It's cold outside! November/December 2013

A note from Jen  Staff and Program Coordinator


Over the past month and a half the children and staff have been so busy preparing for our Christmas Services and I'm sure you will all agree that they turned out absolutely beautifully! Seeing all the children standing up there smiling, singing, saying their lines and looking so proud of themselves is a very special part of the year for all the staff and worth every minute of practice time! 

Now we are in our final week of preschool before we break for Christmas and there is so much excitement in the air! We have parties happening in all the classes and lots of cookie decorating, Christmas art, stories and talk of Santa! There is no better place to work than preschool at Christmas time; it's just so much fun!

Thank you to everyone who has donated to our Christmas hamper for our Sponsored Family. We were able to go above and beyond for a family who is struggling this Christmas. We ended up being able to purchase not only the $250 gift card from Real Canadian Superstore, but also a $150 gift card for Walmart as well as warm jackets for both dad and the little boy and of course we also have all the beautiful toys, clothing and food donated by you, our wonderful families! This hamper will be an incredible gift to receive this Christmas, thanks to you!

This month we purchased some new items for our classrooms with our fundraising money. We have a beautiful teaching kit for the Jan Brett book "The Mitten" with the book, floor puzzle, teaching guide, a mitten with plush animals to tell the story and poster boards with pieces for telling the story at circle time! It is so important to tell a story in many different ways so that children get a chance to absorb the information from the story in a variety of ways. We also bought a new colour sorting set with fruits and veggies and cute little baskets to sort them into! You can never have too many ways to sort and sequence when you are a preschooler!

On behalf of all the staff of St. Catherine's Preschool we wish each of our families a peaceful, happy Christmas, filled with love, laughter and lots of cuddles with your precious children. We will see you back at preschool on January 6th.

A note from Marion   Developmental Resource Teacher

What a magical time of year! I feel especially blessed at Christmas time to be surrounded by children every day. I wanted to take a moment to share a family tradition that Jim and I continue with our boys each year even though they are now aged 30, 29, and 27. Every Christmas Eve we give them a new pair of PJ's. This year we had to send our youngest off to Australia with his, and then a pair for each of the boys in Winnipeg, and let's not forget the girlfriends! They grow up so fast so take the time to enjoy these special moments and remember to pass on those family traditions.

I was so proud of all the children in the Services and I want to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and all the best in 2014.

A note from Cheryl   Creative Music Teacher

Thank you to everyone for all their hard work over the past weeks as we prepared for the Christmas Services. The Services are very dear to my heart and seeing it all come together and sharing it with all the families is incredibly rewarding and a very special time for me.

I would like to wish you all a wonderful Christmas filled with love and laughter and of course, music!

A note from the Discovery 2's  Danielle, Vibha, Estelle, Stephanie and Karen

The seasons are just flying by, here we are already into December preparing and decorating for all the Christmas festivities. Last month we continued with our Fall theme as well as talking about how to get along with our classmates.

For art we painted with leaves, made a leaf collage, did bubble wrap painting decorated squirrels, bears and acorns. At circle time we sang songs about Fall, and did some movement songs. We played games with our names and find the mouse or acorn. These games taught us patience and how to wait for our turn, which is hard to do when you are only two or even younger! We also talked about using our words instead of our hands when we would like something especially if someone else is using it; “stop”, “my turn” and “no thank you”.  We read books such as “Hands are not for hitting” to help teach this important lesson. 

Quite a few children are starting to use the toilet. If you would like us to help you in this next milestone please let us know and we would be happy to help you out. Just remember to send extra clothes and shoes.

Remember these early years go by fast. Please take the time this season to slow down and enjoy those special moments with your child. Whether it’s reading a book together, doing a puzzle, baking cookies, going for a walk or just being silly together! Merry Christmas from the 2's teachers!

A note from 301 Permjit and Gabi

It's been a very busy couple of months.

We celebrated Remembrance Day and did poppy collages and talked about freedom and peace.

We went over colours and shapes and had lots of fun playing games which incorporated remembering and naming different ones.

