A Fine Day for Fine Motor

 As we often talk about, fine motor development happens in lots of different ways besides just drawing and writing, and today we worked with inter-locking links, which was a very tricky fine motor-task.

measuring Fran with links

 We also revisited the clay, today working with slabs of clay and wooden tools. The Turtles found many different ways to manipulate the clay from scoring the surface, to tearing chunks, and from pinching pieces to rubbing the surface, again building their fine motor strength and coordination.

 In the garden, we discovered that some tomatoes and lettuce had sprouted, and that a red radish was developing!

 And then we were off to Missy for a Bear Hunt, a game of Dodge Ball, some free play with balls and hula hoops, and of course, stretching.

A Castle in the Clouds

We assembled out castle today, and it quickly became home to many giants and princesses! We didn't stay long before we headed outside to the playground for the Kindergarten's Earth Day Parade!

Outside, we noticed that our garden is sprouting peas and radishes!

We headed back inside for snack and choice time, and several children worked with their seedlings, making observational drawings.

Other activities:

Creating Our Castle

Since the Turtles made sketches for our classroom castle, it was time to get to work! Tamara helped cut out the castle, while the Turtles mixed custom paint colors to paint the castle. It was great seeing the Turtles' beanstalk story come to life with all the additions we are making to the room!

Some other fun things we did during the morning included:

watering our beans and sunflowers,

building VERY tall buildings with magnatiles (good thing Fran had lots of extra help from the Turtles),

and creating parking garages for all of our cars.

Then we set off to see Jenny where we began the class with one of our favorite greeting songs.  We even recorded it so that we could share it with all our families and friends.  In class today, we sang a Pete Seger story about a frog who went to the corner store,  made beats with wooden sticks, and peeled our bodies like a banana.

singing "Speckled Frogs"

peeling like bananas

pretending to have tusks