Dec. 18, 2008

Parents,
We've had a wonderful final day before winter break! This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of making snow in our journals (powder + water = snow!). For our fine motor work we cut pictures of things we liked and created collages, worked with craft sticks that had different numbers of buttons glued to them, glued macaroni on letters, and created funny faces by putting magnetic features on magnet books. We didn't have time for circle time today because we joined the entire school for a sing-a-long in the cafeteria. We were with Pre-K and we sang "Rudolph, the Red Nosed Reindeer". We wore our reindeer headbands (antlers made from our hand shapes) and the kiddos all had their noses colored red (with washable marker). We did a great job! And we were wonderful listeners for the rest of the performances! We returned to the room and worked with the snow we made yesterday. We scooped it with spoons and added water to it as well. When we finished with our snow we put it in baggies to take home. Please have fun playing with it! This afternoon we're doing some top secret stuff, so don't even ask us about it. :-)

I wish you all a very happy winter break! See you in 2009!
Love,
Ms. Parsons

Dec. 16, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a kite in our journals. The children are getting so good at telling me stories about what they've drawn! For our fine motor work, we worked with a braille typewriter, counted candles and cakes, strung beads on strings, and cut and pasted holiday pictures to make collages. During circle time we determined that it's cloudy today and put the gray cloud over our tree, we counted to 16 during calendar and continued our red/green pattern, and we danced to "I Like Potatoes" during movement. For story time today I read "Merry Christmas Mom and Dad". During centers today we drew letter "K" objects from our green bag. We found a kettle, two keys, a kangaroo, a kazoo, and an upper and lower case "K" while we practiced the letter "K" sound. We then glued letter "K" objects to a letter "K" paper (kite, keys, Ks, and a king). The home center was also open and we cooked up all kinds of great dishes. Ms. McGuire came today for speech therapy. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. This afternoon we'll continue working on our tree project.
I'll be out tomorrow because my son is having a cast put on his broken elbow. I'll be back on Thursday.
Have a wonderful evening!
Kali Parsons

Dec. 15, 2008

Parents,
The most amazing thing happened over the weekend!!! All of the leaves fell off of our classroom tree! We determined that it must be winter. So exciting!

This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a key in our journals. For our fine motor work we made frogs jump, created structures with bristle blocks, made towers with letter blocks, and cut holiday pictures and glued them on paper to make collages. During circle time we determined that it was rainy today (and I sprayed everyone with our squirt bottle so they could feel rain), counted to 15 during calendar and continued our red/green pattern, and danced to "Peanut Butter". After circle time we continued dancing, doing 3 more songs, because it is in the 30s outside and not everyone had a heavy coat. I read the book "The Snow Tree", about forest animals decorating a tree in the woods with found objects. After the book we all placed decorations on our classroom tree. We moved to centers where in the art center we all cut stars to go on top of our winter trees that we created last week and we placed decorations on them. In the big toys center we created structures with many shapes/sizes of blocks. We ended center time today by mixing shaving cream together with silver glitter and working with it on our art table. We are VERY sparkly! We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K (brrrrr!). This afternoon we'll cut stars, triangles, and rectangles to form trees in Pre-K. We are working hard on learning all of our geometric shapes.
Have a great night! Stay warm!
Kali Parsons

Dec. 12, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a cookie with sprinkles (we noticed that there were two "K"s!). We went to the library and Ms. Kraal's substitute read two holiday books. We returned to the classroom and did our fine motor work (working with big wooden letters, drawing with chalk, and creating pictures with shape magnets. We had a wonderful holiday performance to attend this morning. We went to the cafeteria to hear the "Circle of Light". It was a group of musicians/dancers that performed many different songs from different cultures. We were a wonderful audience! We returned to the room briefly before lunch and worked with shaving cream. We had jewels, balls and cars in it. We made trails with the objects and hid them in the shaving cream. We talked about how the shaving cream felt and smelled. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. This afternoon we'll work on our matching skills by playing BINGO in Ms. Mitchell's Pre-K room.
Have a wonderful weekend!
Kali Parsons

