Our September Learning Goals Include:

  • Whole Group Learning Themes
    • Welcome to School
      • My Wild First Day of School (click on the link to hear Mrs. Hoffman read the story aloud)
      • Time for School, Mouse! (click on the link to hear Mrs. Hoffman read the story aloud)
        • Wonderful Word – find: to discover where something is
        • Mystery Bag – cookies
    • Clothing
      • Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons (click on the link to sing along with the story)
        • Wonderful Word – button: a circular item that is used on clothing to hold two sides together
        • Mystery Bag – ice cream
      • Mrs. McNosh Hangs Up the Wash (click on the link to hear Mrs. Hoffman read the story aloud)
        • Wonderful Word – barrel: a round, wooden container that is used to hold things
        • Mystery Bag – bat
On Thursdays we have a hands-on interaction portion to our weekly read. For our Pete the Cat story we popped off buttons as they were lost in the story.
Listening for rhymes and marking the pairs with buttons.
Each of our wonderful words has an action that goes with it. This helps us to show that we heard it during our weekly read. This is the action for “button.”
  • Literacy Focus
    • Rhyming Words – We introduced rhyming words with our story, “Mrs. McNosh Hangs Up Her Wash.” We completed a couple of small group activities where we listened for rhyming pairs. Sometimes we placed a clothespin on the pair and the other times we used matching buttons. We will continue listening for rhymes into October.
    • Describe Characters & Settings of a Story
      • Time for School, Mouse – Mouse (character) & Home (setting)
      • Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons – Pete the Cat (character) & Home, Outside, Beach (settings)
    • Distinguish Print from Pictures – during our weekly read aloud time, Mrs. Hoffman pointed out where the pictures were in our story “Time for School, Mouse!” as well as where the words were that she was reading. We tried it ourselves in small groups while reading “If You Take a Mouse to School”
    • Understand and Use New Words for Actions (verbs) and Objects (nouns) – our wonderful words find and button have given us a new action word and object word to incorporate into our daily conversations
Working on differentiating print from pictures. We use both to gain knowledge but we use them in different ways.
  • Math Focus
    • Counting Within 10 – we have been counting to 10 as a whole group, counting animals, counting ingredients in our school “stew” and butterflies
    • Sorting by Color – we have sorted counting bears, butterflies and buttons by color
    • Comparing Size – in whole group learning we have sorted pictures of butterflies into the groups big, medium and small
    • ABAB Patterns – we have practiced copying, extending and creating ABAB patterns using colorful buttons
    • Subitizing to 5 – we have practiced subitizing using our elephant erasers and buttons
    • Matching Sets to Numerals – using the recipe cards for our school “stew” we have had to recognize the numbers up to 6 and then find the appropriate amount of ingredients within our sensory “stew”
  • Science
    • Matching Butterflies – matching games help us practice visual discrimination and improve our memory and concentration
    • Sorting Butterflies by Color– sorting helps us build a visual memory and also improves hand-eye coordination
    • Observing Caterpillars
  • Social Studies
    • Demonstrates Knowledge About Self
      • Name Games – Games like _________ be nimble, helps us to recognize our own name when said aloud and also helps us to learn the names of our peers.
      • Question of the Day – Each day our kiddos are asked a question of the day during snack time. This gives our friends the opportunity to have focused conversations during snack and also to think about what their answer will be and why.
  • Social and Emotional
    • Getting a Peer’s Attention – to get a peer’s attention we gently tap them on the shoulder and then say their name. We have modeled this in whole group learning and then asked our friends to practice it as we hand out our Play Passports at the start of center time.
    • Feelings
      • Sad – We have looked at pictures and drawings of kiddos who are sad and talked about what we see when someone is sad and also why some people may feel sad. We also emphasize that all feelings are okay, but it is up to us to choose how we handle our feelings.
      • Happy – We introduced happy with pictures as well as trying on our happy face and feeling how it feels different than a sad face. We took time to look at feeling faces up close and separate them into “happy” or “sad” depending on what we saw.
Getting our Peer’s Attention