"You Really Should Clean This Ear!" (some new freebies too)

Ask a bunch of four year olds if they've ever been to the doctor and you will be entertained with wonderful stories and anecdotes about what "goes down" during such a visit.

Today we talked about doctors, and about experiences that we have had while visiting our doctors.

I loved the discussion and everything the children had to share, but for them, the most exciting part of the day was the opportunity to put on the nurse and doctor apparel, and play the part of such a care giver.

There wasn't enough time in the day to accommodate everyone's desire to play with the newly introduced doctor's kit.  I had to assure several worried students that the doctor's kit would in fact stay in our room for a while, and that they would get an opportunity to play with it at some point.

I had a hoot watching them interact and get completely absorbed in the imaginative play.  They had such a wonderful time. 

(The EA and I may have shared several laughs together while watching them.)

The funniest thing I overheard today was from one of the JK doctors as they were performing an examination of one of their patients. 

"You should really clean this ear......it's hard for me to see in it!!"

To accompany our "healthy me" theme, I added some themed activities to our math and literacy centres.  The following is a great hands-on literacy and fine motor activity which I made to give the children an opportunity to do some letter matching while forming words we've been learning about during our theme time.  

You can find these letter tile cards {here} or {here}.

The words are built using letter tiles.  

The new letter tiles have been added to our class as a result of credit earned through Scholastic orders.  I love getting "free" stuff!  

(You know you're dutch when......)

Newly posted to my stores is a collection of my ABC flashcards.  All the themed flashcards are in one handy pack.  The themed flashcards go along with the free ABC highlighting pages that you can also find in the free stuff collection.  They are great for whole class activities, small literacy groups or individual practice.  The kids love the different seasonal themes.......it makes ABC practice just a little more interesting.  Set includes Fall/Halloween, Teddy Bears, Christmas, Winter, Valentine/Monster, and The Mitten.

You can find this pack {here} or {here}.

New freebies available:  Winter Alphabet ABC Highlighting page......

Freebie available {here} or {here}.

AND

a multi-use pattern colouring handout.

Find this freebie {here} and {here}.

For anyone interested, I am throwing a FEBRUARY BLAAH'S STORE WIDE SALE at both my TPT store and Teacher's Notebook store right now!!!  Nothing takes away the blaah's like some new teaching material! :)  

Teddy Bear Picnic & Valentine Time

What a great day!!!

We FINALLY went on our teddy bear picnic class trip.  

(This was the trip that was originally planned for the end of November, on MY birthday. Unfortunately, I came down with the most NASTY and violent stomach flu that I spent that day in bed and had to postpone the trip. We were all so disappointed and some life lessons were learned that day.  We might make plans, but God is in control. He directs our ways and our times are in His hands.)

Today was adventure day!

We went to the Whitehern Historic House & Gardens, in Hamilton, to enjoy their teddy bear picnic program.

First, let me just say that we have THE best EA ever, because not only is she our EA......she also DRIVES A BUS!  

Mrs. VanderWier braved the narrow streets of Hamilton and delivered us safely to our destination.

  

We were greeted by our friendly hosts who then spent the next couple hours keeping us busy and entertained.  

We had a wonderful tour of the historic home, while "eye-spying" for all the hidden teddy bears.

We acted out a very creative "Goldilocks and the Three Bears" story, made a tan-gram bear puzzle, and also a bear craft to take home.  

In between all of that we enjoyed some snacks and a lunch break. 

A special thank-you to Whitehern for hosting us, and to the great dads and mom who came along with us.  Thank you also to our great EA's, Christine (who doubles as a bus driver) and Christine.

(Yes, they have the same name.)

Our host Nonni.
We peppered her with questions.

 

The bears were everywhere!

Papa Bear, Mama Bear, and Baby Bear

The musician in me was itching to touch this!!!

 

Tennis anyone?!?

 

We arrived back at the school just in time for recess, so after our long bus ride we had some run around time!

Next came quiet time, (someone may have fallen asleep today), library time, and just when you thought the day couldn't get any better, we also had our Valentine's party.  

