We are continuing our study of the letter P and it is amazing how many words the children continue to think up. At lunch today, they realized peanut butter, pudding and peas all start with P. Hmmm... how long before they realize their beloved pretzels start with P?
Yesterday I cut a hole in our class pumpkin and pulled out the stringy mass of seeds. For some reason the class knew there would be seeds inside but were shocked to find they were connected to the slimy strings in the center. We needed to separate them from the seeds so we could cooked with them later but only a few were willing to put their hands on them. Now I've seen their hands after playing in wet sand and mud so you can imagine my surprise at their reaction. It took quite a bit of coaxing before much was accomplished.
Next we looked at Jack-O-Lantern designs in my old Family Fun magazines. This class is very clear on the fact that a carved pumpkin is no longer a pumpkin but has become a Jack-O-Lantern so please do not make that mistake (really, don't!). They chose a frightened face design and while we were at fruit break play Chelsea (our Hollin's helper) drew the face on the pumpkin with magic marker. I found a pumpkin saw this weekend and pulled out my power tool (all 4 AA batteries worth) to start the carving. Now carving isn't particularly interesting unless it's noisy and fast so they were captivated by my little saw. They took turns peeking inside the pumpkin to watch the saw at work. With all the "oohs" and "aahs" I heard, One would think I was performing magic!
Once carved the children were ready to see the splendor. Then they realized our Jack-O-Lantern was missing its light. Xan cautioned me not to use a candle because they are not safe around young children. Heeding his wise words I pulled out my battery operated flickering flame and lit up our creation. How did we ever have Halloween before the invention of batteries?
We continued our P study with a page of pumpkins to color and decorate. Naturally it wasn't just a color page but a page of multi-sized pumpkins. Pumpkins had to be colored green or orange or decorated depending on their size. Visual discrimination is extremely important for children to be able to distinguish the subtle differences of our letters so I love to "trick" the children with these type of exercises. They tricked me this time.
We will cook our seeds tomorrow and perhaps have time to make some pumpkin treats. I will include recipes on the blog in case you wish to use them at home.
Picture proofs are coming home today. Depending on which option you choose, money and proofs need to be returned by Nov. 24, Dec. 1 or Dec. 10. Please do not be late with your order. Teena puts in a huge effort to have all pictures ready in time and every year gets slammed with late orders so let's give her a break this year and get those orders in early.
Last week's fun was recorded by pictures which are already posted on our blogs. The pictures taken by staff have been combined and burned to a master CD. Karen is copying it for each family and will have your CD ready by the end of the week. Some very cute pictures were taken so please wade through all 300 and find the pictures of your child. Many are worth printing for the family album.
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