Snowdays!

This week wasn't connected to any letter and just developed with our children's natural amazement to what Mother Nature brought us to enjoy over the holiday break...SNOW!

Since the windchill was in the teens and twenties and our little babes are quite young and vulnerable we decided to bring the snow IN for some science, discovery and play!

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I like to MOVE IT!

Preschoolers and Toddlers LOVE to move anything from one container to another.  They will dig, dump, scoop and spoon just about anything they can get their little hands on.  This is LEARNING!  They are learning about empty and full, capacity, weight and measurements.  These do not have to come in the form of formal tools...but sometime do!

We used our measuring cups and spoons to determine how many spoonfulls it would take to make a full cup.  Since the snow was melting this was a challenge!

ALOT of the snow ended up in the tum!  This is her, "The snow is BERY, BERY cowld, MOMMY!" face...

Lots and Lots of CLEAN snow was eaten.  This was...without a doubt...their FAVORITE part of snow play and THE reason I opted to give each of them their very own measuring cups and spoons and bowl of snow. 

We did have to keep refilling it as it melted.  The 2's and 3's noticed the melting and observed that the snow melts because we brought it inside and that it is WARM inside, but that outside it is COLD and the snow can last longer in the cold.  YAY!  Score 1 for teacher and students!!!  I LOVE it when a plan comes together! 

They also noted on many occasions that the snow was VERY cold inside their mouths and turned into water inside their mouths almost instantly.  (yep...another point please!)  I explained that their mouths were even warmer than it was inside our home and so the snow will melt EVEN FASTER. 

Soooo...you guessed it...snow was everywhere, towels were everywhere and the children loved every minute of "snowdays!"

Later in the day...and the week...

We do lots and lots of fine motor skills practice that take the shape of many different forms of "play."  They don't realize that its learning...it's so organic and self-directed that it doesn't seem like anything other than having a GREAT time. 

Here the girls are using scissors and papers to cut out anything they like.  The older children asked that I draw different shapes, objects, etc. for them to cut out.  This was a wonderful opportunity for me to make every moment count.  I drew a butterfly, a heart, a house, a tree.  These are simple shapes, but incorporate alot of angles, curves and edges that maintained their focus for quite some time.  When they would accidently cut too short or long, we would simply draw again and try again. 

Lots of great fine motor practice and fun occurs during simple moments like these....

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MY favorite pic of the week!

We decided to make snowmen.  This was a lesson in counting, size recognition, color and again...a discussion on seasons and tempurature. 

What makes this MY favorite picture of the week is the DETERMINATION on all those little faces.  As you can see they each have a FULL bottle of glue and the green light to SQUEEZE! 

This is just the way they like it...uninhibited, no rules, no worries, let the mess ensue!  It's also a time when you could almost here a pin drop they are so engaged in their "edu" play!   We started with the BIG circles, then the medium sized and last, the small circles.  We stacked them one upon the next, added some black circles eyes and smiles and then some more scissor practice to cut up scrap paper into LOTS of snow for our snowman pictures.  These turned out super sweet, the children were so proud of their accomplishment and ready to show them off to their families upon arrival.

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I forgot to mention...

These two books about snow were the class favorites during this week.  We read "The Jacket I Wear In The Snow," MANY times each day. 

It's a cute little book with a great meter.  It talks about all the things we wear when we go out in the snow and concludes with the "tear that fell from my eye," along with "this is the Mommy that wiped the tear that fell from my eye."

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We also discussed how snowflakes are frozen rain, which is why snow turns back INTO water when it gets warmer.  From this we talked all about snowflakes being "unique."  That meant that each one was different, none are the same, just like people. 

We practiced making each one of our snowflakes different too with glitter, glue, paints, and stickers.  Sure enough, not one of them looked alike!

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