Dec. 11, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a tree with a star shape on top. For our fine motor work we put keys on key rings, moved metal circles with a magnet, and put magnetic eyes/noses/mouths in a book with funny faces. We also observed the gerbils with an apple (they only considered eating it...never took a bite). During circle time we determined that it's sunny and windy today and put the jackets on our weather bears, we counted to 11 and continued our red/green pattern during calendar, and we danced to "Tooty Ta". We played outside with our Pre-K friends. I read "Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What do you Hear?" for story time. During centers we applied glitter to our painted squares and also worked on a thank you poster for one of our community donors (we cut a pine tree and a star and trunk and glued it all together, then added glitter). We glued keys on a big letter "K" and practiced the letter "K" sound. Ms. McGuire came today for speech therapy. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest time we completed our reindeer antlers.
Have a wonderful night!
Kali Parsons

Dec. 10, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a candy cane in our journals. We noticed that there was a red/white pattern on it. For our fine motor work we created pictures using different shape/color/size wooden pieces, strung beads on strings, matched shapes using folder games, and cut pictures out of magazines to make collages. We also had a free art table with markers and paper. During circle time we determined that it's sunny today (we also felt the heat from a flashlight), counted to 10 and continued our red/green pattern during calendar, and danced to "Button Factory". We did some extra dances because it was too cold to go outside. We danced to "Hand Dance" and "Lettercise". During centers we painted squares made from craft sticks. We used red and green paint. We noticed that when the colors mixed it made brown. We also cut out rectangles to put on the base of our pine trees that we created yesterday. We rotated through many centers today: toy center with blocks, home center, small toys center with Mr. Potato Head, and the science center with rice to scoop/fill/empty. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest we'll go to Pre-K and create Rudolph antlers (we'll be singing with the entire school next Thursday and our song is "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer"). We'll create antlers by tracing our hands, counting our 10 fingers, and cutting them out. We'll staple them to a headband.
Enjoy this cold day!
Kali Parsons

Dec. 9, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a pine tree. For our fine motor work we did a transportation puzzle, put sequencing cards in order, and matched restaurant objects with photographs. During circle time we determined that it's rainy today. We put the gray cloud and the rain drops over the class tree. We also put the raincoats on our weather bears. We counted to 9 during calendar and continued our red/green pattern. Our movement song was "If You're Happy and You Know it". We played outside with Pre-K. I re-read "The Little Pine Tree" today and we talked about the seasons and what the trees did during each season. We talked about the shape of the pine tree. During center time everyone cut out a big white triangle. We then mixed blue and yellow paint with our hands to create green. The triangles were clipped to our easel and everyone used their green hands to paint them. Ms. McGuire came today for speech therapy. After centers we read books about the winter holidays and looked at pictures from this season. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest we'll go to math centers in Pre-K. In my center we'll continue creating our Santas with our hand print (counting our fingers), cutting out the triangles for hats, and creating faces and talking about the emotions they're showing.
Have a wonderful night!
Kali Parsons

Dec. 8, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of the letter "K" (big line down, slide in, slide out). For our fine motor work we drew pictures of buses with chunky crayons, created structures with bristle blocks, fit shapes in a shape sorter, and counted using birthday counting cakes. During circle time we determined that it's cloudy today, dressed the bears in their jackets because it's cold outside, counted to 8 on the calendar and continued our red/green pattern, and danced to "The Wheels on the Bus". We played outside with Pre-K. For story time I read "The Little Pine Tree". It is about a pine tree that is in a forest with other trees that show changes with the seasons, but it does not. We moved to the art center and we all cut a curvy line along the top of a huge sheet of white butcher paper. We then painted the entire paper with glue and then used our pincer fingers to sprinkle white glitter all over it. We made snow to be the background for a snow scene that we're going to be working on for the next several weeks. We also worked in the science center, pouring and measuring rice and pretending that it was snow. The big toys center was also open and we made structures with big and small blocks of various shapes. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest we'll go to Pre-K and in our center we'll begin creating Santas using our hand print for his beard (counting 5 fingers), cutting a triangle for his hat, and adding features including a mouth (we'll discuss how he feels).
I hope you all had a restful weekend!
Kali Parsons

