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CLASSROOMS - Preschool Kindergarten 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th Computer Art Choir / Band / Music P.E.
Preschool Aide's
Mrs. Melissa Hughes
BIO 
Mrs. Patti Bernesser
BIO 
Mrs. Jo Safranski
BIO
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Welcome to Preschool Important Dates:
3 Year Old Preschool Class4 Year Old Preschool ClassKindergarten Prep Class |
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3 Year Old Class
Our exploration of balls continued again this week. Our focus question for the week was, “Who uses balls?” We again explored how balls are used to play sports. I brought in 2 examples of balls used for exercise: a yoga ball and a 10 lb medicine ball. The children demonstrated how the yoga ball is used and held onto the medicine ball. During the second part of our week, we talked about how animals use balls. We watched a short clip of a hamster using a ball to walk around. Finally, we saw another clip of a wrecking ball used to break down a building.
We also focused on a lot of fine motor practice. The children used scissors for the first time. When introducing scissors, we start with a discussion on safety. Scissors are only for cutting paper or other materials that the teacher may give you. Next we focus on form. All of our scissors have a small piece of tape on the thumb hole. We teach that the tape and thumb hole goes on top. Children then start with small, straight snips. Check out their cutting practice on those turkeys they brought home this week.
We have been making straight, slanted, and curvy lines with our bodies. This week, we practiced writing straight lines on paper. These pre-writing skills eventually translate to name and letter writing. As they learn how to make these lines, I teach them to start at the top and go down. This comes from the Handwriting Without Tears Model. You may have seen the smiley faces and stop signs on their papers. These are guides to help them remember to start at the top. We also used rock crayons to write these lines. These little crayons are shaped like rocks and encourage the children to use a 3 finger grip to hold them. We teach them that they have 3 working fingers: thumb, pointer, and middle man. The other 2 fingers ringman and pinky are sleeping. We will continue working on teaching these lines and building fine motor muscles.
Next week is our last week of the Ball Study. Our focus question will be, “What is inside balls?” We will learn about the concept of hollow and solid. Which balls in our collection are hollow? Which balls are solid? We will have some messy fun by making balls of our own with paper mache.
Highlights for Week of 11/19/2019
We also focused on a lot of fine motor practice. The children used scissors for the first time. When introducing scissors, we start with a discussion on safety. Scissors are only for cutting paper or other materials that the teacher may give you. Next we focus on form. All of our scissors have a small piece of tape on the thumb hole. We teach that the tape and thumb hole goes on top. Children then start with small, straight snips. Check out their cutting practice on those turkeys they brought home this week.
We have been making straight, slanted, and curvy lines with our bodies. This week, we practiced writing straight lines on paper. These pre-writing skills eventually translate to name and letter writing. As they learn how to make these lines, I teach them to start at the top and go down. This comes from the Handwriting Without Tears Model. You may have seen the smiley faces and stop signs on their papers. These are guides to help them remember to start at the top. We also used rock crayons to write these lines. These little crayons are shaped like rocks and encourage the children to use a 3 finger grip to hold them. We teach them that they have 3 working fingers: thumb, pointer, and middle man. The other 2 fingers ringman and pinky are sleeping. We will continue working on teaching these lines and building fine motor muscles.
Next week is our last week of the Ball Study. Our focus question will be, “What is inside balls?” We will learn about the concept of hollow and solid. Which balls in our collection are hollow? Which balls are solid? We will have some messy fun by making balls of our own with paper mache.
Highlights for Week of 11/19/2019
- Books: The Doorbell Rang
- Songs: I'm a Little Turkey
- Exploration of Balls - Comparing balls and how they feel; What balls have air inside? What balls do not.
- Jumping Bean - Letter Identification Game
- Paper Mache Balls
- What is it? - Shape Identification Song
- Zoo Phonic Signal Review
- Spanish Lesson - Hola = Hello; Como Estas? = How are you?; Estoy muy bien = I am good; Gracias = Thank You
- Hollow vs. Solid Balls - Compare and contrast
- Number Cruncher
- Spin and Build - Children will spin a number spinner. They will then build a tower that number of blocks.
