apples).

 Core and slice up the apples.

Place in pot with a shallow layer of boiling water and a pinch of salt.

Turn apples down to a simmer and partially cover.  

Refill water when pan sounds "dry."  

When apples turn somewhat translucent (after 10-15 minutes), take off the heat and allow to cool some.  

Use a potato masher to squish up apples (my children love to help with this) or ladle apples into a blender and gently process.  

When finished to desired consistency, ladle into bowls and top with cinnamon and or cream and enjoy!

Apple Exploration!  What does an apple look like?... taste like?... sound like?...feel like?...smell like?  Today we found out.  We used various words to describe our apples--hard, round, red, green, yellow, sweet, juicy, etc. 

Apple Facts: We learned that another word for apple seed is a pip.  (Lemons seeds are also called pips.)  Also, we cut an apple in half and learned that it hides a star inside.

Johnny Appleseed, Myth or Man?  Man!

John Chapman, often called Johnny Appleseed, was an American pioneer nurseryman who introduced apple trees to large parts of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, including the northern counties of present day West Virginia. Wikipedia

Born: September 26, 1774, Leominster, MA

Died: February 18, 1845, Fort Wayne, IN

Song:  Johnny Appleseed Grace (Song)

(For a link to the music and other verses click on the above underlined song title.) 

Oh, the Lord's been good to me.

And so I thank the Lord

For giving me the things I need:

The sun, the rain and the appleseed;

Oh, the Lord's been good to me.

For the old Disney version, see here.(Click on the link and hear the music)

We had fun with our Show N' Teaches and will get to our A
Finger Painting Activity on Tuesday.

 We learned that A the alligator is angry because ants took his adorable apples, "A a a! Bring me back my apple!" he calls.  Students make their hands into fists and shout "a" with A the alligator.  In the finger painting activity, student made an ant path up the maze to the apple.

Parents, thank you for sending in apples/apple slices with your student.  We had a fun day exploring apples.

Comments:  

• Lukas: "I have an apple tree in my backyard!"
• Lena: "Look--my apple is green and red!"

Show and Teach (The Letter "A"):

• Tanner: Grandma's genuine alligator head
• Anna: A toy alligator
• Lena: A FP airplane and Princess Ariel doll
• Raegan: A "bendy" alligator toy
• Eva: apple puppet
• Harris: Straw hat (A for Amish)
• Ben: Lightning McQueen car (red like an Apple)
• Zakai: Towel with a monkey on it, that had his name "Zakai" on it

Books Read:

Johnny Appleseed: A Poem by Reeve Lindbergh, Paintings by Kathy Kakobsen

Little Apple: A Book of Thanks by Brigitte Weninger and Anne Moller 

Apples Here! Written and illustrated by Will Hubbell

Ten Apples Up on Top by Dr. Suess

Preschool to the Rescue by Judy Sierra and Will Hillenbran

Ten Red Apples by Pat Hutchins (Math Counting, backwards from 10-0)

Celebrating Dads

Mother's and Father's Day

Question of the Day: I do fun things with my Dad? 

Toys: Dolls, Doll cloths, Traffic Rug, Cars, trucks, and airplanes.

Snack: Carrots, animal crackers, and Twizzlers. 

Circle Time: We read What Daddies Do Best and talked about Father's Day coming on the third Sunday in June (19). What do you do with your Dad?
Andi: Daddy plays Ilsa Legos with me.
Carter: One day we played "Tag, You're it!" and "Zombie Hide and Seek" at the Park.
Chloe:I help my Daddy pick out food from the garden.
Daxton: "My Dad teaches me how to do stuff." Like what "stuff?" I asked.  "Like trust in Heavenly Father."
Ella:We play the "Teasing Game."
Luke: Me and my Dad play games when he stays home, if mom is sick, or after his work.
Micah: We play at the Park.

Song:  "My Father is my Favorite Pal", "Mother dear I love you so!"

Today we sang the song My Daddy is My Favorite Pal, and then we did the 'I love you, Daddy! Here's how I will help you!' activity.

We also finished a small picture for our Moms too. 

Chloe said spontaneously,"I love you, Miss Julie!" I told her I loved her and thought about my little friends from preschool a lot.  Daxton piped up," I love you guys!"  That set off a "love fest" among these cuties.

