A "spooky" reading...well not really

Happy Halloween

We had a "spooky" reading of The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything. We went in the big room and shut off the lights. Then teachers held flashlights toward the book as we read and acted out our book.  We also invited our stuffed animal friends from home to enjoy the story. It was a fun day!

Harvest Soiree

Our Harvest Soiree was a great success! We had fun at choice time wearing our costumes.  Then our school went to see Dr. Conti and central office on our Harvest Soiree Parade.  He gave us stickers too. It was so fun.  Then we continued our parade to the cafeteria and then to the athletic wing.  The high school students and teachers loved asking us about our costumes.  

Just a reminder, tomorrow we are going to have a "spooky" reading of our unit book The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything. We will read our book under a sheet with a flashlight. You child can bring in a small stuffed animal friend from home to join in the fun.  We wrote invitations to them today. Also your child can dress in red, white, and blue for Red Sox Day. Tomorrow we will show our Red Sox pride by wearing Red Sox or wearing their colors. 

This is a fun week to celebrate the end of our first unit of Harvest.

 Creating Costumes out of Pattern Blocks

Dr. Conti, thank you for dressing up and giving us stickers!

Happy Soiree

End of our Harvest Unit October 28-November 1

Harvest Unit- Last Week of Unit
 Classroom Happenings
- Our class Soiree- Your child may dress in a costume, fancy shirt, or choose to wear nothing. It is their choice. We are celebrating the end of our harvest unit. We will parade with our harvest lanterns around the high school to make this day special.
-October 31- Please send your child to school with 1 stuffed animal friend so we can have a special reading of our supplemental book, The Little Old Lady Who Wasn't Afraid of Anything. We will go under a sheet and use a flashlight to read our story.

Books This Week:
Possum's Harvest Moon
Frederick
The Little Old Lady Who Wasn't Afraid of Anything


Concept Questions For This Week:
-Manners and rules for a party
-Animal Habitats
-What is a harvest soiree? Why should be celebrate harvest time?

Handwriting Activities
Continuing with our Handwriting Without Tears color books.  We are work in these books to reinforce alligator fingers and how to color specific pictures using controlled fine motor movements.
-Acorn Painting (promoting alligator grip)

Small Groups This Week:
1. Moon Sequencing (To prepare for the Harvest Moon Celebration) We will sequence the phases of the moon and relate it back to our unit book Possum's Harvest Moon
2. Writing Invitations- We will be writing invitations for our stuffed animal friends to come to school on October 31.  We will have a spooky reading of the Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid Of Anything.  We can bring 1 stuffed animal to join us under a sheet with a flashlight to read our supplemental book.  It should be a lot of fun!
3.Number Recognition and 1:1 Correspondence game- We will roll a number cube, label the number and  write the number on dry erase boards.  Then each child will take the correct number of corn kernels to add to a chicken bingo board. The idea is to "feed" all the hungry chickens on the board.
****Soiree- Pictures of the event and more info will follow

Centers

Art Table: tooth brush "flicking" to create white paint specks on a black sky background. Then painting a yellow harvest moon

Block Area:blocks 

Sensory Table: Popcorn kernels

Book Area: books about farms and growing

Easel: painting with primary colors

Writing Table: Party Notes

Dramatic Play: Dress-up for the Soiree (a collection of various costumes)

Puzzles and Manipulatives: farm related puzzles

Science Table: Gerbils from the Science Center(drawing pictures and making observations)
Rug- Tinker Toys

Preschool Life Skills

Every week we will be reinforcing previous skills and introducing new skills. Some weeks we will spend more time with a previous skill before moving to a new skill.
New Life Skill: 
"When I give you an instructions, do them right away." (2-3 step directions)

Previous Life Skills:

"When a teacher calls your name, you stop, look at the speaker, and say "yes".

 "When I give you an instruction, do it right away."

Go Red Sox

Today for our handwriting time we made Red Sox hats. We colored the socks red then we traced the letters Boston Red Sox.  We used red and blue bingo dobbers, markers, and stickers to decorate the head bands too.  We are hoping it brings them good luck tonight! Go Sox!

Harvest Unit October 21-25

Harvest Unit (Week 4)
 Books This Week:
Possum's Harvest Moon
Frederick
The Little Old Lady Who Wasn't Afraid of Anything

Concept Questions For This Week:
-Preparing for Winter
-Nocturnal Animals
-Moon phases
-What is a harvest soiree? Why should be celebrate harvest time?

Handwriting Activities
Continuing with our Handwriting Without Tears color books.  We are work in these books to reinforce alligator fingers and how to color specific pictures using controlled fine motor movements.
-Making Lanterns for our classroom to prepare for our harvest soiree (more info will follow to explain)

Small Groups This Week:
1.Following Directions- We will listen to direction to complete a farm scene
2.Sorting- We will discuss what people and animals do to prepare for the winter. Then we will sort a variety of objects
3. Farm Sound Bingo Game
**Creating Memory Bubbles to correlate to our story Frederick. He was a mouse that chose to collect memories instead of food for the winter.

