This week in Science we have been learning about our five senses. Today we had a taste tasting to show the differences between sour, sweet, salty and bitter. Of course, the girls were looking forward to this experience! :-)
Pictured below are all the items we got to sample today:
Here are my girlies enjoying their sweet donut treat :-)
Of course when they tried the sour and bitter items, they had to be quite dramatic with their facial expressions!
Some exciting things happened in the classroom while we were out for Easter break! Cally's Mom had offered to do a "hatching chicks" experience with the girls, and I was beyond thrilled about it. I have always wanted to go through the process of having eggs in the classroom, and see them hatch into chicks. Since Cally's Mom is experienced with working with chickens, it was the perfect year to do it. Over break, she set up a mini incubator in the classroom. Needless to say, when the girls spotted the eggs today, they were quite ecstatic (when are they ever NOT ecstatic you may ask? :P)! Of course, this will be a few weeks' process, so we'll see how patient they are! They were already asking me today if the eggs were hatching into chicks yet....oh dear :-)
Figures that the caterpillars would choose Easter break to enter the chrysalis stage. :-) I was a bit bummed that the girls didn't get to see the caterpillars hanging upside down, beginning the whole process, but they really didn't seem to be bothered by it. They were just excited that we could finally move them to the butterfly pavilion! It is just one step closer to seeing them turn into butterflies!!
We had a special treat this afternoon. Ella's mom offered to come in and
tell the Easter story by using "resurrection eggs". It was a great
object lesson for the girls! Each egg had a different object inside related to the
Easter story. She definitely had the girls' attention. :-) They couldn't
wait to see what was in each egg and pass it around. Of course, the best part was finding out that the last egg was empty, reminding the girls that Jesus rose from the dead -
the tomb is empty!!!
After the story was over, the girls were able to decorate Easter egg cookies. They had a lot of fun adding icing, sprinkles, and little candies!
Today was another beautiful spring day, so I looked for any opportunity to spend time outdoors with my girls. We had our snack outside picnic-style, and then the girls enjoyed extra playground time. I definitely got my exercise giving these girls "under-doggies" on the swings!
Our caterpillars have doubled in size in just one week! The girls are still in love with them, and are in awe at how big they are getting. It never ceases to amaze me how these creepy, crawly little creatures turn into such beautiful butterflies. Only an amazing God could do something like this! :-)
Today I was quite anxious to be outside with my girls. It was simply not a day to stay in the classroom. It was a day to go EXPLORING! Of course, the girls were all for that! We went to the back edges of the church property to explore the creek. The girls could have stayed back there all day. :-)
On our exploration, the girls were excited to spot some daffodils. A definite first sign of spring!! We picked one to bring back as evidence of our exploration :-) Everyone wanted to have a picture with it. Even Miss Follett got her picture taken....5 times. {Each girl had to have a turn, but hey, it gave me a lot of choices on which one I liked the best. :-)}
My girls were able to meet some new "friends" today! Every year when I teach Kindergarten, I always enjoy having my students watch the life cycle of a butterfly. I knew these girls would be excited about it, and they sure didn't disappoint me today! They already are in love with these 5 little caterpillars, and have even named them after themselves. (I am not sure how they can tell who is who?! I guess it depends on what the caterpillars are doing at that moment? :P)
Stay tuned for more pictures as we enjoy watching this amazing life cycle!
Today was one of those days. The kind when, for some reason, you just feel like you are not doing a great job as a teacher. Here we are in the last quarter of the school year already - have I accomplished anything with these girls???!!
It had been a crazy, whirlwind, hyperactive morning with these little ladies, and I didn't have much "willpower" left. Well, I was trying to get the papers out for numbers class, and of course, I finally got the girls sitting down and didn't want them to just be going wild in their seats while I gathered things together. To give them something to do, I told them to count by 5's. Now we had been working on it this whole past quarter, but usually I counted along with them. Today I had them try it for the first time by themselves, and they DID it!!!! Of course, I gave them the excited, thrilled, "mouth-open" reaction they wanted to see, so they kept counting by 5's over and over. :-)
I had to get a video of them during one of their many "rounds". It is amazing how hearing your students count by 5's gives you just enough of a "teacher boost" to get you through the rest of the afternoon! Hmmmm...perhaps they are learning something in Kindergarten?!!!!