Dec. 3, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a jelly jar in our journals (3 great letter "J" words!). For our fine motor work we cut paper and created pictures with geometric shapes. We also observed the two gerbils that are visiting our classroom. During circle time we determined that it's windy today, counted to 3 during calendar, and danced to "The Freeze". We played outside with our Pre-K friends. I read "We're Going on a Bear Hunt" for story time. We acted out the entire book. It was sometimes the same as the song we do and sometimes different. During centers we created fall trees to go on our community map. We each had a toilet paper tube, sheets of red, orange, and yellow tissue paper, and glue. We put the tissue paper in the end of the tube and glued it in place. We then glued our trees to our community map. We also observed our gerbils in the pet center. Each child drew pictures of them and their cage and what they were doing. Ms. Welcome and I transcribed their stories. We also worked with shaving cream. We used small wiffle balls to draw shapes/letters in the shaving cream. It was interesting to see how the balls made trails in the shaving cream. We independently read books about bears just before lunch. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. This afternoon in Pre-K we'll begin creating fall trees using a science tool, a pipette. We'll color round coffee filters with orange, brown, yellow, and red markers. Then we'll use the pipettes to put drops of water on the filter, causing the colors to bleed together. This will be the top of our trees. We'll continue working on these the remainder of the week.
Have a great night!
Kali Parsons

Dec. 2, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a jacket in our journals. For our fine motor work we fit shapes in a shape container, threaded spools on strings, and connected pop beads to make shapes. During circle time we determined that it's sunny today, we dressed our weather bears in jackets because it's cold outside, counted to 2 during calendar, and danced to "5 Little Ducks". I read "Hold Tight, Bear!" during story time. We finished our friendship bears today. Everyone cut out their friends' pictures and glued them on a piece of poster board. We drew features on our bear faces (that we painted yesterday) and talked about how our bears felt. We glued googly eyes on them, too. We glued the bear head at the top of the paper in the middle, the two front paws at the top beside the head, and the two rear paws on the bottom. It looks like the bear is holding a sign with our friends' pictures on it (I'm not publishing a picture of them because they have student faces on them). We also continued working in our home center/restaurant. There is a lot of great language going on in there! Ms. McGuire came for speech therapy today. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. This afternoon we'll continue working on our scarves with zig-zags and slanted lines.
Have a wonderful night!
Kali Parsons

Dec. 1, 2008

Parents,
I hope you all had a wonderful long holiday weekend!

The December newsletter is available by clicking on the Newsletter link to the right.

This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a triangle in our journals. For our fine motor work we played a small piano, drew with chalk, put sequence cards in correct order, and worked with shape magnets. We were VERY observant this morning! We noticed that we have a new month on our calendar, a new color of the month (green), a new shape of the month (triangle), and two new weather bears (see circle time to see what we did with them). During circle time we determined that it's cloudy today, felt a soft cloud, dressed our new weather bears in warm jackets because it's cold outside, counted to 1 during calendar, and danced to "Lettercize". I read the book "Bear Wants More" for story time. During center time today we worked in the home center ordering and creating meals for our friends. We also began creating friendship bears. We painted the individual bear parts brown today. We'll continue this project tomorrow. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest we'll work on the concept of zig-zag and slant and create paper scarves with these features.
Have a restful evening!
Kali Parsons

Nov. 25, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew "taste" in our journals. We went to a special presentation with Pre-K provided by Zilker Arts in Education. We saw a play called "The Heron and the Crane" in the cafeteria. We made all kinds of sounds to go along with the play (buzzing bees, wind, rain, baby birds, frogs, etc.). It was a wonderful play about friendship. We returned to the room to do our fine motor work (bristle blocks, player piano, drawing with crayons in our bus safety coloring books provided by AISD, and creating pictures with plastic shapes). During circle time we determined that it's sunny today, counted to 25 and continued our color pattern during calendar, and danced to "I Like Potatoes". Ms. McGuire came for speech therapy. We also added our legs and feet to our turkeys. Please look in your child's backpack for turkey art work. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest we're going to go to Ms. Mitchell's to enjoy pumpkin pie that her class made from scratch this morning!

I wish you all a very happy and safe Thanksgiving holiday break. We are certainly very thankful for the time you allow us to have with your children!
Ms. Parsons

