The first week of March we started planting our garden. The morning class helped the teacher plant seeds and water. In the afternoon, we talked about the fruits, vegetables and herbs. Our afternoon class planted; rosemary, sage, dill, cilantro, lavender, tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots, broccoli, swish chard, beets and watermelon. 

The AM class has been working on shapes, colors, letter sounds, letter identification and applying what we've been learning to play. 
The PM class has been working on wrapping up the community unit by creating and learning about places on our maps and building our own communities with forts. To end our unit next week the class will be applying what they know to a real life treasure hunt using a map and compass!

​March was the start of our Minnesota spring. We were hit with a mixture of warm sunny days and a snow storm. The teachers made sure the kids were able to take advantage of all of it. We spent a couple of our warm days outside on the playground. Three of our kids learned how to use the monkey bars! A big accomplishment! After the snow storm we went outside to climb the snow mounds in the parking lot, have a snowball fight, make snow slides  and build snowmen. ​

Our classroom has partnered with Macphail music to have our music teacher, Ms. Nora, come in weekly to sing, dance and play instruments with the kids. The kids recently learned how to play the tone block!

We started off the new year finishing up our unit on jobs. The kids learned about the importance of jobs and how they can help others and our community. We spent the last day of our unit playing bean bag toss, working together to make necklaces, playing doctors and shopping for groceries.  

In between units we had a surprise visit from my puppy Olive! She spent the day with the PM class. The kids had a chance to practice tricks with her, play fetch and run outside. Many of the kids were nervous to have her in the classroom but by the end of the day they all gave her lots of goodbye pets. The teachers constantly hear from the kids, "when is Olive going to come back?".

Olive came to visit our classroom to give the kids a chance to experience what it was like to have an animal in our classroom and get ready for our special visitors! Snake Discovery! 

Snake Discovery visited our classroom this February. The kids and their parents had the chance to learn about native snakes, their habitats, what they eat, how they shed their skin and fun facts about reptiles. The most exciting part was getting to hold some of them! We had so many brave volunteers!

We ended the month of February by celebrating Valentine’s Day and starting our new unit on community. This next month we will continue to learn about places in our Minneapolis community, how to use a map, explore with a compass and learn what it means to be a part of a community inside the classroom .

At the beginning of December we started our unit on jobs. Our first week we learned about community helpers and what jobs we see in our surrounding communities. The kiddos explored our new classroom layout equipped with a grocery store, doctors office and postoffice. During free play many kiddos took the time to buy groceries, have picnics and take care of sick patients. They learned about what a job is, the responsibility that comes with it and what kind of job they would like when they grow up!

The week before break we learned about and celebrated different winter holidays. These winter holiday's included Diwali, Ramadan, Hanukah, Ethiopian Christmas and Christian Christmas. We decorated our classroom with all of kids arts and crafts to celebrate the end of 2024. Our last day before break we decorated gingerbread houses. Of course the kiddos favorite part was licking the frosting off the cookies!

After our long winter break we continued to study our jobs unit. We learned about the importance of a job and the responsibility that comes with it. Our PM kids now have the responsibility of their own jobs in the classroom. Every week the kids will pick a different job from the bucket. Our kids jobs are table cleaner, snack helper, sweep, backpack patrol, bathroom monitor, supply manager, calendar, weather, time keeper and much more. So far it seems their favorite jobs are helping out during group time with calendar, counting and erasing the board. They have been doing a wonderful job creating their own structure in the classroom and becoming their own leader!

In mid-June, our class started the summer with a games unit. The kids learned how to play kick ball, connect 4, candyland, busytown, go fish, etc. Many of these games involved winning and losing. The big emotions that came with losing created a beautiful opportunity to problem solve and cope with one of life's biggest obstacles.
Throughout the summer our class continued to read and study author and illustrator Mo Willems. The kids learned to identify characters, settings, problems and solutions. Their favorite book was "Watch Me Throw the Ball!".
By the end of June Ms. Gwen had many requests to bake cookies. Each class worked together to bake chocolate chip banana bread. Their favorite parts were smashing the bananas and sitting down to eat the finished product.

During the third week of July, the class took a trip to the Como Zoo! The kids spent time with their families looking at some of their favorite animals and watching a sparky the seal show. ​
To end the month of July the kids played with shaving cream, made sandcastles, watered the garden and had a surprise visit from the ice cream man! 

To start the month of August, our class took some time to talk about big transitions. The morning class learned about what it would be like moving up to the afternoon. And the afternoon class talked about graduating and going to a new school for kindergarten! We watched Inside Out, which talked all about the emotions that come with a big move. 

We wrapped up our summer with the PM kids graduation and our end of the school year celebration at Huset Park. On our last day of school we had a water balloon fight, made ice cream, handed out awards and said goodbye to many of our kids. It was a whirlwind of a summer that ended in a bittersweet way. All the best to our little graduates!

​See you next year!

Last week we finished up our forest animal unit. To the kids surprise zebras, tigers and cheetahs do not live in Minnesota! Our focus was learning about what animals we see outside like squirrels, deer, birds, chipmunks, beavers, etc. We categorized these animals into the habitats they live in; tree, ground and water. The kids spent plenty of time playing with flash lights in the bear den and protecting their castles from evil snakes. ​

After coming back from summer break, the class finally started to build our garden! We learned about what types of fruits and vegetables we were growing and how to plant them. The kids took the time to paint plant labels and decorate the garden bed. Finally it was time to plant! The kids learned to cultivate the soil using their racks, dig holes to put the seeds in and water them. Wow so much hard work! We took a much-needed break with some ice pops in the shade. Every day the kids have looked forward to watering our garden and watching the little sprouts grow.

For the summer our AM and PM classes will start a small unit on games. The goal is to help with following directions, listening to others and being okay with winning and losing. The PM class's main focus will be our author study for the summer. The kids decided they wanted to learn about and read books by author and illustrator, Mo Willems! 

Week 4 we finished up our plants unit by learning about what fruits and vegetable we can grow in our garden. Next, we got ready for Mother's Day by going on a rainy nature walk to collect flowers to make cards! The kids were most excited about all the dandelions that bloomed in the field next to the preschool. 

Week 5 we ended our plants unit with gardening. The kids took the time to paint pots. We spent an afternoon outside learning how to plant seeds! The kids have continued to check their plants everyday.

We finished our unit by going on a field trip to the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum. The kids attended to Ready, Set, Grow! program. There they watched a puppet show, looked at bugs under a microscope, released ladybugs into the greenhouse, planted seeds to bring home and went on a bird watching walk! So many sights, sounds and textures to explore!

Throughout the plants unit the kids loved playing with the stuffed animals. Based on student interests and preparation for summer, Ms. Gwen decided to started a new unit on Forest Animals! The first weeks focus was on sights, sounds and smells in the forest. The kids spent the week exploring changes in the classroom, learning about different forest animals, the sounds they make, creating animal habitats and spending extra time outside. The kids spotted a robin, rabbit, geese and pine cones while playing outside.

During this mini project, we spent time learning about the different food groups. We talked about foods we would like to try, but haven’t, and tried them during our snack time.  We sorted pictures from the food groups on the classroom wall. We read the book “Stone Soup” to learn even more about vegetables.  Students made a grocery list for our own stone soup.  They took turns cutting the different vegetables and helping to cook the soup.  We all agreed the best part of the day was getting to try our soup.  Check out the pictures from our soup making day!