Gray Whale Cove

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Gray Whale Cove!

When it is 85 degrees in SF, you must go to the beach!

We discovered this spot with our kindergarten group on an adventure the week before, and it was so amazing and empty we had to come explore it again with the preschoolers! The fun (read: slightly terrifying) part about getting here, is you have to park across the highway (in a bumpy and rocky dirt lot with the bus!), and then find a gap to run across and then hop the guardrail to find the trail. Thankfully our bright green matching tie-dye, and adorable faces usually make all cars stop to happily watch us pass.

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Once across, the views below are breathtaking!

And there were quite a few dramatic and creative ideas the kids came up with for how we should get down!

But it doesn’t stop there. As we make our way down the trail (with everyone laughing that Teacher Becca forgot to put her shoes on when we loaded up!) we found some cool climbing trees on the cliff and a swing that overlooks the cove. Once we made our way further down the trail, we came to a large set of stairs that led all the way down to the beach. There was a small river to cross, and the fast stair climbers explored the pond a bit, before running onto the beach and the waves.

We loved playing and running through the waves, searching for mussel shells (the kindergarteners had shown us some of their collections from this beach), building castles, and climbing the rocks. We also has some fun digging holes close to the water line, watching them fill up to makes “pools,” and jumping in them!

Redwood Regional Park

We decided to head across the bay bridge to the East Bay and explore the redwood trees in Redwood Regional Park. We explored some of the trails and found lots of interesting flowers, leaves, and climbing trees before meeting up with Teacher Charity for some “jammin” in the forest! Before starting, we relocated to a new spot with an amazing open and flat space amongst the tall trees, and ever heard a woodpecker pecking along to our music. We quickly hunted for our own rhythm sticks (which Charity normally brought when we used to have class back at school) so that we could bang along to some songs. One of our favorites is “Tree House” and it was especially magical to get to sing and dance to it in the forest surrounded by so many trees that would make great tree houses! We will definitely come back to this spot again soon.

Preschool Circle Time Discussions

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sign language

Over the course of the last two weeks, the preschool children have shown interest in sign language when we eat lunch together as a group. They’ve been practicing the words that are familiar to them like, “more”, “milk”, “thank you”, and “clean up”. With this child-initiated topic of interest, we decided to expand their horizons of sign language and brought out the ASL (American Sign Language) alphabet to practice some finger spelling at Circle Time. We show them the hand gestures for each letter and encourage them to try to do it with their hands. We’ve also practiced spelling some friends’ names and have learned how to sign emotions like “happy”, “excited”, “mad”, and “frustrated”. It’s amazing to see how fast they pick up on it and how many sign letters they can recall! This past week we practiced finger spelling the days of the week and are now becoming masters of the letters “D A Y”. We have also set out sign language sheets (same image as above) and letters as a tabletop activity so that those kids who are interested can refer to the chart to continue practicing on during open-play. Not only does sign language help build fine motor development, it provides another vessel for communication for the children. Some children may feel shy or low energy throughout different parts of their day. Knowing that they are becoming skilled at a different type of communication will help them build confidence in those moments. Children thrive off of having options for mostly anything, including how to communicate with their adults and peers alike. For families at home, dinnertime is a great opportunity to practice finger spelling common words or phrases you and your children use around the house. The image above can be downloaded onto an iPad or computer for easy access, or even printed off (you can also find the image on google when you type “American Sign Language Chart”). There are also different sets of flash cards on Amazon if your child seems really interested in extending their sign language use at home. Our next step in sign language will likely be learning common words that we use at school like, “please”, “thank you”, “today”, and “yesterday”. Feel free to share different words of interests your children may have at home and we can practice them at Circle Time, too!

If you want to keep your child’s interest in sign language going for some time, there’s a set of 500 Flash Cards of American Sign Language that has relatable photos of adults showing the movements for $17.06 on Amazon.

If you want a set of flash cards around for more common and every day words, this set consists of the numbers 1-10 along with 105 other common sign language terms that children typically use, with photos of cartoon-like children showing the movements. - $8.69 on Amazon.