- Jack Hartmann Count to 10 Song
4 Year Old Am Class
This was the final week of our tree investigation. We began our week with a fun field trip (in house) with the naturalists from Hemlock Crossing. During their visit we talked about who lives in trees, how trees make air for us to breathe, about how trees change, how trees are different and even some things that we can use trees for. We looked at samples of different types of wood, tree bark, leaves and seeds and made some bark rubbings too. The naturalists also brough a display of different types of bird nests giving us a chance to see some of the different materials that birds use this their nests. We wrapped up the day by taking some tree parts and building our own trees. It was a great chance for the students to have a hands-on overview to wrap up our tree investigation.
Ms. Jo (alias Dona Jo) gave us our first lesson in Spanish. We have been learning the words: hola = hello; Como te llamas? = What is your name?; Me llamo = My Name is. The students enjoyed learning some Spanish--they learn it so quickly! On Wednesday, unfortunatly Father was unable to visit with us but we had plenty to do. We spent quite a bit of our time working on rhyming words, had our first practice on lined paper, worked in journals and made handprint turkeys that will come home next week. Thank you for all of your work on the "Turkey Trouble" Homework. The creative projects are displayed on the bulletin board in the hallway. Be sure to take a peek.
Friday we read the story about Jonah and the whale and made a whale out of a paperbag including a drawing of Jonah that is inside each whale. The gang had so much fun with the whales--they came out at center time to play with the students. Violet brought Roary, our traveling lion back and we shared his adventures about fun times at Violet's house. Violet drew the name of the student who Roary will visit this week--Caroline. Violet mentiond that they did have to talk to Roary about roaring at the dinner table.
This week we will be working on letters and letter sounds, but are starting to take a look at some word families. Last week we took a look at the "an" word family and the students had fun creating new words by changing the beginning letter. Work will continue on counting syllables in small group, as we play a game to count the syllables.
We are going to be working on introducing the concept of number sets in preparation of some simple addition. Everyone loves to play "Shape Monster" so we are going to make "Shape Monster" books this week as we focus our math work on shapes. We will be playing "Where's Turkey Hiding"--turkey hides behind some different shapes that we have to name to find him. The language of "verticies" will be introduced as we describe the different shapes. Friday we will be talkig about the history of the First Thanksgiving and making some necklaces to help us remember the events of those first settlers. We will also be working on making a thankful wheel--asking each student to think of 6 things that he or she is thankful for. Monday, the 25th, we are going to make some pumpkin muffins and have a little taste of Thanksgiving at school during snack. It should be lots of learning fun.
This Week's Highlights:
Books: Shape Monster, Shape Monster, The Story of Thanksgiving, Turkey Tot, The Night Before Thanksgving & Ten Fat Turkeys
Games: Where's Turkey Hiding?, Let's Build a Shape Monster, Spin and Create (building fall figures with shape blocks), Building shapes with toothpicks and playdoh, What shape is in the bag? (feeling a hidden shape and feeling it to figure out what shape it is)
Songs: Shapes, Sides and Verticies; Turkey Trott; The Syllable Song; Turkey Dance and Freeze; I'm Glad I'm Not a Turkey; and Hickory Dickory Dock
Journal Response: Where will you be celebrating Thanksgiving?
Specials: Music & Spanish with Dona Jo
Small Group: Shape Monster Book, Syllable Counting, Thanksgiving Necklace & Making Pumpkin Muffins
Art: Thankful Wheel, Thanksgiving Necklace
Virtue: Gratitude
Special Note: We plan to play outside daily--unless temps dip below 10 degrees or following Mass. Please send weather appropriate clothing for outdoor play daily.
Ms. Jo (alias Dona Jo) gave us our first lesson in Spanish. We have been learning the words: hola = hello; Como te llamas? = What is your name?; Me llamo = My Name is. The students enjoyed learning some Spanish--they learn it so quickly! On Wednesday, unfortunatly Father was unable to visit with us but we had plenty to do. We spent quite a bit of our time working on rhyming words, had our first practice on lined paper, worked in journals and made handprint turkeys that will come home next week. Thank you for all of your work on the "Turkey Trouble" Homework. The creative projects are displayed on the bulletin board in the hallway. Be sure to take a peek.
Friday we read the story about Jonah and the whale and made a whale out of a paperbag including a drawing of Jonah that is inside each whale. The gang had so much fun with the whales--they came out at center time to play with the students. Violet brought Roary, our traveling lion back and we shared his adventures about fun times at Violet's house. Violet drew the name of the student who Roary will visit this week--Caroline. Violet mentiond that they did have to talk to Roary about roaring at the dinner table.
This week we will be working on letters and letter sounds, but are starting to take a look at some word families. Last week we took a look at the "an" word family and the students had fun creating new words by changing the beginning letter. Work will continue on counting syllables in small group, as we play a game to count the syllables.