Centers

Art Table: acorn painting and creating a rock wall mural 

Block Area:blocks 

Sensory Table: Acorns we collected last week

Book Area: books about farms and growing

Easel: painting with primary colors

Writing Table: Party Notes

Dramatic Play: Farmers Market

Puzzles and Manipulatives: farm related puzzles

Science Table: Gerbils from the Science Center(drawing pictures and making observations)
Rug- Legos

Preschool Life Skills

Every week we will be reinforcing previous skills and introducing new skills. Some weeks we will spend more time with a previous skill before moving to a new skill.
New Life Skill: 
"When I give you an instructions, do them right away." (2-3 step directions)

Previous Life Skills:

"When a teacher calls your name, you stop, look at the speaker, and say "yes".

 "When I give you an instruction, do it right away."

Meet Harvest: The Newest Member to our Classroom

Today we read The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything.  This book is one of our supplemental books for our Harvest Unit.  After reading and acting out the story, we used shredded paper to create a scarecrow like in the book.  We then labeled all of the scarecrow's body parts along with the action words from the story.  We then brainstormed names for our new friend.  We chose Harvest as it is also the name of our unit to help reinforce that vocabulary word.  

Harvest Unit September 15-18

Classroom Happenings:
-No School Monday- Columbus Day
-Back to School Night-Thursday October 17 at 6:30 (for info to follow)
-Science Center Visitor- I have given the children a hint that a special visitor from the Burlington Science Center will visit our classroom. We have 2 gerbils visiting our classroom from the Science Center. We named them Sugar and Spice.  It is very exciting! We earned them as our first class reward.

Harvest Unit (Week 3)
Books This Week:
The Little Red Hen
Eddie's Garden
The Little Old Lady Who Wasn't Afraid of Anything

Concept Questions For This Week:
-How does food get from the farm to your house?
-What can Apples
-Seasons on the farm
-Scarecrows on the farm

Handwriting Activities
Continuing with our Handwriting Without Tears color books.  We are work in these books to reinforce alligator fingers and how to color specific pictures using controlled fine motor movements.
-Making Big Lines and Little Lines with chalk boards and dry erase boards

Small Groups This Week:
***Special Small Group-After reading the Little Old Lady Who Wasn't Afraid of Anything, we will recreate the story by creating a scarecrow. We will stuff clothes with shredded paper. Then we will label each part along with the action word for each part of the clothing.
1. Language- We will be discussing jobs on the farm then creating books to reinforce beginning sounds in words. We will listen to the sound in a word such as "Collecting" (ie. Collecting eggs) Then think of the sound we hear first. Then we will either trace or write the letter in groups.
2. Story Sequencing- We have read Eddie's Garden multiple times. We will now discuss the story to sequence the story in small groups.  This will involve cutting, sequencing, then gluing.  Each child will then need to tell the story about how Eddie grew a garden to the teacher in their group.
3. Math- More and Less- We will be counting then comparing 2 sets of vegetables. Then discuss which set is more and less. Then we will create a chart to show our results.

Centers

Art Table:Scarecrow assembling 

Block Area:blocks and farm animals

Sensory Table: Acorns we collected last week

Book Area: books about farms and growing

Easel: painting with primary colors

Writing Table: Farmer To Do Lists

Dramatic Play: Farmers Market

Puzzles and Manipulatives: farm related puzzles

Science Table: Gerbils from the Science Center(drawing pictures and making observations)

Preschool Life Skills

Every week we will be reinforcing previous skills and introducing new skills. Some weeks we will spend more time with a previous skill before moving to a new skill.
New Life Skill: 
"When I give you an instructions, do them right away." (2-3 step directions)

Previous Life Skills:

"When a teacher calls your name, you stop, look at the speaker, and say "yes".

 "When I give you an instruction, do it right away."

Early Childhood Information Series Tomorrow 10-10-13

We are excited for the opportunity to share information about early childhood development with you.  Our hope is that the sessions provide you with useful tools to understand the development of your child.  Here are the dates and proposed topics of each session:

October 10, 2013 – Life Skills and Social Thinking Curricula

November 21, 2013 – Opening the World of Learning (OWL) Curriculum

December 12, 2013 – Morning and Nighttime Routines in the Home

January 16, 2014 – Fine and Gross Motor Activities

February 6, 2014 – Reading to Your Child and Homework Routines

March 6, 2014 – Transitions to New Buildings and Classrooms

April 10, 2014 – Technology for Early Learners

May 22, 2014 – Fun Activities for the Summer

The sessions will be held in the School Committee Room, housed in Burlington High School.  Each session will begin promptly at 6:30pm, and will last approximately 1 hour.  We will also be available for questions after each session.  In order to ensure that the Information Series is useful to you, we ask that you please complete the attached survey.  This will help us better understand your families needs, and tailor the information sessions to topics that are relevant to you.  Please click on the link below to access the survey:

Information Series Survey

If you have specific questions pertaining to the the Information Series, please feel free to email Naomi Abelson and Tiffany D’Abbraccio at beccinfoseries@gmail.com.  You can also access useful information regarding the series by visiting the BECC Information Series blog at beccinformationseries.blogspot.com.  We look forward to seeing you on October 10th!

