Spring has finally arrived! The Kindergarteners are learning about different insects and flowers as they welcome Spring. Among the various species we read about were bees, fireflies and butterflies. The children were excited to share their pre-K knowledge and experiences with us after reading an educational book about the many different species of bees and how they produce their delicious honey. One kiddos were ecstatic to inform us that butterflies come in over 20,000 species and that their wings are stunningly colored. Fireflies were one of their favorite insects, the notion that a jar does not heat up when filled with a lot of fireflies was one that the children found fascinating! Also a jar filled with fireflies can be used as a flashlight or lantern. In our group, flowers are quite popular! One of our kindergartners had a brilliant idea- she proposed that we create an insect garden! We were so taken with the idea she proposed that we covered one of our classroom boards with gorgeous, vibrant flowers for our insects. We ended the week with a fun game of insect bingo and a simple science experiment. Our kids love science! We collected a coffee filter, a mason jar, and a marker. After adding warm water to the mason jar and drawing a circle in the center of the coffee filter, we folded it in half and then folded it again. We waited for the coffee filter to absorb the water after inserting the sharp end into it. The outcome was amazing! The coffee filter has the appearance of a lovely flower!

Books we enjoyed:

Butterflies By: Emily Neye

Fireflies in The Night By: Judy Hawes

The Life and Times of the Honeybee By: Charles Micucci

Small Wonders By: Jean-Henri Fabre

From Seed to Daisy Following the Life Cycle By: Laura Purdie Salas

Bloom Bloom By: April Pulley Sayre

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss! Celebrating this fantastic children’s author with the kindergartners was inspiring. They enjoyed listening to some of his silly books, such as “Green Eggs and Ham,” “Oh the Places You’ll Go!” and “The Lorax.” One of our art activities was making green eggs and ham with paper plates and construction paper. The kids thought it was so funny that their finished art looked like goofy faces instead of a delicious breakfast plate! We also made hot air balloons and decorated them with dot markers. It was fun discussing the different countries and states the children chose to visit if they traveled in a hot air balloon.  After reading The Lorax, we made the cutest Truffula trees with different colored paper, tissue paper and popsicle sticks. Our classroom bulletin board looks incredible, containing the children’s Truffula trees as well as our favorite quotes from “The Lorax!” As part of our activity, we talked about the importance of trees and how they help produce oxygen and clean the air. The lesson within “The Lorax” is a lesson we all can take to heart. We ended Dr. Seuss’ birthday celebration by making colorful birthday cakes of construction paper and wishing him a very Happy Birthday! The cakes were filled with color and pizazz, making us hungry for some delicious cake! 

Rainbows are always fun, they express beauty, change and peace! For a simple science experiment, we made a rainbow in the shape of a circle with Skittles on a paper plate. We added warm water and watched the colors of the Skittles run forming a beautiful rainbow effect. The kiddos were fascinated with the results! 

Making paper bag Leprechaun puppets on St. Patrick’s Day was a hit! We adorned a paper bag with green construction paper, googly eyes and glitter. Glitter is very popular in kindergarten! We learned a couple of jigs from Irish step dance with Josie and made a pot of gold! We had such a blast celebrating and learning about St. Patrick’s Day!

Books we enjoyed:

Happy Birthday To You! 

The Cat in the Hat

By: Dr. Seuss

St. Patrick’s Day in the morning 

By: Eve Bunting 

Reminder: Spring is here and the weather is getting warmer, will be staying outside longer weather permitting.

In honor of Black History Month we celebrated by reading and learning about famous African American figures who made a difference in all of our lives. Dr. Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks, Maya Angelou, Serena and Venus Williams and Jackie Robinson were a few among the many. The children were delighted to be a part of Dr. Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” journal writing prompt. They drew and wrote about their dream for a better world. Listening to poems by Maya Angelo and Langston Hughes was a delight! It was such a joyful experience watching the children trying to understand the meaning of the poems. They got so engaged that it became a group discussion, as they all had their personal opinions, questions and comments. Each child went around and shared their favorite poem by Langston Hughes. It was prevalent that they not only were attentive but also passionate about the book of poems.

The sun is shining bright in Kindergarten! As spring is approaching, we started the month of March discussing the warm weather, where rain comes from, and how storms are formed. The children made their own beautiful Sun from paper plates, construction paper and adorned them with gems or shimmering glitter. We also made colorful umbrellas, rainbows and we did a cloud in a jar science experiment using a mason jar, warm water, hair spray, and ice. It was awesome to see the children’s expression waiting for the results, as well as their hypothesis on the results of the final outcome!

Books we enjoyed:

Young Martin Luther King Jr “I Have a Dream” By: Joanne Mattern

The Dream Keeper and other Poems By: Langston Hughes

She Persisted in Sports By: Chelsea Clinton

NationalGeographic for Kids

Flash Crash,Rumble and Roll By:Franklyn M. Branley

Small Cloud By: Ariane

Reminders:

Now that the weather is getting warmer, please provide a lighter piece of outerwear.

