Dear Toddler Parents, 

Continuing our study of North America, the Toddlers engaged in wonderful group discussions of popular land masses and oceans. Children viewed pictures of the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Ocean.  We explained what an ocean is and Ava Malick-Rich raised her hand and said, "An ocean is a big swimming pool." Everyone laughed.  We also asked the children to tell us if they could see any differences in the two? Maxx Johnston replied, "The Pacific Ocean is dirty."

 

During the days that followed, we viewed pictures of rivers and lakes and continued our discussions. The ones we focused on were the Mississippi River and Lake Michigan. The children learned that the river's water speed varies from the depending on where the flow is located. We also learned about how many different rivers and streams flow through the huge Lake Michigan.

As we said good-bye to North America and hello to Antarctica (burr), the children learned about the coldest continent. Children enjoyed the ice cube sensory table with blue sprinkles on top. Large travel movement using a big plastic bucket to collect ice was a delight work for this cultural unit. Using blueberry and lemon Jello, cream cheese and cool whip, the children created two different icebergs similar to the ones found in Antarctica.

The students have been reviewing their knowledge of the previous month's numbers 0 through 26 and we also introduced the numbers 27, 28, and 29. Art has been so much fun as we create cupcake liner igloos, snowflakes made out of tree branches, and food art penguins. Yum!

The students explored the science concept of how liquids moved by capillary action when they made color climbing bridges using plastic cups, color tablets, dropper, water, paper towel and newspaper. We introduced the green colored cylinder and introduced the color box 2. These Sensorial works, along with the new 'pattern puzzle' helps to develop fine motor skills, problem solving and creative thinking.

The children have been learning about the letter sounds I, f, b and o. Most children are still practicing writing their name by using their name cards and tracing paper. Other children are writing their names free hand using pencil and paper or chalk with a chalk board. The Toddlers are continuing to enhance their fine motor skills by using varies shaped knobbed puzzles of animals and fruits.

Cooking is so much fun and we don't care if we make a mess because we know how to clean up! Children prepared and made banana orange smoothies this last month. Unfortunately, this was the least favorite among all of our cooking projects thus far. The cutting, mixing and scooping part was exciting but everyone threw out their smoothies and Gia Eloi said, "I want the smoothies that my mommy makes." I guess we need to perfect our recipe.

We would like to send a big thank you out to Justin Rich for donating balls for our play yard and to Jeana Malick, Kurt del Rosario, Jamila Dugan, and Grandma Stockwell for donating ingredients for our many cooking projects. We would also like to thank Kurt del Rosario, Jeana Malick and Jamila Dugan for taking on the task of cleaning our dirty laundry and Jeannie Bellaci for donating new work rugs to our classroom and Jeana Malick for donating a cart, dishes and a basins for our lunchtime set-up.

Thank you all for your help during Harvest Meal and for wonderful attendance at our Winterfest Performance and Cookie Exchange.