One hand sign that Courtney brought to the classroom is called “Quiet Coyote” (pictured above). This hand signal provides a visual for children to join circle with calm bodies and quiet voices. The middle and ring finger touching the thumb represents a quiet voice, while the pointer and pinky fingers represent open ears and ready for listening. Courtney likes to use Quiet Coyote to minimize the voice volume level in the classroom during transitions and at Circle Times, that way teacher’s aren’t trying to raise their voice levels above children’s, making it a more relaxed and well-regulated experience when we are together as a group.

Dear firefighters

With all the fires that have been burning throughout California, the children have been drawing pictures and writing letters to the firefighters, rooting them on and thanking them for everything they do. To build on their interest in letter writing and firefighters, we’ve introduced and created several salutations/greeting cards that the kids can refer to to practice writing it themselves. We’ve also discussed all the gear that firefighters wear as well as their functions and ultimately wrote one big letter as a class. As the fires continue, children have consistent interest in writing letters and discussing the role of “the helpers”. Once we collect all of their written letters, we will take the children to the post office where they can personally send their letters off to the firefighters. If you know a firefighter, give them an elbow bump for all their hard work and bravery!

a note to families from the preschool teachers

Thank you for all of your encouragement, flexibility, patience, and understanding during these unprecedented times. We hope that you are staying safe, healthy, and enjoying the time you have outside in nature when the smoke or the heat isn’t keeping you inside!

With love and gratitude, Courtney, Alice, and Rebecca.

Preschool Picassos

Over the past few weeks, the children have been participating in various art projects, ranging from painting to beading to making three-dimensional creations! They love painting with different colors and blending them together to see if they can create a new color or simply to see how the colors blend with each other. They’ve discovered that water colors can blend quite beautifully and softly as one color bleeds into another color, whereas with tempera paint, the whole page may turn brown if they mix too many at a time! They have also explored movement and the different ways in which they can make the paintbrush move across the canvas, making large, back-and-forth strokes to fill the entire page; making thinner, more precise strokes that resemble scattered dots; adding texture by layering the paint; and/or creating lines of all shapes and sizes. Using this exploration, they have created their own versions of rainstorms, treasure maps, wildfires, and hearts to name a few. When they are not busy exploring with paint, they are often occupied with glitter art! The children use a paintbrush to paint glue to where they want the glitter to be placed before subsequently scattering the glitter on top. It’s always exciting to see where the glitter actually ends up landing.

When we were stuck inside because of the poor air quality and wanted to unwind with a little fine motor work, the children practiced stringing beads of various sizes to create necklaces. Since the beads were wooden and bare, they decorated them by developing their own designs and painting them all sorts of colors. Though it was challenging to put the beads through the shoelace, they tried their best to stay focused, ultimately creating unique necklaces that they were so excited to show their friends and family. Some friends even strung the beads in patterns based on size or colors. From a teacher’s perspective, it was amazing to see the children refine their fine motor control and manual dexterity while doing something they enjoyed and thought was fun. We will definitely be revisiting bead stringing in the future so that those children who are interested can continue to master it! It will be interesting to see how they work with it in a different way that reflects their current development. Another activity they have really enjoyed is art with loose parts. Using a paintbrush with glue, they carefully decide where they want to place glitter and various items like buttons and shapes, adding to their work as they see fit.

We love seeing the kids explore their own artistic identities and can’t wait to see how their artwork evolves!

Forest Music Adventure to China Camp State Park!

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Bus Adventure to China Camp!

On the morning of our adventure, it was starting to get very smokey here in the Sunset, so we needed to figure out a place to go to escape the smoke. We looked on the map and saw that San Rafael had green air, so we packed up and off we went in the bus to China Camp State Park! We are so grateful to have the bus now to get to explore so much more of our beautiful world!

The drive over the golden gate bridge was foggy but exciting, and then of course the rainbow tunnel. Once we got closer to San Rafael, the smoke disappeared and it was all blue skies. We passed by lots of sailboats and fishing boats along the water that sparked many conversations until finally making it to the parking lot at China Camp. Once we unloaded, we had to check out the map, and were very curious about where the different places were and just how big the park is! We will definitely need to make some more trips here, because there is still so much we want to explore. We then made our plan to hike for a bit, find some climbing trees, and then meet teacher Charity down at the beach for music class.

