Valentine's Day 2015!

Here are some pictures of valentine themed activities we did leading up to Valentine's Day.

Heart is the shape we are learning about this month.  Heart shaped parquetry cards...

 Heart patterns with paint dobbers...

 Measuring with hearts...

Puppy love heart craft...

 Syllable sorting with Valentine words...

 Counting and clipping with clothes pins...

 Rhyming hearts...

 Bat rhymes with cat...

 We recorded the rhymes we found...

 CVC word building with Valentine hearts and a candy train...

Something new and fun for the sensory table!

On Valentine's Day we ate heart shaped Kashi cereal, pears, and a smoothie with a fun straw...

 Group pic...

 We made love bug headbands...

 We sorted Valentine heart shaped candy...

 Then we graphed our candy and identified which color we had the most and least of...

 For lunch we had heart shaped grilled cheese sandwiches, a Baby Bel cheese with a heart punched out of it, strawberries, tomato soup, and milk with another fun straw!

We loved showing off our valentine boxes we made at home!!!

 Passing out our valentine's - one person passed at a time...

 "THANK YOU!"  Group hug!!!!

 Building with heart shaped marshmallows!

 More sugar!  Cupcakes and X & O Pretzels (Kisses and Hugs)...

 We played tic-tac-toe with our pretzels...

 J was amazed because R won!

 Pink frosting monster!

 We can make a heart with our hands...

 "I love you!"

 A- was so proud of her robot valentine box...

 Afternoon activities:

Fill the container with pom poms using a clothes pin (great for fine motor)...

 Sort the hearts by color or size...

 Counting with hearts...

 Cake walk with number mats!  E was in charge of the music...

 Free art with valentine stickers, fun cutting scissors, colored paper, and valentine themed stamps...

 Lot's of singing, dancing, and music making on this day!

 At the end of the day these kids played "My Turn, Your Turn!"

What an awesome Valentine's Day!  Thank you for all the sweet valentine's!!!!

We are independant kids!

Since our dinosaur unit, I have been allowing the kids to serve themselves recently.  I figure it is a life skill they should be encouraged to practice every once and a while.  They will potentially go through the lunch line in Kindergarten, so this is great practice!

On this day we had taco salad bowls with all the fixings...

I also recently purchased "Help Yourself - Child Sized Pitchers!"  The kids LOVE pouring their own milk!  They really have had only a few accidents, and with each accident they learn a little more!

We had a lot of kids make the "Clean Plate Club" on this day!  Who doesn't love tacos?!

On this day we had homemade "Subway" sandwiches on hoagie bread!  The kids were so excited because they really believed we were having Subway!

Our Snow Globe Family

It is "I love to read month!"  We read one of my favorite books recently...

Then I cut photos of the kids and put them in clear plastic plates with white packing peanuts for snow.  The kids answered a questionnaire:  If I lived in a snow globe I would see, hear, smell, feel...

They turned out super cute!

Our Time Management System...

I love love LOVE our new timer!!!!  This timer is a great visual for the kids to see how much time we have left for eating meals, cleaning up, art projects, etc.  It also beeps when the time has run out!  I am certain the kids love it as much as I do!  I want to get one for Emmett for piano lessons, reading minutes, etc.!

The blue ooze tube is a fun timer we use for taking turns with toys.  It takes about four minutes for the ooze to reach the bottom, and then it can be turned back over to start again.  A lot of times the kids will tattle on a friend and tell me "She/He is not sharing."  My response has always been, "Sharing also means we have to wait our turn.  Please get an ooze tube and wait your turn.  If your friend doesn't share at that point, you can come and tell me."