Books:

What Mommies do Best by Laura Numeroff & Lynn Munsinger

My Mother is Mine by Marion Dane Bauer and Peter Elwell

I Love my Mommy Because...Laurel Porter-Gaylord, Ashley Wolff

I Love You, Mom by Iris Hisky Arno and Joan Holub
Just Mommy and Me by Tara Morrow and Katy Bratun 
Because Your Mommy Loves You by Andrew Clements and R.W. Alley
The Night Before Mother's Day by Natasha Wing and Amy Wummer
I'm My Mommy (Golden Book) Jim Henson's Muppet

Father's Day Books:

What Daddies Do Best by Laura Numeroff and Lynn Munsinger

I Love You, Dad by Iris Hisky Arno and Joan Holub

I Shop With My Daddy by Grace Maccarone and Denise Brunkus

A Day With My Dad (Power Phonics) by Larry Baron
I Love You, Daddy by Dandi Mackall and Karen Schmidt
A Day with My Dad (PowerPhonics) by Larry Baron
Because Your Daddy Loves You by Andrew Clements and R.W. Alley
The Secret Father's Day Present by Andrew Clements & Varda Livney
I Shop With My Daddy by Grace Maccarone and Denise Brunkus 
My Father is Taller Than a Tree by Joseph Bruchac and Wendy Halperin 
I'm My Daddy (Golden Book) with Jim Henson's Muppets 

I Know My Shapes!

I Know My Shapes!

Do you know your shapes? 
Shapes review that includes flat and 3D shapes.

Toys: Shape foam blocks, (new) Fish Tank shapes sorter, FP Village, Skee-Ball, Tinker Toys

Snack: Olives, carrots, and alphabet cookies. (Vegetables and fruits have fun shapes to talk about.)


Circle Time discussion began at snack time. We had fun looking at pictures of fruits, vegetables, and crackers and guessing their shapes.  We talked about fruit like strawberries (cut sideways=hearts), starfruit (star shape--showed picture. Taste is tangy like citrus but sweeter), melons and bananas (cut=crescent shape), plums, oranges, apples, apricots, peaches (circle shapes), avocado (this was a new vegetable/fruit for some) was an oval, etc.

We watched a short DVD clip (3 minutes) by Baby Einstein called, "I Know my Shapes!" about a box of crayons who are drawn into shapes and form a clown.

We enjoyed reading and learning about shapes and became "Shape Hunters!" discovering shapes all around our classroom: the round clock, the rectangular lights, the square books, the rectangular bathroom door, etc.
We also talked about octagon, sounding like octopus, is a shape that has eight sides.  A hexagon has six sides.  A pentagon has five sides. A circle is a continuous side with only one side.

Shape Games (and fun assessment): Cranium Hullabaloo. In this clever and fun game put to music, students must listen for directions to lead them to a "cranium pad" of a certain shape, color, or with an animal, food, or instrument on it. Kids are having so much fun moving and listening--they don't know they are learning as well.

Extension Activity: Why not go on a shapes hunt around your house or neighborhood? You could say..."I spy with my little eye" or be Shape Detectives. Homes have rectangular doors, magazines, books and bricks. Windows are often square. Trampolines, bowls, frames can be circular. Some roof tops and gables can be triangular. You get the idea--have fun learning and talking about shapes!

Shape Books:
Fun with Colors and Shapes (World Book)
My First Book of Shapes (Baby Einstein ) by Julie Aigner-Clark, Ill. by Nadeem Zaidi
Colors and Shapes (Let's Look, DK) Essential Preschool Learning
Baby See-a-Shape Shapes by Mark Tattam (Make Believe Ideas Limited)
Making Shapes: A Very First Math Book Ill. by Jo Moon *finger traceable shape tracks
The Silly Story of Goldie Locks and the Three Squares (Hello, Math lvl. 2) by Grace Maccarone, Ill. by Anne Kennedy. Math Activities by Marilyn

Parents for Free Shape Printables and Flash Cards click here: TLSBooks

Parents: FYI State Kindergarten Core changed in 2013.  The Kindergarten entrance exam now asks children to identify Geometric shapes that include 2D shapes (circle, oval, triangle, star, rectangle, square, pentagon, hexagon, and ocatagon) in addition to 3D shapes: sphere, cylinder, cone, cube, and rectangular prism.

The Same or Opposite

The Same or Different? Opposites

Do you know your opposites? 

Toys:  Opposite Puzzles, Buck-a-Roo, and ABSeas Games. 

Snack: Carrots, Raisins, Dried Mango, and Alphabet cookies.

