January 9-13
Irvington Pre-K Newsletter January 9-13, 2012
Hello, Pre-K Families! We hope you all enjoyed this cold, full week of school. The students had great week learning about animals in the winter. We discussed hibernation, migration and adaptation, or what we like to call, “dealing with it” and celebrated with a pajama party on Friday. Next week, we will be learning about pets and pet care, and our letter of the week will be M. Photos, pictures, stories and books about pets are great share ideas, as are items that start with the letter M
Reminders and Thank you
We will be closed on January 16th in observance of Martin Luther King Jr’s birthday. We also will be celebrating the New Year with a family Potluck on Friday the 20th from 5:30-6:45PM, in the cafeteria. Potluck sign-up is in the classroom, and there are still open slots. We hope to see you all there! Also, a big thanks to Leo, Julian and their family for the wonderful snacks. Lastly, please remember that the window for pick-up in the afternoon is from 2:50-3:00 and late fees will be applied for late pick-ups.
This week our Person of the Week is Helen Cruz Uribe. Helen is 5 years old, has brownish-greenish eyes, brown hair, and is 3 feet 11 inches. Her favorite colors are dark purple, light red and dark pink. Some of Helen’s favorite foods are bacon, artichoke soup (“which is really delicious!”), and apple pie granola. When Helen grows up she wants to be a shop owner, but she’s undecided about what kind of shop it will be. If she could have 3 wishes, Helen would wish for more Playmobiles, to be a really good drawer, and to be line leader again. Some other things that Helen likes are her spaceship collage, Colorado, and non-fiction animal facts. It’s always great to learn new things about our friends, thanks!
On Monday, we began talking about what animals do in the winter time. We introduced the terms migration, hibernation and adaptation, and quickly discussed some of the animals that migrate, hibernate and adapt. We started a chart that will help us keep track of different animal’s winter-time habits. We read Animals in Winter, A Little Bit of Winter, and sections from Migration. Today we also celebrated Helen Cruz Uribe’s 5th birthday. Helen shared some previous birthday photos, decorated a birthday crown, students made birthday pages for her book and we sang Happy Birthday to her. (Yea!) For our project, we made Person of the Week pages for Helen’s Person of the Week book. During our share circle, Lily shared her name, Lillian, which has 3 L’s and some photos of herself as a baby, Ben shared a great book called Library Lion and he showed us his favorite page, Brady also shared a book called The Happy Lion and gave us a good summary of the book, Helen Colletti shared the light from her big red flashlight and the word lip gloss, and Lucia share several L words like; light bulb, lion, Levi, Laura, Liam and her name Lucia.
On Tuesday, we began to discuss the animals that adapt to the winter conditions, and what they do to survive. We read When Winter Comes and North Country Night, which show some of the changes that occur. Some animals prepare for the colder weather by storing up food, some grow heavier fur to protect them in the cold and other animals change color to blend in with their surroundings which protect them from predators. For our project, we made bird/squirrel feeders from pine cones, nut-butter, and seeds to give the animals a helping hand during the winter months. Students made these in groups and we will hang them up in trees on Wednesday. During our share circle, Netta brought in a photo of a rainbow lollipop that she saw in an ABC book, Zachary shared a leaf he found on the way to school, Tessa shared a drawing of her baby doll Lila, Phoebe shared puzzle pieces of a Lipizzaner horse and her “lippy” lip balm, and Leo shared some L words like; Leo likes Legos. 
We also had fun guessing some of the items from the “L” bag; ladder, lips, lizard, lime green, Lego, Lincoln Log and lemons.
On Wednesday, we shifted our focus to migration. We sang a fun song about different animals that migrate such as geese, ducks, butterflies, earthworms, reindeer, whales and salmon. We read a great non-fiction book called Migration. It presented a wealth of information in a very easy to understand fashion. Students made either a bird or butterfly Popsicle stick puppet to pretend-play migration for our project. Students cut out traced birds/butterflies and decorated them with eyes, feathers, and markers and then attached them to a stick. We also read Katie Discovers Winter, The Lonely Moose, and Hooray for Snow. In both the morning and afternoon outside times, we hung our bird feeders on the trees around the school. We placed some near our play area so that we can observe the birds eating from them. Today we also celebrated Dane’s 5 ½ birthday. Dane decorated a birthday crown, shared photos of himself, and students made birthday pages for him and sang Happy Birthday to him. (Yea!) During share, Willem brought in a bag of lollipops and licorice-oh, yum!, Darwin shared a very large US map and pointed out where his mom and dad were born, Mary shared her pillow-pet bumblebee because “bees hibernate”, Isa thought of some L-sounding words like, Elle and Ella, and Dane shared his mom’s name Leslie and a photo of a lollipop.
On Thursday, we discussed hibernation, which seems to be the most interesting of the winter-time animal activities. We read Hibernation, Winter Visitors, Time to Sleep and Hibernation Station. We learned that some insects also hibernate like bees and ladybugs! Our project was to show how these insects hibernate differently than other animals. Ladybugs and bees hibernate together, which is called congregating. Students glued small hole-punched pieces of red construction paper onto brown paper and added snow. They also described what their ladybugs were doing. During share, Liam brought in The Jolly Postman, which is a book of letters from Fairy Tale characters, Kate shared a photo of her nanny Linda, Olivia shared a ladybug clip and a Tinkerbell lantern, Quinn told us some L words like Lucia, lock and little, and Paxton shared a little light from his Christmas tree and his ladybug pillow-pet.
On Friday, we celebrated our week of learning with a pajama party. The students enjoyed playing “hibernation” in the bear caves. We were able to fit 13 students and one teacher comfortably in one of the caves. We continued our discussion of hibernation and talked about other animals that spend the winter months snuggled in a cozy cave, den or burrow. For our project, students made hibernation dens for any animal they imagined. We collected leaves, sticks and other natural materials while outside to use for this project. We read Hibernation Station, Bear Dreams, Old Bear, Who is Sleeping? and The Bear Snores On. We also read Helen’s Person of the Week book and interview. During share, Aidan told us he “saw a bear trying to find his cave and it finally found it and started snoring”, Helen CU shared a cozy blanket made by a woman named Linda, Jaden shared his brother’s name, Landon and Legos, “which have six dots on them”, Odessa shared a very large stuffed lion named Ellie, and Julian shared the book Llama Llama Red Pajama, which starts with L and relates to pajama day.
We hope you all enjoy your 3 day weekend and we will see you on Tuesday!
Pre-K Team