For your consideration, LEDP has created an Amazon wishlist with a link posted on the front page of the website. We thank you in advance for your generosity!

Welcome to our world of mystical creatures! In Kindergarten we went on an imaginary adventure, listening to fairy tales while giggling and chatting with friends about the funniest characters in the books. We drew Kings and Queens, Prince and Princesses, Dragons, Knights,

Fairies and Unicorns were a few of our many favorites. The children drew well detailed characters and garnished them with silver, gold and red glitter to adorn our beautiful classroom castle. It was cute to see how excited they were while decorating their very own fairy wings with glitter and markers, they couldn't wait to try them on and pretend they were flying like fairies in a movie.

Our Valentine’s Day activities were warm and exciting! The children showed their friends kindness by making and decorating cards with pink and red hearts for each other or their families. We made friendship bracelets and necklaces from colorful clay and pony beads. We also investigated a Floating Hearts sensory bottle science experiment! The kids were super excited to participate in all our art and science activities!

Books we enjoyed:

• The Very Fairy Princess Sparkles in the Snow By: Julie Andrews and Walton Hamilton

• Sophie Johnson Unicon Expert By: Morag Hoop

• Blueberries for the Queen By: John and Katherine

• Love By: Matt De La Peña

• The Friendship Book By: Mary Lynn Ray

• Arthur’s Great Big Valentine By: Lillian Hoban

Reminders:

Please have your child dress according to the weather.

Please send extra clothes to keep in your Childs cubby.

This week we had a lot of fun admiring our kindergarten friends presentation of their storybooks! They were filled with original stories and illustrations and we were so proud of all our kiddos for standing up in front of their friends to share each page! We had some friends that were a little nervous, but with some encouragement and some guidance from teachers everyone did such a fabulous job! 

The last couple weeks we were so excited to explore the ocean! We had a great time learning about sea creatures by diving into the ocean and creating colorful jellyfish, starfish, mystical mermaids and hand print fish! We have decorated our boards with all of our wonderful artwork, creating our own oasis of undersea fun!

With Mother Nature sending cold winds and snow our way, we've spent some time in the gym. In addition to practicing yoga poses, we played games like Red Light, Green Light and Fishy, Fishy Cross My Ocean. 

Overall the Kindergartners were  engaged and having lots of fun!

We are just adding another reminder to please send your kiddos with the proper winter attire (i.e coats, hats, gloves, boots, snow pants). We will do our best to make it outside when we can. It would also be ideal to send in an extra pair of clothes for friends to keep in their LEDP cubbies. Thank you in advance and we look forward to an amazing month of February!

Happy New Year to all out Kindergarten families!

We hope everyone had add an amazing winter break, celebrating the holidays with lots of fun, relaxation and quality time with friends and family!

The kindergarteners were very excited to be back and share their adventures during their break. They wrote and drew about the places they visited and the time they spent with their friends and families.

With the winter season in full affect, what better way to celebrate than with some winter animal friends? In the last couple weeks we read and painted pictures of deer, snowy owls, deer and polar bears!  We read and paint pictures of Deer, Snowy owl, Hare and Polar Bears.

Some fascinating facts we learned about the polar bears revolved a lot on how they can keep warm in such cold weather! We learned that polar bears have two layers- a very thick layer of fur and an oily outer layer of guard hair; the guard hair is special as it reflects light and the thick layer of fur helps insult heat, keeping our furry friends nice and toasty from the frigid weather! Did you know that an adult polar bear can walk up to 50 miles a days and can swim up to 60 miles?

We are excited to be back in the swings of things and jumping head first into the New Year! Another quick reminder for families to please send their little ones with the proper winter attire, as we learned from our polar bear friends, layers are ideal! :-)

In the last leg of November we learned a lot about snakes, alligators and lizards!

Some art highlights the last few weeks were making paper plate snakes, cutting a spiral along the paper, coloring in there colorful scales and adding googley eyes! Another fun fact we learned about snakes is that they only eat about 30 meals a year!

We also created a paper bag alligator. Did you know that an alligator has three eye lids and one  is clear so they can see underwater? Well….. the K children were definitely impressed to learn this cool fact about alligators!

We transitioned our reptile week with highlighting one of our favorite books, " The Rainbow Fish," by Marcus Pfister. Our wonderful artists created their own rainbow fish and because they were all so beautiful and unique we wanted to display them in our LEDP classroom! There beautiful scales reflect and catch our eye every time we walk by our K fish bowl!

We hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving and can't wait to see our kiddos back in action some fun filled family time!

As we say goodbye to spooky October, we are thankful to welcome autumn's November! Although we loved hearing of our friends' Halloween festivities and their amazing costumes, we had a wonderful time exploring this week's theme, Harvest!