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Off We Go!

We always let the kids direct our hikes, stopping for discussion and encouraging healthy debate over which way to go, when to stop ,and what to see. Whenever we reach a fork in the road, it is fun to hear the conversations and ideas they try to convince each other to agree to.

Our first stop was not far down the trail- we discovered some amazing trees that just HAD to be climbed! Climbing trees are always on our list of “must-do’s” when we go on adventures. Often at circle time before we leave, and during snack, we have a discussion about what everyone would like to do and accomplish that day. Sometimes these discussions will lead to the ultimate decision of where we will go, especially now with the bus allowing us so much more freedom, and less need to plan ahead. I don’t think climbing trees have ever been left off the list, and we often think we could spend the full day just at some of our favorites. They are pretty much the ultimate open-ended play environment!

After doing some climbing, we discovered that the ground was covered in so many leaves! We decided we should make a big pile to jump in, but then discovered that throwing them up into the air is the most fun! This prompted a discussion about the seasons, and how it must be getting close to fall. One friend told me “Hey, maybe it’s already fall here because it’s a different part of the world and you said different places have different seasons!” We had a discussion earlier in the week about the equator and climates, and specifically the rain forests around the world. And you know, the school bus is pretty magical, so maybe it did take us further than I thought ;)

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Heading Down!

Once we had our fill in the leaves, it was time to head to the beach to find Teacher Charity and do some Jammin’! Some of us chose to explore a pretty adventurous way down to the beach, and others took an easier route along the road. But, we all made it back together at the bottom!

It was quite the beautifully, picturesque day down at the beach, with almost no breeze, clear skies, calm water, and it felt like we had the beach all to ourselves! Music class was so fun, and the location of course prompting us to sing some of our favorites, “We love the Beach”, “Ice Cream” and “Rocket Ship.” We finished class as always with some mindfulness, this time doing some pebble meditation with little beach pebbles we found all around us.

After music, we set up for a lunch picnic by the water. After lunch we took off our shoes (and some even our pants!) so we could explore the water! It was cold, but refreshing, and we all decided that it was definitely a little warmer than ocean beach. We found sticks, some climbing rocks, and two different types of seaweed! Some friends continued collecting pebbles and enjoyed throwing them into the water. We wanted to try skipping them, but most of the pebbles were too round for that. We also found lots of little shells. A few brave friends went deeper into the water (maybe not all on purpose!) and enjoyed running through the little waves and splashing. We wished we could stay there all day! But, it was time to get back on the bus and head back across the bridge to school to take a nap- dreaming of all the fun we had and the many adventures to come.

Welcome to the 2020 School Year! (first two weeks of preschool)

We have been so excited for the start of this new school year! We have so many new friends, and new plans, and covid can’t stop us from all the fun! These first couple weeks have flown by- enjoy the highlights from the preschool classroom below.

Dramatic Play

To start the year, we have a “house” set up in our dramatic play area. We have already seen lots of role playing: dressing up as chefs and cooking meals for our friends and teachers, becoming cleaners and doing laundry as well as cleaning lots of different parts of our room, and being mommies/daddies taking care of the baby dolls and animals. It is always so interesting to watch and see how much they learn just by watching their role models in everyday life! We are already seeing friendships grow and blossom here, and are excited to see all of the play and growth in this space throughout this year.

Art Area

We have been exploring watercolor, both from dry cake form and liquid. We have enjoyed both, but discovered that the liquid colors are much more vivid, while the dry form is easier to blend and create our own colors. We have created quite the watercolor gallery on our walls- feel free to take a peek across the classroom during drop offs/pick ups to see our creations!

After the watercolor, we noticed lots of friends enjoying using the brushes and blending colors, but wanting more color and texture. We got a delivery of many large gallons of paint, which were very exciting to unpack (bubble wrap!) and discuss, so we decided to move on to acrylic painting. We tried on multiple mediums: cardboard, printer paper, and painting paper. We have quite the group of artists!