Circle Time: 
We discussed our question of the day and presented it on a math graph.

Math-Graph.... it was pretty split yes and no, with 4 "No"s and 3 "Yes"s. But when we asked the class if they could tell me what an opposite was, most did not know. 
  -Luke gave a fun response! "When something is different and something is the same."
  -Eva gave us some examples: "Yes and No. Open and Close."

An opposite is something completely different from another thing.

A person or thing that is totally different from or the reverse of someone or something else.

We had fun talking about opposites--
city/country, wet/dry, front/back, sitting/standing, winter/summer, coming/going, clean/dirty, in/out, whole/smashed, top/bottom.

We watched Harry The Dirty Dog (Scholastic, DVD)
-We found some opposites in the movie! Harry was a white dog with black spots. He was dirty, then he was clean.

My Opposites Game:  

 

Inside Recess:  It was a rainy day! 

After recess, we read Exactly The Opposite by Tana Hoban. This helped our class to better understand what opposites are.

Show and Teach!

This week we had a lot of toys. We had fun talking about what an opposite would be. 

We used Chloe's stuffed animals to talk about things that were "the same" and things that were "different" and "opposite."

Daxton showed us his Transformer who went from a "man to a tank."  A toy which mutates from one thing to another. Quite different or opposite! 

Spring Break next week! No School Tuesday or Thursday. (See you on April 12, tuition due). 

We decorated and took home baby chick cookies to celebrate Spring!

Books on Opposites:
Black? White! Day? Night!; A Book of Opposites by Laura Seeger
Opposites (First Concepts) by Melanie Whittington 
What's Opposite? by Stephen R. Swinburne 
Earth, Sky, Wet, Dry; A Book of Nature Opposites by Durga Bernhard 
The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss
Go Dog Go by P.D. Eastman
The Opposites by Monique Felix 
Exactly The Opposite by Tana Hoban
Is it Rough? Is it Smooth?  Is it Shiny? by Tana Hoban
Opposites by George Siede and Donna Preis
Tops & Bottoms (Audio) by Janet Stevens

Vowels and Consonants

Do you know what a vowel is?  Most of the students wrote their names under "yes" but my guess is that they didn't and learned today about what a vowel is.

Toys: FP Village, Race cars, and Doorbell house.(Others include:ABSeas, letter magnets, ABC puzzles, and Lace-up Shoes.) 

Snack: Carrots, Saltines, and fruit snacks. At snack time, we read two fun stories to celebrate the start of Spring! "Swing High, Swing Low" by Fiona Coward, and "I am Water" by Jean Marzollo. 

Circle Time:

We showed clip from Leappad Talking Words Factory DVD on vowels and consonants.  "Vowels are the glue (letters) that stick the words (consonants) together!" Consonants are the non-vowel letters: A consonant is a speech sound that is not a vowel. It also refers to letters of the alphabet that represent those sounds: Z, B, T, G, and H are all consonants.

My Vowels:

We recognized that each child had a vowel in their name. We went through and found the vowels in everyone's names.


My Vowels Song:
We shouted Aa, Ee, Ii, Oo, Uu, and then whispered (sometimes Yy).  

 
Vowel Egg Hunt: 

After learning about vowels, we had a fun activity to see if we could separate our vowels from consonants! On the back of laminated Easter eggs, was written either a red vowel, or a black consonant. They were laid out on the floor and stairs outside our preschool room. One at a time, each child went out to find an egg, bring it back, show it to the class, and either sort it into our vowel basket or consonant basket. After each child had gone once, we all went out to find as many as we could to bring them back and sort them. It was a lot of fun! 

 

Inside recess since it was a rainy day!

Signs of Spring:
After recess, we mentioned how yesterday was the first day of Spring! We talked about how Spring is one of the four seasons, and then discussed as a class what were some signs of Springtime. Eva said, "We can hear the birds outside!" Luke said, "It starts to get warm for us to play!" Ella talked about how in Spring, the trees and flowers grow! 
 

Songs: 
Popcorn Popping (using empty water bottles in socks.)

Speaking of trees and sounds we can hear in Spring, we passed out our popcorn socks! The students explored the sounds they could make with their socks and guessed what was inside! They correctly guessed water bottles. Then, we used our popcorn socks to help us with our song "Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree."

Easter Egg Decorating:

In honor of Easter, we used many different colored crayons to decorate a fun Easter egg worksheet to take home!