This week’s book of the week is entitled Dan the Flying Man.  The children came up with a list of other things that fly.  We took that list and categorized the items into four different categories: vehicles (spaceship, airplane, helicopter, jet, hot air balloon, and space shuttle), animals (chicken, bird, butterfly, fly, bee, ladybug), people (Superman, Dan, ghost?, Buzz Lightyear, Batman), and toys (kite).  Putting things into categories can help children organize information and/or ideas.  For an art craft, the children are making butterflies using coffee filters and markers.  The children colored the coffee filters with the markers.  When they were finished, they dropped water drops on it using a pipette.  Using pipettes helps develop fine motor. After it dries, they will pinch it together and use a clothespin for the body and a pipe cleaner for the antennas.

Today we explored musical instruments and had “free” dancing.  From this picture, can you guess what song is most requested by the children for free dance time?  All children love music and their inborn love of music makes it an absolute natural for child development.  In our preschool classroom we try to build a community of young children sharing songs, playing songs, moving to different paced songs, dancing to different genres of music, doing the hula in a relaxed, playful, non-performance oriented setting.

This week’s collaborative art piece involves fluorescent paint with “funny” foam brushes, fluorescent glue, small paper flowers, and colored feathers.  In the preschool classroom, we do collaborative art pieces because it encourages working towards a common shared goal, supports teamwork, helps promote a positive work ethic, and it provides an opportunity for children to engage in conversation with each other.  Throughout the year, we will continue to do collaboration art pieces using different art medium and art techniques.  The current ones are displayed in a black frame around the classroom.

Today we shared our stick projects with children from two other classrooms by doing a “stick parade.”   As they marched, they held their sticks up proudly.  Mahalo families for helping your keiki with this project.