In concert with “senses” week, the children used “smelly” markers at the writing center to practice their writing skills.  Paper and small booklets were available for children to practice making letters, words, sentences, or simply pre-letter marks.  Coming up, “Write Stuff”, a game for playing with writing will be available at the writing center.  Write-on/wipe-off activity cards introduce ready writers to letter formation.  The activity cards show the children how to make certain shapes before progressing to actual letters.

The children began this month making “junk art collages”.  A variety of materials were available including assorted paper scraps, buttons, stickers, foam cut-outs, craft sticks, and wooden spools.  The children enjoyed using glue and a white paper base to make their own unique designs.  This promoted great conversation as they worked on their masterpieces.  Last week the children thoroughly enjoyed working with shaving cream.  They spread shaving cream on the table and mixed in purple, pink, teal and blue liquid water color with their fingers (we love to exercise those fine motor muscles!).  Once they had finished working with the cream, they placed a piece of white paper on top to make a print of their creation appear (sea, trees, waves, etc.).  This week, to go along with our “nutrition” theme, the children will be making prints using paint and an assortment of colorful fruits and vegetables.

Working with paint is always a delightful way to exercise creativity, and the children had lots of fun working on a flat horizontal surface, using small textured foam rollers to apply black and white paint to large sheets of white paper.  Water colors were also available at an easel for those who preferred to work on a vertical surface with bright colors.  This week, we have returned to traditional easels with three shades of green tempera paint available at one, and colorful egg-shaped chalk with pastel egg-shaped paper at the other. 

To go along with “opposites” we provided black and white playdough for sculpting, rolling, and cutting.  The children had lots of fun mixing the two together, even though it didn’t turn gray – it stayed black!  During “senses” week lime-jello playdough led to lots of conversation about smells.  This week, in hopes of spring, the playdough is pink. 

It’s gooey!  It’s slimey!  It’s melting!  It’s slippery!  It’s GOOP!  Beginning last week, the sensory table provided a slippery concoction of cornstarch and water that we call “goop”.  (One box cornstarch mixed with 2 cups water.)  The children love to experiment with this mixture because it is sometimes solid and sometimes not!  Adding liquid water color and small plastic turtles and frogs to the mix led to delightful conversations and imaginary play.  Coming soon the table will hide small reptiles within colorful plastic eggs and Easter grass.

The children have been learning lots of new songs over the last few weeks, including Please and Thank You are the Magic Words, All Filled Up, Your Face Will Surely Show It, I’m So Mad, Spread the Good News, Put Your Hands Up in the Air, If I Were a Butterfly, The Freeze, The Balancing Act, Tumbly Diddly Die Di Dum, and Animals Go Marching.  The words to some of