Nov. 24, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a brown bear in our journals. We also practiced our first lock down drill (which we had talked about during breakfast). We all sat in the dark in the reading center and were very quiet. We did a great job! We are very hopeful that we'll never need to do this in a real situation. For our fine motor work we felt a texture book, put coins in a pig, matched real restaurant items to pictures of like items, and created restaurant signs for each of our restaurants on the community map. We glued them to our restaurant. The community map is really coming along. We'll be adding fall trees soon. During circle time we determined that it was cloudy today (we used the gray cloud over our tree), counted to 24 and said that orange was next in our calendar pattern, and danced to "Itsy, Bitsy Spider". We played outside with our Pre-K friends. I continued reading poems out of our Thanksgiving book today. The poem today was about a girl that couldn't eat because her braces were too tight. For centers we had many different sizes of blocks in the big toys center. We created structures, admired them, and knocked them down. We also began creating turkeys in the art center. We cut a little circle for a head and a big circle for a body (which we folded in half). We added eyes, a diamond shape for a beak (we folded the diamond shape in half), and a waddle. We also cut strips of yellow, red, and orange paper and folded them in half to make feathers. We glued them to the body piece and added the head. Tomorrow we'll add the legs and feet. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest we'll create pattern bracelets in Pre-K. We were going to do this activity on Friday, but we ended up working on a shapes song as a large group.

Please check your child's backpack today. Their Thanksgiving place mats are in them.


Have a wonderful night!
Kali Parsons

Nov. 21, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew pictures of insects in our journals. We went to the library with Pre-K and Ms. Kraal read two books about bears. We played outside on the boulders. When we returned to the classroom we did our fine motor activities (cutting pictures of food from fliers and talking about whether they were healthy or unhealthy choices, creating structures with bristle blocks, and stringing beads and spools). During center time we expanded our home center (we made it BIGGER!). Now three children can be in there at once. We also put our writing center table near there. Now we have an entire restaurant set up. Customers ordered healthy food from the menus and the chefs cooked and served. Yummy! We also continued working on the letter "I" and glued letter "I" objects on our letter "I" paper (igloo, ice cream, insects, ink, iron, invitation, etc.). Please look out for the letter "I" in your environment! We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest in my group in Pre-K we'll create bracelets using 6, 7, 8, 9, or 10 beads. We'll be making patterns with the beads.
I hope you all have a wonderful weekend! Reminder: only two days of school next week!
Kali Parsons

Nov. 20, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of an inchworm in our journals (the inchworm had a brown/orange pattern). For our fine motor work we drew with dry erase markers, made frogs jump, sorted fish and frogs, and laced numbers and letters. During circle time we determined that it's sunny today, counted to 20 during calendar, and danced to "The Number Game". Our class and Pre-K attended a special event today in the cafeteria. The fourth graders were rehearsing a bunch of Texas songs that they're going to perform at tonight's PTA meeting. Some of us noticed that Ms. Parsons' son was on stage. :-) For story time today I continued reading poems out of our Thanksgiving poetry book. During centers we ran our restaurant in the home center, glued insects onto big letter "I"s, completed our Five Fat Turkeys, and created menus to use in our restaurant by cutting pictures of food out of ads and gluing them on white paper. There were lots of good things to order! Our counselor, Ms. Pundt, and our speech therapist, Ms. McGuire, also came today. We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest Ms. Welcome will do a BINGO game in Pre-K (I'm off work this afternoon).
See everyone tomorrow!
Kali Parsons

Nov. 19, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew our turkeys (with features) in our journals. For our fine motor work we put money in a pig, drew with chalk on chalkboards, sorted insects, and counted with counting cakes. During circle time today we determined that it's sunny today (we also felt the heat from a flashlight), counted to 19 during calendar time, determined what was next in our orange/brown pattern, and danced to "The Bear Hunt". We played outside with our Pre-K friends. I continued reading our Thanksgiving poem book during story time. In the book it showed a classroom with children's art on their walls. Just like in our classroom they had pumpkins and turkeys that they were working on! During centers we continued working in our home center/restaurant, played with dollhouse characters, and completed our Thanksgiving place mats (these will go home next week). We also worked with Mr. Potato Head giving him all kinds of funny features! We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest we'll complete our 5 fat turkeys art work and work on patterning.
I'll be absent tomorrow after 10 AM. I'll be back on Friday.
Have a great night!
Kali Parsons

Nov. 18, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew the beginning of our turkey hands in our journals. For our fine motor work we drew with small pieces of chalk on small chalkboards, laced letters and numbers, counted pegs on peg boards, and created pictures with plastic shapes. During circle time we determined that it's cloudy today, felt a puffy white cloud, counted to 18 during calendar time, and danced to "Ride that Pony" (a song about position words - front, side, back). We played outside with our Pre-K friends. We all held part of a big parachute and made it go up and down. We did a pattern with our lifting and lowering (fast, fast, slow, fast, fast, slow and up, down, up, down). When we all came to the circle area back inside, we danced to "Five Fat Turkeys". I continued reading the next poem in our Thanksgiving poem book for storytime. During center time we added features to our turkeys (beak, legs/feet, waddle, and an eye). We also turned our home center into a restaurant and began creating menus. Ms. McGuire came today and did speech therapy. We had lunch and played on the playground with our Pre-K friends. After rest we'll go to Pre-K and continue working on our five fat turkeys in the tree. We'll add real feathers, googly eyes, legs/feet, beaks, waddles, and the numbers 1-5.
Have a wonderful evening!
Kali Parsons