Then along came December and we were very busy bees indeed! We rehearsed for our Christmas Services as well as having fun doing lots of Christmas activities. We made Christmas trees, Christmas surprises, gingerbread houses and people. These are just a few of our festive activities!

We talked about the real meaning of Christmas and introduced our Nativity sets. At circle we told the story of Jesus's birth through felt board stories.

We have to congratulate the children on their marvelous performances at the Christmas Service. They worked very hard and it really paid of. We were in awe of them!

We wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and look forward to seeing everyone in  2014.

A note from 302 Gabi Rachel and Sali

Hello everyone!

For the month of November we focused on shapes and the children created some incredible art pieces using different shapes. Next we talked about Remembrance Day and why we wear red poppies and our art and circle were also themed around this topic.

Now we can't believe it's  December already. All the children are excited about Christmas and Santa coming! We made a secret surprise for our families for Christmas as well as lots of other art activities and festive themed materials for sorting and counting were out all over the classroom.

We had lots fun at music rehearing for our Service. Our Service was a great success. Thank you for all the participation and a big thank you to Cheryl and Marion for motivating our class. They were all fantastic on the night and we are so proud of them!

We wish you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

A note from 304 Stephanie and Gabi

Wow we can't believe how quickly the days are passing by. We are doing so many exciting things at the preschool that it just seems to zoom by. This month we focused on colours and shapes. During circle time we read many stories and played games to help us recognize our shapes and colours. 

For colours we talked about the primary colours and what happens when we mix two of them together. The children were amazed at what happened. The each experimented with them by choosing two colours and fingerpainting with them to see what happens. 

For shapes we talked about the basic shapes such as squares, circles, rectangles, and triangles. We talked about how shapes are all around us and created art using a variety of different shapes. 

We got started on Christmas activities before November ended. The children worked on a beautiful Christmas surprise for the parents and we did many Christmas crafts with lots of glitter and paint! The children are very excited about this very special day. We also wrote a group letter to Santa! We can't wait to hear back from him. 

If you have any questions or concerns please speak to one of the teachers.

A note from 401 Sali Rachel and Karen

Our theme for November was Space. We had a supersonic time exploring the universe, learning the names and order of the planets. We also learned how the planets move around the sun. We played active games where the children would be moons , planets or the sun  and read lots of books  about space both fiction and non-fiction.

 

A couple of the children’s favourite songs were ‘Zoom, zoom, zoom”(a movement song) and “Five little men in a flying saucer” (a counting finger play).

For art, we made puffy paint out of shaving cream and glue to paint astronauts. We made sparkly stars, flying saucers and earth’s where we traced and cut out a circle, then sponge painted with blue and green.

We transformed the home corner into a spaceship, the children were excited to use out-dated computers and phones as modern day space equipment!

We were lucky to have some great weather for most of November and enjoyed many days playing outside.Toward the end of November, we started Christmas activities. Take a look at our boards outside the classroom and you will see our display of snowmen, collage Christmas trees and how we sponge painted the background. We also made gingerbread men and sparkly candies for our gingerbread house board.

 

We have transformed the house corner once again, this time into a gingerbread bakery.

The children have also been busy working on a surprise for their families.

The children were so great at learning their songs and words for the Christmas services and were so proud to have family members and friends there to watch. Thank you all for coming out.

We have also been teaching the children about giving with our Christmas hamper project and have been happily checking much needed items off the list, thank you so much for your generous donations.

We are now looking forward to the class Christmas party on Wednesday where we hope you will join us to share a snack and sing some festive songs!

We wish you all a very happy and healthy holiday season and are looking forward to a wonderful New Year with your children.

A note from 402  Arsi Stephanie Karen and Cheryl

Brr... The weather is getting colder as the days pass! We love to go outside every chance we get so please dress your children in warm jackets with mittens and toques and proper running shoes.

We spent one day talking about what Remembrance Day is and made some poppy art.Next we moved onto some of our favorite books. It was great reading the stories at circle time and bringing them to life with out artwork. There are so many different ways you can expand on one book!

We looked at two different books that were written by the same author, Leo Lionni. They were Swimmy and Frederick. For the book Swimmy we painted fish with red paint and big Lego blocks. For the book Frederick we created a mouse out of construction paper.

