It's time to garden!

Today we began to till the earth and prepare our garden for planting! We have a small space at the back of our school where we can plant some seeds and watch the fruits of our labour grow!

I can't wait to see what manages to flourish, so that we can have a feast for our eyes and our tummies. Last year we had some great flowers and got to munch on some beans!

Update:

The seeds went in today and we watered them with our new watering cans!

What the??

Sometimes I simply love putting something new in the classroom with out explanation, and have the tots figure out what to do with that object!
I have had this "Bilibo" for a few years and it always confounds the tots. It's a rocker - chair - bowl, whatever the tots can imagine. It also comes in a small hand held version for what ever you wish it to be!

At first the tots just stood around the Bilibo - not sure what to make of it.

Then one brave tot took a seat!

The rockin' and rollin' began!

This became a fun experience to repeat again and again!

Yup it's a keeper!

This is a great toy for gross motor movement.

 It takes a lot of muscle coordination to get this thing going in a fluid manner.

It's durable - hard plastic, that can be used indoors or outdoors - a plus!

Peanut Balls and Scooter Boards

Peanut Balls and Scooter Boards Oh my! We had such great fun today - if I had kept these out all day we would NOT have gotten bored. In fact we had them out most of the morning and then later in the afternoon and the smiles and shrieks of laughter consumed the room. I would have to say this was a very good choice to include in my toddler program.

  

Find this great equipment here!

 

Fun to share!

 

                        How does this work?            Oh we get it!

 

Each and every one of the toddlers could manipulate and enjoy this equipment to the fullest!

 

I am sure the more we use this, there will be more skill building - muscle strengthening and joy!

 Peanut Balls & Scooter Boards            

         

Speed Racers

In my classroom I have a lot of boys - boys with tons of energy. No matter how much we move, they want to move some more. We even play hockey inside our classroom! Dues to this, I ended up buying mini hockey sticks with sponge balls and we took the hockey game to the gym.

We also made sure the girls got involved.

There is no lack of gross motor movement in our day. We even get up during our circle activities while we are teaching things like the ABC's, to 'shake our sillies out'. All this on top of our daily outdoor recess times.

So again - no matter how much we move, they want to move some more!

Which leads us to the new daily activity which the boys spontaneously get involved in. They race around the room as fast as they can - pushing the cars and trucks available on our toy shelf.

I get a little nervous when they do this - there have been some face planting moments - but I don't want to be a total party pooper and tell them to stop all together, so I simply ask them to slow down.

They go so fast it was even hard to take these pictures!

                                                                                       So they haven't really slowed down at all!

                                                 Yikes! 

Beanbag fun!

So we pushed back the tables and chairs and broke out the beanbags - it was another rainy day! So we tossed them - caught them - balanced them - and walked with them on our head and shoulders! You name it we had loads of beanbag fun!

Opps - where did that beanbag go?

Love the seriousness of the face! LOL

I can balance it on my head!

We can too!

Look I can do it on my shoulder!

Weeee!

BTW our beanbags were sewn by my class partner from material I got for $1 at a garage sale and I filled them with polyplastic beads for stuffed doll making that I had on hand! They are about 4.5 inches square.

Little bears prepare for winter!

Today we made bear masks - then played a game with them.

Forgive me I have lost the link for the image but I have added another below - if you know who's it is can you please link up in the comments below!

Here we are creeping through the woods foraging for food!

Our tummies are full - we are laying down for a long winter nap!

These were just plain fun to play with!

I see you!!

There is a printable mask here: animal jr

Hibernation links for you to enjoy!

http://www.atozkidsstuff.com/hibernation.html

http://stepbystepcc.com/hibernation.html

http://www.preschoolplaybook.com/2009/01/hibernating-bear.html

http://www.everythingpreschool.com/themes/hibernation/

http://www.theteachersguide.com/hibernation.htm

http://www.preschool-plan-it.com/hibernation.html

http://www.kidssoup.com/Animals-Winter/animals-in-winter.html

http://mrsjonesroom.com/themes/hibernation.html

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/nature/bear-essentials-of-hibernation.html

http://www.bry-backmanor.org/actpag24.html

http://lilteacher.com/hibernation.html