We are going to be working on introducing the concept of number sets in preparation of some simple addition. Everyone loves to play "Shape Monster" so we are going to make "Shape Monster" books this week as we focus our math work on shapes. We will be playing "Where's Turkey Hiding"--turkey hides behind some different shapes that we have to name to find him. The language of "verticies" will be introduced as we describe the different shapes. Friday we will be talkig about the history of the First Thanksgiving and making some necklaces to help us remember the events of those first settlers. We will also be working on making a thankful wheel--asking each student to think of 6 things that he or she is thankful for. Monday, the 25th, we are going to make some pumpkin muffins and have a little taste of Thanksgiving at school during snack. It should be lots of learning fun.
This Week's Highlights:
Books: Shape Monster, Shape Monster, The Story of Thanksgiving, Turkey Tot, The Night Before Thanksgving & Ten Fat Turkeys
Games: Where's Turkey Hiding?, Let's Build a Shape Monster, Spin and Create (building fall figures with shape blocks), Building shapes with toothpicks and playdoh, What shape is in the bag? (feeling a hidden shape and feeling it to figure out what shape it is)
Songs: Shapes, Sides and Verticies; Turkey Trott; The Syllable Song; Turkey Dance and Freeze; I'm Glad I'm Not a Turkey; and Hickory Dickory Dock
Journal Response: Where will you be celebrating Thanksgiving?
Specials: Music & Spanish with Dona Jo
Small Group: Shape Monster Book, Syllable Counting, Thanksgiving Necklace & Making Pumpkin Muffins
Art: Thankful Wheel, Thanksgiving Necklace
Virtue: Gratitude
Special Note: We plan to play outside daily--unless temps dip below 10 degrees or following Mass. Please send weather appropriate clothing for outdoor play daily.
Kindergarten Prep PM class
This week our focus question was, “What special clothes do we wear for work?” Some jobs require special clothes for safety such as a firefighter. Other jobs have uniforms so everyone can identify the worker like a mail carrier. The children thought about what job they would like to do and the clothes they would need to wear for that job. We also discussed ID cards, and the children created secret agent ID cards where they created a code name and a secret power. We laminated the cards and they will get them back next week.
In September and October we were focusing on the Phonological Awareness skill of sentence segmenting. This is listening to a sentence and identifying individual words in the sentence. As we say a sentence, we tap our head for each word. This week we added on the skill of syllabication. We focus on an individual word and identify the number of sounds in the word. A trick I teach the children is to place their hand under their mouth. As the say the word they count how many times their mouth moves down. That helps them to identify the sounds or syllables in a word. We practice this skill with the words in our Question of the Day and our Daily News.
Next week will be our final week of the Clothing Study. Our question will be, “What other special clothes do we wear?” We will talk about specific clothes for sports, weather, and special events. Please send in a picture of your child wearing clothes from a special event, sports team, or other unique clothes. You can email me the pictures and I will put them up on the board. We will also celebrate the end of our Clothing Study by tie-dying shirts. Please send in a plain white t-shirt by Monday. We will tie-dye on Thursday, so please have your child wear old clothes that day.
Highlights for the Week of 11/18/2019
In September and October we were focusing on the Phonological Awareness skill of sentence segmenting. This is listening to a sentence and identifying individual words in the sentence. As we say a sentence, we tap our head for each word. This week we added on the skill of syllabication. We focus on an individual word and identify the number of sounds in the word. A trick I teach the children is to place their hand under their mouth. As the say the word they count how many times their mouth moves down. That helps them to identify the sounds or syllables in a word. We practice this skill with the words in our Question of the Day and our Daily News.
Next week will be our final week of the Clothing Study. Our question will be, “What other special clothes do we wear?” We will talk about specific clothes for sports, weather, and special events. Please send in a picture of your child wearing clothes from a special event, sports team, or other unique clothes. You can email me the pictures and I will put them up on the board. We will also celebrate the end of our Clothing Study by tie-dying shirts. Please send in a plain white t-shirt by Monday. We will tie-dye on Thursday, so please have your child wear old clothes that day.
Highlights for the Week of 11/18/2019
- Books: The Paper Bag Princess; The Dress I Will Wear to the Party; Give Thanks for Each Day
- Song: 5 Little Turkeys
- Journal Topics: 1. What sport do you like to play?