Nov. 17, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of an ice cream cone in our journals. For our fine motor work we cut pictures out of magazines and made collages, counted pegs and put them on peg boards, worked with community helper cars, and worked with larger wooden number blocks. We all came to the carpet and I created an upper case letter "I" and a lower case letter "i" on the carpet using masking tape. We talked about all of the strokes needed to create these letters. We were unable to have our circle time today because Mr. Emilio needed to clean up something in our classroom. We played outside with our Pre-K friends. I began reading the book, "It's Thanksgiving", a series of Thanksgiving poems. During center time we worked in the home center creating food to eat, worked in the dollhouse center, and worked in the art center. In the art center I worked with each child individually to help the create a turkey. I painted their hands with fall colors and they made a handprint on a paper with their name that they had written. With extra time, some of the children chose to create their own turkey handprint by painting their own hands. Tomorrow we'll add features to our turkeys. We had lunch and played on the playground with our Pre-K friends. This afternoon we'll begin creating "Five Fat Turkeys in a Tree" artwork by dipping our hands in brown paint and making five brown handprints up in the limbs of a tree. We'll add feathers, eyes, and number them 1-5.
I hope everyone has a great evening!
Read to your kiddos!
Kali Parsons

Nov. 14, 2008

Nov. 14, 2008
Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a straw hat in our journals. For our fine motor work we threaded shapes with yarn, made frogs jump, and colored our turkeys from Ms. Mitchell's class. We went to the library with Pre-K and Ms. Kraal read two books about mice. We played outside on the boulders, pretending that we were dogs. We came in and had circle time. We determined that it's sunny today, counted to 14 during calendar time, and we danced to "Boogaloo". We talked about what our favorite part of the song was. During center time we all drew letter "H" objects out of our brown bag. Some items were hat, helmet, horse, hippo, etc. Next we all put letter "H" stickers and objects on letter H paper (hearts, hats, hens, hands, happy faces, and the letter "H"). We continued working on our thank you poster for Faith, our PTA president. We had pictures of our faces on paper and we drew our body and clothing below. We glued our portraits on the poster in the hay. We look just like we're riding on a hay ride! We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest we'll continue working on our fall trees with the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 on them.
Have a wonderful weekend!
Kali Parsons
PPCD Teacher
Zilker Elementary
841-0746

Nov. 13, 2008

Parents,
This morning we ate breakfast and drew a picture of a fall tree in our journals. For our fine motor work we drew with dry erase markers, made frogs jump, created structures with oval legos, and created circles by connecting pop beads. During circle time we determined that it's sunny today, counted to 13 and continued our orange/brown (ABAB) pattern during calendar time, and danced to "If You're Happy and You Know it". We played outside with our Pre-K friends. For story time today I read "The Scarecrow's Hat". After I read it we practiced the letter "H" sound. We noticed that we can feel our warm breath when we make the "H" sound. During centers created letter "H" art by gluing hearts and hands on big letter "H"s. Some chose to create patterns. We also began creating a thank you poster for Faith, our PTA President, for taking us on a hay ride. We glued hay (we noticed that it's a letter "H" word!) on the bottom half of a blue poster board. We glued cotton balls on the top half to create clouds in the sky. Ms. Pundt, our counselor, came to our class today. She talked about feelings and what we can do when we have those feelings. If we're sad, scared, or mad we can ignore what a friend is doing, we can use our words, we can walk away, or we can talk to an adult. She encouraged everyone to try the first three first before talking to an adult (unless someone is hurt, of course). We had lunch and played on the playground with Pre-K. After rest we'll do math centers in Pre-K. In my group we'll create fall trees by tracing our hand and arm. We'll glue a leaf on each finger and then write the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 on the leaves.
Have a great night!
Kali Parsons
PPCD Teacher
Zilker Elementary
841-0746