Sincerely,

Tiffany D’Abbraccio, M.S.Ed., Special Education Teacher

Naomi Abelson, Behavior Specialist

October 7-11-2013 Harvest Unit (Week 2)

Classroom Happenings:
-Mystery Bags- We will start phasing out daily mystery bags. We have told the children that they are doing such great work that teachers are running out of prizes. We will be explaining to them that the system is going to change. Every child who gets a "high five" will not get a mystery bag but instead a sticker to add to their cubby chart or bring home.  However, if they get a "high five" I will randomly choose one name from a bucket and 1or 2 children will get a bag.  We will explain to them they still want to earn a high five to have a chance to get a bag.  As time goes on we will also work toward class rewards such as taking a trip to the science center, a special visit to see Louise or Dr. Conti in central offices, or have a picnic lunch outside. I will keep you updated as this program changes so you can continue to encourage your child. 
-Science Center Visitor- I have given the children a hint that a special visitor from the Burlington Science Center will visit our classroom. On Wednesday, we will be bringing gerbils back to our classroom to visit.

Harvest Unit (Week 2)Books This Week:The Little Red Hen makes a pizza
Eddie's Garden
Farmer Duck

Concept Questions For This Week:
-Where does our food come from?
-Reading "Apple Farmer Annie" book and discussing
-How do machines help farmers?
-How food is prepared?
-What happens to wheat before we can eat it?

Handwriting Activities
-Acorn painting- We will use acorns we collect from outside and use them to paint. This will reinforce our alligator fingers to hold the acorns. 
-Beginning our Handwriting Without Tears color books.  We are work in these books to reinforce alligator fingers and how to color specific pictures using controlled fine motor movements.
-Using lines and curves to create "Mat Man" on the tables as a group. Then we will play a game where one child closes their eyes then 1 or 2 pieces are removed. Then they child has to guess what important part is missing.

Small Groups This Week:
1.Phonemic Awareness-We will clap out the syllables for a variety of farm vocabulary words. Then we will cut, sort, and glue the pictures on a chart for one syllable words or two syllable words.
2. Story Sequencing- We have read Eddie's Garden multiple times. We will now discuss the story to sequence the story in small groups.  This will involve cutting, sequencing, then gluing.  Each child will then need to tell the story about how Eddie grew a garden to the teacher in their group.
3. Memory Game- Using unit vocabulary words. They will first discuss the meanings of the words and relate them back to our books. Then they will play a memory game with the cards.
1. Planting seeds- We will decorate cups with markers, add soil, and add grass seeds. We will be watching our seeds grow over the course of this unit.
2. Bingo Game- Our bingo boards will have tools that can be found on a farm. (rake, tractor,hoe, shovel, sickle,.....)
3. Art- Creating textured animals to add to our farm mural (to be created at center time)

Centers

Art Table:Apple Trees-Painting our arms brown to make a tree then using our fingers to make yellow, red, and orange "leaves"

Block Area:blocks and farm animals

Sensory Table: Beans

Book Area: books about farms and growing

Easel: painting with primary colors

Writing Table: Farmer To Do Lists

Dramatic Play: Cooking

Puzzles and Manipulatives: farm related puzzles

Science Table: Acorns from the playground

Preschool Life Skills

Every week we will be reinforcing previous skills and introducing new skills. Some weeks we will spend more time with a previous skill before moving to a new skill.

New Life Skill: "When I give you an instruction, do it right away."

Previous Life Skill: "When a teacher calls your name, you stop, look at the speaker, and say "yes".

Therapist Blog Updated

Please remember to visit our therapist blog.
Our Physical Therapist just posted about "W sitting".

http://becctherapists.wordpress.com/2013/10/03/why-should-i-stop-my-child-from-w-sitting/

Harvest Activities

 We painted a big empty box last week.  Then we cut out two doors and painted the barn on the front.  We just started reading our unit book Farmer Duck.  We have been role playing this story in our house area this week.

 We have been using clothespins to create "pens" for animals to reinforce our fine motor development.

We have also been playing with farm animals, tractors, farmers, and barns on the rug during choice time.