Just elfin around

Today I slept in until 6:30 . Not for any reason other than I know this is going to be a hectic week and Randy had my favorite Pandora radio station playing and it was COLD outside and the covers were SO warm.  Take a few extra minutes for yourself during the holiday season. Sometimes we all get so stressed we don’t even get the chance to enjoy the magic of Christmas.

Today I pulled out the Christmas theme box .  I love opening theme boxes that have been put away all year.  It is like…well.. Christmas !

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The loved the little elf mask !

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Danielle showed them how to make a pattern on a Christmas chain.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More tree decorating . They found some REALLY LARGE ornaments.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was a tiny table top tree to decorate with figures made by  a former student mom.  I love these little guys. They are hand painted.  Great fine motor work trying to get them on the tree.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There were miniature  presents to stack, count or sort.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There is a village for pretend play.  One time today Kimber said ” Look MsDebbie, they are all on the top of the building watching the parade! ”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was a sensory box for the kids to explore with things like rubies, pinecones and cinnamon sticks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There were colored paint chips to sort .

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One of  the activities we did today was a Christmas tree shape review.  The shapes were all piled on their paper. Our first step was to sort the shapes and then figure out how to build the tree with the largest on the bottom to the smallest on top.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can see that some of the three year olds were not quite ready for this activity. Too many steps.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Others got it almost right…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was so proud of this picture. Sometimes when we just have a few minutes left to kill before nap time I might read a story and ask the kids to draw me a picture of something in the book.   This is really a hard thing for kids to do. They are taking something abstract and putting it on paper . They have to come up with a plan in their head as to what they want to draw.  Many of the younger threes would just circle scribble on their paper and tell me it’s a tornado.  ( Tornados are their favorite thing to draw when they haven’t developed that skill yet.   And well.. they are some pretty gorgeous tornados! )  The older 4’s and 5’s draw large pictures and tell me paragraphs about what they drew .  It is all developmental and can’t really be taught. Listening skills can be practiced by playing listening games like… Simon Says or reading a LOT and asking questions after each page.  It will all come in time.

It has been a good day.