Happy Thanksgiving

I wanted to make a special post and wish my classroom families a Happy Thanksgiving.  I hope you are able to spend some much needed time with your family and enjoy those moments together.

I also wanted to let you know how thankful I am for every single kiddo in our classroom as well as the family that support them.   Each and every child in our classroom holds a special place in my heart, and I thank you for sharing them with me for these 9 months.  Each child brings a positive spark into our classroom, a gentle spirit or a lively chatter, a continuous smile or a burst of knowledge. Each child has an important place in our classroom and I am soo thankful to be a part of their learning this year.

I have learned so much from your child too.  I have been reminded to slow down and follow their lead. I've learned that we all need breaks and in different ways. I've learned to teach the same material in a different way, to stretch my mind and better meet the needs of the children. Your child has helped me grow as a teacher and a parent.  They have taught me to find those learning moments in places that I least expect them, to find different ways of looking at what we're doing.

And I'm thankful for you, our parents.  I truly believe that the relationships between home and school has a big impact on student learning.  I am thankful for your continued support and your dedication to helping make your child's school year an important focus.  I appreciate the openness and relationships that we've started to build, between parent and teacher.

So as we get this break from school, I hope you are able to find things that you are thankful for.  I hope you get to find some special time with your kiddo during the break, time to tell them that you're thankful for their smiles, personalities, and for them being there.

To my Fremont families.....HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Pioneer Days

Whew...These past two days were a whirlwind of excitement and now exhaustion!  And this is a warning....this post is full of pictures!

As mentioned in previous posts that we've been reading about pioneer life while reading aloud Little House in the Big Woods.  We're soon going to be taking a break from the book and looking at the Nutcracker.  So what better time to celebrate what we know about pioneer life and spend some time actually doing things like pioneers might have?

We experienced many things:

• making bread and butter
• learning how to weave and make a basket
• saw a duck and a chicken, talked about raising farm animals
• learned games like hopscotch, Cat's Cradle, and leapfrog
• made rag dolls

I hope that these activities truly impacted your child and made a lasting impression, driving home the similarities and differences of the times back then. I hope too that these past 2 days your child learned a new skill or found they enjoy something new.

We also had our first FAMILY LUNCH TIME on Tuesday. It was great to have more of our classroom family with us for lunch.  I will let you know if and when we will have another one.  If you have any suggestions or comments please let me know.

Enjoy your Thanksgiving break...hopefully you get to spend some special time with your family.

Learning to play Leapfrog!

Making a RagDoll

Working on their RagDolls

The Cramer family in a duck and chicken...we got to crack open the eggs to compare them!

Chip the duck got to visit our classroom

Checking out the different eggs

Mrs. Cramer and Nibbles the duck (he's the nice one)

We learned some square dancing moves

 

Miss Alison helping with the yarn for our baskets

Just getting started on her woven basket.

The basket weaving was HARD work!

We finished 2 of the 3 parts to the Little House in the Big Woods mini-series

Our Pioneer Journals