Right before we went to Summer Break, we went on a field trip to the zoo. We read a book called "Never Ever Shout in a Zoo" by Karma Wilson. We had animal wash station in our sensory table, we talked about our favorite animals and we drew some animals (well.. the other half of the animals!). 
At the zoo, we did an animal scavenger hunt and all the kids found all the animals! We also saw a seal show. The weather was nice and it was a really fun trip! 

While we're learning letter Pp, we decided that we'd like to have a party. As party was one of the words that begin with letter Pp. So we did a "Pajama Party." When we decided what to eat, we voted and Pancake won over Pie. Pineapple also won over Peach and Pear. It was a fun and delicious day! 

As scheduled, every month Ms. Nora would come to our classroom and we had a wonderful time singing, dancing and playing musical instruments! 

Phase 2 of the project, we continued to do more baking and invited more experts to answers some of the children's questions from phase 1. We changed the pretend center into a bakery, where children can sell bakery goods such as cakes, cookies, breads etc. The main area is the sensory table which act as a kitchen where children can pretend making cookies and cakes with cloud dough. Children surrounded by books about baking and activities that enforce the project. For every books that we read, we did activities to support children's knowledge in the project. We talked about things we can make with apples, & apple tasting when we read Apple Farmer Annie, we decided what can we put in our version of Friendship Pie when we read Porcupine's Pie, we made cake from sponges, we made art mixing baking soda and vinegar and more. We also did scrap paper collages, magnet art, bubble painting, our own gingerbread person, string art and even dandelion bouquet. 
We had a visitor from a cake decorator (Ms. Olivia) and had a wonderful time decorating (and eating) our own cake. Of course, we did a life painting of it before we ate it! 
Oh.. we don't want to forget about the runaway gingerbread cowboy, we made it, put it in the oven then he ran away, we looked everywhere until we found it hiding in one of the room so we hurry ate it up!  

Once a month, our preschoolers got a visitor from MacPhail Music. Ms. Nora, our music teacher from MacPhail, would teach us new songs, have us play with variety of musical instruments and move and dance. We are always excited to see her! 

Based on our observation in December, we came to a project that the children seemed to be interested in which is Baking and Bakery. So the classroom went through some changes to create an environment where children can learn more about baking and bakery. The pretend center is now a baking center where everywhere else are supporting play area to help children learn more about the project. Our first book to read was "The Little Red Hen," where she made a loaf of bread. So we did a bread test where children tried different kind of bread and decided which one they like best. The activities after that based on the books we read or the letter we were learning. All the activities were done to help children learn more about baking and bakery and answering all their questions about them.  During the month of February, while we kept learning about baking, we were also celebrating the month of LOVE and Black History Month!

After a few months of virtual learning, Preschool Pals was open for summer school with limited student. Only the children who were going to kindergarten were encouraged to attend. We have a smaller class for two days a week. We also did extra cleaning, more washing hands both for children and staff, temperature check every morning and used facial mask while we're inside. This summer the children were interested in bugs (they found a lot of bugs and worms while we were gardening) so we had a little project about bugs. Due to the short summer session and the two days a week class we were unable to answer all the children's questions. Nevertheless, the children had a lot of fun at school. Since we couldn't held a graduation party, on our last day of school, we had a little party with cupcakes, goody bags and diplomas for the children to bring home! 

Due to the pandemic caused by Covid 19, Way to Grow Preschool Pals had to close in mid March. Classroom teaching was placed by virtual visits and virtual classroom. We would like to thank all parents and caregivers who scheduled visits every week and encouraged their child to attend our virtual classroom. Here are some the pictures when we were away from each other and connected virtually.