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Mud Kitchen

The mud kitchen is constantly full of life, this week creating some deliciously muddy concoctions, and then turning into a music studio for a friendly percussion band.

Blocks and Building

Outside, we have gotten busy with our blocks: creating different balance beams and platforms, using the flat planks as surfboards and skateboards, and making new bridges for our river. We have enjoyed giving our friends rides in the wheelbarrow as well as bringing the materials to different areas for building.

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The Swing

Why are swings always just so much fun? Add on a bunch of friends, a spinner, and it can’t get better.… or can it?

The swing has been a staple of our yard- turning into a train, a rocket, an airplane, or a ship- almost always carrying at least one passenger (but often many more) somewhere. We’ve enjoyed it for the last few weeks (and years!) until our friendly magical garden gnomes decided to get a little tricky! (ask the kids for the whole story, they will tell it much better than me ;) But, don’t worry, we are taking this opportunity to create an even better swing set up- so stay tuned for the new and improved version!

A Few More Backyard Highlights…

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Bus Adventures!

We went on our first bus adventures! The first week, we just had to check it out, explore the seats, and go for a little drive. Then, we were ready for the next week and our first forest adventure and music class!

We had so much fun exploring Golden Gate Park, going back to one of our favorite spots from last year (below the casting pools) and finding climbing trees, the teepee fort, and of course lots of sticks. We built a fairy house, and discovered more forts have popped up before heading to the field to meet teacher Charity for music class. We have been so excited to finally get the see her and sing and dance together in person! We cannot wait for all the thursday adventures to come.

Magnet Wall Water Play

With spring days upon us, we have been eager to help water the plants and play with the sprinkler. But who are we kidding, no matter the season we always love water play. In the backyard, we just got a new water kit that pairs with the magnet wall! When first introduced to this, we were confused how the pieces connected and what the tubes were for, but with further exploration we found that they could be a firehouse, or even a gardening hose! We had to make sure that our plants were taken care of for the day and decided what a fun way to water them. We also quickly learned that teamwork is helpful for this activity because multiple hands are needed in order to make sure the hose goes where we want it to. It was fun seeing what different things we could use to transfer the water from the bucket to the wall. We tried cones, the funnels, plastic cups, but our favorite was the watering cans. We had to explore with different heights while pouring, we were resourceful and used a nearby stump. This activity allows the kids to gain awareness of gravity, force, and speed. It also promotes cooperation and communication between everyone. With more warm days on the horizon, our exploration with this water play has just begun.

Our Silhouettes!

At Manos, we worked on an exciting project in which we made our silhouettes and drew in the features of our faces and bodies. This challenged us to think about our features and their shapes and colors. We took things step-by-step and started by drawing our facial features and hair, trying our best to choose colors that actually corresponded to that of our real features. Next, we drew on our clothes, fingers, and shoes and displayed them on the walls for everyone to view. We had so much fun looking at each other’s drawings and seeing how similar (or not) they were to the friend who made it. Regardless of how realistic our drawings were, we enjoyed the process and are very proud of what we made.

It was amazing to see how focused and attentive to detail the kids were in drawing themselves, with some friends drawing in eyelashes, teeth, fingernails, and personal physical characteristics like freckles and bald spots. This activity not only allowed the children to refine their fine motor control, but it ultimately helped them gain a sense of self as they were challenged to think about and view themselves physically (i.e., “What do I look like?”).

Bubble Wrap Obstacle Course

Since we love popping bubble wrap with our fingers, we decided to switch it up a bit by trying to pop the bubbles with our feet in an obstacle course. With the help of our teachers, who helped us lay out and tape down the bubble wrap, we decided to run over it using a variety of movements. On one lap, we decided that everyone had to stomp. On subsequent laps, friends had to crawl, run, and hop on the bubble wrap in different speeds, carefully making their way around the structure and back to the hill where they would roll down to finish it off. When participating in this obstacle course, we tried our best to stay behind the friends in front of us and reminded each other that it was not a race. We were all there to have fun and get our energy out before heading home for the day; and, in so doing, we were ultimately practicing our gross motor and perpetual awareness skills in a social context. We enjoyed popping the bubbles and anticipate our next roll of bubble wrap to squish!