We spent a lot of time discussing and learning about how pumpkins and vegetables grow! We added more entries into our journals which is something we will do throughout the year- with all of themes represented in their entries. Our goal is to fill the pages with all we've learned together and reflect on these pages at the end of the year! One writing prompt this week was: If you were a farmer what kind of veggies would you harvest? Most of our farmers chose pumpkin patches and corn fields!

We kicked off Harvest's theme with a Fall picnic, with comfy blankets strewn about under the sun, sipping on apple cider and listening to music. We had so much fun talking about our favorite fall activities and some of our families Thanksgiving traditions! 

One of our favorite science projects this year was the dancing popcorn! We filled a mason jar with vinegar and a few tablespoons of baking soda and observed how the popcorn kernels began to dance about! We learned that when the baking soda and the vinegar are combined they make a gas called carbon dioxide which is what makes the those little guys put on a show in the mason jar!

We loved exploring harvest and the work it takes behind this special time of year when farmers gather up their crops, and year after year we get to celebrate autumns gifts, like corn and pumpkins! We had a wonderful two weeks and we look forward to giving thanks in the following weeks!

Fall has definitely arrived with the crisp air and falling leaves sprinkling the ground with hues of red, yellow, green and brown! Our kindergartners have been excited to celebrate the new season as the last few weeks we explored how and why the leaves change color!

Through science we collected some fallen leaves, crumpled them into pieces and put them in a Mason jar with rubbing alcohol and a coffee filter. We wanted to demonstrate how leaves loose chlorophyl and change color. We also painted beautiful Fall trees with finger paint and made beautiful leaf collages!

We also read , "A Log's Life," by Wendy Pfeffer which is a creative tale of a fallen oak in the forest and describes the importance a log and its leaves contributes to it's ecosystem.  We chatted and observed what the Lawrence ecosystem looks like and our friends found that next to all the fallen leaves were an abundance of acorns! So we made made rainbow acorns with bright beautiful colors to celebrate our unique ecosystem!

We'd also like to thank all the families that joined us on our first Parent Night! The kiddos were so excited to have their grownups in our K/1 room for an evening, walking around to admire their wonderful artwork and to learn of their afternoons in LEDP! We also loved to see our families work on their clay creations with some notable projects being a cute hedgehog, a sweet little pig, a ode to a bunch of grapes (like our display in the LEDP hallway) and many additions our friends hope to add to their kitchens with clay bowls and drinkware!  

Looking ahead we'd also like to remind all our families that with the time change it is especially important that we are receiving the most accurate pick up times, as our days will be ending inside and teachers will only be at the pickup doors for five minutes before returning to the group. We thank you in advance for your cooperation. We look forward to the next couple of weeks celebrating the month of November!

We have officially said goodbye to summer’s warmth and said hello to the cool breeze of autumn! We welcomed the first couple weeks of October with three new and exciting themes- manners, the spread of germs and the life cycle of an apple! 

Each child created and decorated a kindness collage; we talked about what words can be used to be kind, like using “please,” and “thank you,” or ways you can show respect to your friends. Then we used different materials like feathers and glitter to display how being kind makes us feel on the inside! 

Following the kindness collage, we did a germy experiment! We used hand sanitizer with glitter representing all the different germs we can’t normally see and observed how fast germs can spread and the importance of washing our hands! Although we discussed yucky germs, our K friends sure loved seeing their glittery hands!

This past week we explored the life cycle of an apple! We learned that the seeds from an apple core are planted or replanted to then sprout and blossom, and with time become a whole new apple! We cut out different apples, made a life cycle chart and created a big beautiful apple tree that we proudly displayed in the K/1 LEDP room! Lastly, for science we did an apple tasting experiment- we had so much fun eating the yummy snack and rated our least favorite to our favorites! 

We’ve had so much fun in the K room the last few weeks and looking forward to more exciting activities ahead! We’d also like to invite you to our first of four Open Houses this year- on October 24 from 5:00-5:45 in the small LEDP room. Please, be on the lookout via email for more information! 

It has been an amazing start of the new school year! The children are adjusting wonderfully to their new routines and schedule! They are  interacting with their teachers, their friends from preschool and exploring new friendships! 

The first week we made an "All About Me," book. We played hot potato and getting to know you game with a beach ball. Together as a whole group we made up some inside and outside safety rules.  

A few themes that we had fun working on are: 

Transportation: We talked about the different ways we go to school. Do we travel on bikes, scooters, the bus, walking, train or car? 

Community Service: We discussed what it means to be a community helper and the importance of their job. We made hats and read books about police officers, firefighters, doctors and asked each child what they wanted to be when they grow up!  

We started journal writing and we gave each child a prompt in accordance to our theme, then they would creating a drawing and write about it. 

It's been an amazing start to the school year and we can't wait to see what spooky October will bring!