This month we have been focusing a lot on shapes and numbers and the kids are getting so good at recognizing them! We've also learned about Q and R. I've been very impressed at how good the kids are getting at recognizing words that begin with our letter of the week.
This month has also been about Arizona Animals!
Last week we learned about what kinds of animals live in the desert. It was fun to talk about the difference between what animals the kids have seen in Arizona (at the zoo and the farm) and what animals are actually native to our state.
This week has been all about birds of Arizona. We have read lots of books and the kids have loved finding pictures of birds that they have actually seen before.
We spent the most time this week on Elf Owls, Roadrunners and Woodpeckers. This week we have watched a couple of clips from Wild Kratts to learn about these birds. The kids loved it and were always sad that we didn't have time to watch the whole episode. So if you're looking for something to let your child watch, Wild Kratts would be a great choice! There are tons of episodes about Arizona animals.
The favorite activities of the week have been making bird feeders and pretending to be woodpeckers. If your bird feeder hasn't come home yet, it will be sent home on Tuesday. Please take the time to help your child hang it somewhere the birds can find it!
As we talked about woodpeckers, we did a science experiment to find which surface in our classroom made the loudest tapping sound and found that the table was the loudest. We also talked about some of the surfaces that woodpeckers like to tap on. After that we practiced our woodpecker skills by using our beaks (toothpicks) to pick bugs (beads) out of a cactus (playdough). If you have all these supplies at home, this is a fantastic activity! It is great fine motor skills practice and the kids had so much fun doing it. Seriously, they all sat focused and silent for about 10 minutes doing it over and over again. The supplies are still sitting on the preschool table because my son has asked to play this game again at least 5 times this weekend.
