Farewell to Fall

Fall in the Bananas

I'm not sure how, but November is nearly over and we are barreling ahead into December and the end of 2023! My apologies for not updating our blog earlier, but we've been so busy learning and having fun! 

Through October and November we learned so much about fall; about the things we see, hear, taste, touch and smell as the weather gets cooler. During our apple unit we did painted with apples, learned about the apple life cycle, and even made homemade applesauce. While everyone agreed it smelled amazing, not everyone liked it! 

After learning all we could about apples, we moved onto learning about leaves! We talked about the different colors of leaves, the different shapes and sizes, and why they change colors during the fall. The students were given rakes and the ability to rake up the leaves while they were playing outside.

The following week we learned about pumpkins! Again we talked about the pumpkin life cycle and how pumpkins grow in a pumpkin patch. We got to reinforce this learning at the farm when the students got to pick their own pumpkins! We painted pumpkins, found out what was inside a pumpkin, and even used golf tees and hammers for a fun fine motor activity. 

We wrapped up our fall learning by talking about scarecrows. We talked about the job of a scarecrow, their parts, and why we see scarecrows in the fall. Students made shape scarecrows and in math they rolled dice until they built their own scarecrow

All of this fall fun brought us all the way to Thanksgiving! We talked about what it means to be thankful and drew pictures of what we are thankful for. We made pumpkin pie in a cup. Our students were brave and tried it, but not very many of them liked it. On Tuesday, the students LOVED making the turkey hats and I hope you got as much of a kick out of them as we did! And let me take a moment to tell you how thankful I am for all of you. Jumping back into the world of early childhood has been such a joy for me and I have loved getting to know each and every child and their families. I have seen these students work so hard the last three months and I know they are going to continue to grow and learn. Thank you for sharing your child with us and allowing us to laugh and play with them every day. 

We are now exploring our bread study. I thought this was an appropriate time to introduce this topic because of all the baking and treats that we see this time of year. We have talked about different kinds of breads from different parts of the world, such as tortillas, naan, and baguettes. This week we are talking about how bread is made and at the end of the week we will try making a kind of bread on our own. We are learning terms like recipe, ingredients, tablespoons, cups, and so much more. 

We have set up our dramatic play area to be a bakery where the students can practice making goodies for one another. This has quickly become a favorite center and they are loving coming up with their own recipes. 

On the weeks that we are here at least 4 days, we are learning new letters in Letterland. Please continue to work on letter names and letter sounds with your children at home. I have attached links to videos for the letters we have learned since the last blog post. 

            Okay, I think that's all the updates for now! As we move forward we will also begin talking about holidays around the world. If your family has a special tradition and want to share it with the class, we would love to have you or a special family member come in and share it with the class. One of the things I love most about working in Wake County is the diversity and I love how much we can learn from each other. 

As always, please let me know if you have any questions about what we are learning or how we can best help your child succeed both at school and at home. 😊