- I'm Thinking of a Shape - Teacher will describe different shapes' attributes and children will build the shapes.
- Mystery Letter Bag Game - Children will pull out a mystery letter and match the letter to the letter mat. Children will identify the beginning sound. What words begin with that sound?
- Special Event Clothes - Children will share pictures of clothing from special events.
- Sorting by C - Children will sort items that begin with a /c/ sound and items that do not begin with a /c/ sound.
- Letter Formation - Children will practice building letters U, V, and W with magnetic pieces and then practice writing those letters on paper.
- Poke Picture - Children will use a toothpick to poke holes in an outline of a turkey picture.
- Tuesday Music Class
- In This Season, I wear.... - Children will draw pictures of clothes they wear for the 4 different seasons.
- Number Cruncher - Number Identification Game.
- Letter Formation Practice - Children will practice letters: F, E, D, P, B, R, N, M, H, K, L, U, V, and W with Q-tips and paint.
- T-Shirt Tie-Dying
- Fr. Dave Visit
- Spanish Lesson - We have been learning the words: hola = hello; Como te llamas? = What is your name?; Me llamo = My Name is; Como estas? = How are you?; Estoy muy bien? = I am good.
- Friday Activities
- Book - Children will choose 2 favorite books from the clothing study.
- What's Missing - Children will study a collection of objects. Teacher will remove an object and children will identify what object is missing.
- Letter Beads - Teacher will say a letter sound and children will add the corresponding letter bead to a pipe cleaner.
- Journal Writing - How would you have saved Prince Ronald from the dragon?
Science Club
Science Club is an optional activity for students enrolled in either the AM-4 or Kindergarten Prep classes. The club meets on the second Thursday of the month from 9:30-11 am at Hemlock Crossing, September through May. Meetings are lead by Hemlock Crossing naturalists and the membership cost is $ 72 for the year (only $8 per meeting).
Parents, or other adult caregiver, are an important part of the program--you will be actively involved in exploring the topic of the month with your child as well as providing transportation to and from the meetings. Some exceptions can be made for working parents, provided you are able to find a member parent who is willing to transport your child and fill in as your designated adult explorer. If you are interested or would like more information, please contact Mrs. Carey at ccarey@slstm.org.
Snow days: if St. Mary's does not have school on a meeting date, the meeting for that day will be canceled. We will not try to reschedule--just too many schedules to try to accomodate. You will not be billed for that month's meeting.
2019-2020 Investigations
Sept. 12th—Nature Navigators
October 10th—Plants & Seeds
November 14th—Art in Nature
December 12th—Nocturnal & Hibernating Animals
January 9th—Snow Shoeing*
February 13th—Tracks & Feet*
March 12th—All About Birds*
April 23rd—Who lives in a Log**
May 14th—Wetlands & Ponds
* Subject to weather—alternative: Food Chains
** Date changed due to Spring Break.
Note: Meetings are held at Hemlock Crossing Education Center at 8115 West Olive Rd., West Olive. Meetings run from
9:30-11 a.m.
Parents, or other adult caregiver, are an important part of the program--you will be actively involved in exploring the topic of the month with your child as well as providing transportation to and from the meetings. Some exceptions can be made for working parents, provided you are able to find a member parent who is willing to transport your child and fill in as your designated adult explorer. If you are interested or would like more information, please contact Mrs. Carey at ccarey@slstm.org.
Snow days: if St. Mary's does not have school on a meeting date, the meeting for that day will be canceled. We will not try to reschedule--just too many schedules to try to accomodate. You will not be billed for that month's meeting.
2019-2020 Investigations
Sept. 12th—Nature Navigators
October 10th—Plants & Seeds
November 14th—Art in Nature
December 12th—Nocturnal & Hibernating Animals
January 9th—Snow Shoeing*
February 13th—Tracks & Feet*
March 12th—All About Birds*
April 23rd—Who lives in a Log**
May 14th—Wetlands & Ponds
* Subject to weather—alternative: Food Chains
** Date changed due to Spring Break.
Note: Meetings are held at Hemlock Crossing Education Center at 8115 West Olive Rd., West Olive. Meetings run from
9:30-11 a.m.
Science Club
Inspired by Saint Mary and rooted in our Catholic faith, St. Mary's School fosters spiritual development, academic excellence,
responsibility to self, and service to others in order that the Gospel of Christ may be known in the world.
responsibility to self, and service to others in order that the Gospel of Christ may be known in the world.