We decorated bags to hold our Valentines, and had a great time sharing and handing out our Valentines and treats.  

One of our wonderful moms made us JELLO with whipped cream to enjoy, and then we had a short "center-time".  I can't believe we squeezed all that fun and excitement in before the buses arrived to take us home.

I thank the LORD for a wonderful day spent with some wonderful little people.

Is it bed time yet?!?

This teacher is going to sleep like a baby tonight......

Where Does Love Come From?

It is Valentine's week, and it's a short one when you throw in a PD day!

We have been trying to pack in as much learning as we can during this quick month....where is it going?!?

We've kept busy with a variety of Valentine themed math and literacy activities, some of which you can find in my TPT store or my Teacher's Notebook shop.

These are just a few pics of some of the activities we have been doing.  We are also busy hunting for letters, writing the room and playing several number games.  There's really never a dull moment in our class, except maybe when we "try" to have a quiet time.

Okay, if I'm going to be honest, quiet time is not dull.  

It is also usually eventful......

......we have serious issues with resting......

Clip-a-pattern

Count & Clip

Letter sorting

Pattern colouring

Trace-Stamp-Decorate

ABC Highlighting

Number ordering & Tower building

Along with all the Valentine fun, we have also been making beautiful music together, with our class instruments and our "home-made" instruments.  What a blast!!!  The kids brought in some amazing creative music makers, and enjoyed showing them off and playing them for their classmates.  Great fun to go along with our Symphony of Sound unit.

If you want to see a short video clip of us making music together, check our Mrs. Schenk's JK Adventures Facebook page.  You can't beat music from the mouths of babes!!!

We make beautiful music & Praise the Lord together!

I absolutely love teaching in a Christian school. 

I love being able to share the love of Jesus openly with the students I teach.  

I love teaching them where love comes from......God!

What a joy to be able to share His love with others.

Have a blessed Valentine's Day everyone!

Now that the Valentine's are made and the blog is updated, I need to go get some rest.  

I seem to be plagued with sickness this winter, 

and I need to be healthy for our class trip tomorrow!  Aaaaahhhhhh!!!

Time to cuddle under a blanket and get rid of this wicked fever & headache.  :'(

Mitten Time

Winter is upon us, and we have been having a wonderful time enjoying this season!  

It might take us a little longer to get dressed for recess, but we are thankful when God sends us some snow to play in.  In light of our winter theme, we read a couple winter themed Jan Brett books: "The Mitten" and "The Hat".  Last week, we made a cooperative class book.  Everyone drew a picture of something they would like to have in their mitten.  The caption read as follows, "My mitten is so big a __________ can fit in it!" 

 The book has been added to our class library.  The children love reading all the books we have made together as a class!

You can find this freebie {here} or {here}.

This mittens letter-search handout is a review of some of the jolly phonics letters that we have covered so far this year.  

You can find this freebie {here} or {here}

We are focusing on the numbers 1-5 this month, so I created a few new math centre activites.  This one is a "ten-frame" activitiy that involves cutting and pasting snowflakes on to a ten frame.  (I am amazed at how the students' scissor skills have improved in the last few months.) 

If you're interested in this activity, you can find it {here} or {here}.

This is another abc winter highlighting page that can be used with the Mitten flashcards.  Place the cards in the centre of the table, upside down.  The children take turns picking a flashcard, identifying the letter of the alphabet, and then they highlight the corresponding letter on the page.  They take turns until all of the flashcards are used.  (Another option: have all the children highlight every letter that gets pulled).

Find this activity {here} or {here}.

God's Little Helpers

This week in Bible, we have been learning about the young boy Samuel.  This afternoon we talked about how God uses even little people to do work for Him.  We talked about how we can show God that we love Him by loving others AND we can also show others we love them by helping them!

As a follow-up activity to our Bible story, we made another class book together.  First, we had a brainstorming session to come up with a wonderful list of activities that we can do to help those around us.  Next, everyone drew a picture of how they could be a helper in their own special way.

Here are just a few fun pages from our book...