Next we read Mmm, Cookies! By Robert Munsch. It was such a silly story! We used that story and decided to make our own playdough cookies to take home. Then it was on to the book Caps For Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina. We brought this book to life by working together as a group and painting characters from the story to put up on our bulletin board in the classroom. 

Another story was The Wonderful Pigs Of Jillian Jiggs by Phoebe Gilman. The children each had a chance to create their own paper pigs. The last book we focused on was Chicka Chicka Boom Boom by Bill Martin Jr. We spent a week on this book because there was so much to do. One day we made the coconut tree and put our names on it. Then we counted how many letters we have in our name. Then we examined a coconut using our 5 senses. We passed it around during circle time so we could see what a real coconut looks and feels like. Then we shook it to see what it sounded like inside. We cracked it open and smelt it then cut it up into pieces so each child could try to see what it tasted like. We made a chart to see who liked it and who didn't. It was interesting to see the results! The last day we made our very own Chicka Chicka boom boom hats. 

We are all excited now to be celebrating Christmas in our classroom! We are very proud of how well our class performed during the Service and we are sure you are too!

Have a wonderful Christmas and New Year!

If you have any questions or concerns please feel free to speak to any of the teachers.

A note from 403 Stephanie Gabi and Permjit

We are always keeping busy in the classroom and this month we are focusing on a famous author named Robert Munsch. We focused on 3 of our favorite stories written by him. Before we talked about the stories we talked about who Robert Munsch was and how he started writing silly stories. 

The first book was called Smelly Socks. The children practiced their cutting skills by cutting out a pair of socks and then painting them. Then they made their own clothes line with socks hanging from it.The second book was called Mmm, Cookies! The children made their own play dough cookies to take home. It was so interesting listening to their conversations while they were doing this. They had so many ideas about how they were going to trick their parents with their pretend cookie! The third book was called The Paper Bag Princess. We all worked together to paint a big dragon for our board in the classroom then each child made their own princess out of a paper bag. 

We also spent a day talking about why we have Remembrance Day and made tissue paper poppies for art. 

As the weather is getting colder, we would like to remind parents to dress your children in a warm jacket with toques and mittens and proper running shoes, as we will be going outside unless it is raining. 

Now we are well into our celebration of Christmas and there is a lot of excitement in the air! The children's performance in the Christmas Service was fantastic and we are so proud of them! Merry Christmas and a happy New Year to all our families!

If you have any questions or concerns please feel free to speak to any of the teachers. 

Dates to remember:    

Wednesday December 18:   201/301/401/403 Christmas Parties. 
Thursday December 19:       202/204/302/304/402 Christmas Parties.
Friday December 20:            Last Day of classes before Christmas break.
December 21-January 5:      Christmas break.January 6 Back to preschool.

 For general information please contact Jen or Tina in the office.

Tel: 604-980-1326
Fax: 604-982-3277
Email: stcpre@telus.net
Website: www.stcatherinespreschool.com
Facebook: St. Catherine's Childcare Society

Fall Days... October 2013

A note from Jen  Staff and Program Coordinator

Wow what a fun month October is at preschool! Everyone is settling in well, getting to know and connecting with their teachers, making friends, and enjoying fun activities. Our preschoolers have been creating some fantastic Autumn inspired art as well as some very spooky witches, ghosties and pumpkins! 

I have been lucky enough to spend some time in each class and am enjoying getting to know all your beautiful children. 

If you have any questions, comments or concerns about your child's preschool experience please pop by the office at any time and have a chat with me.

A note from Cheryl  Creative Music

Music 3's

Well we navigated our way through the beginning of music class successfully. Now we know eachother a little bit better we have started to explore some different instruments. We met a music room friend “Patches the Scarecrow” and sang a song about different ways we can shake our arms and legs.We used the shaker-eggs to make the shaky sound that a scarecrow would make if it was dancing.

I'm a jingle jangle scarecrow

With a flippy floppy hat.

I can shake my arms like this!

I can shake my legs like that!

Each child told the rest of the class how to shake their arms or their legs; we have some very creative kids! We also used Halloween as an opportunity to talk about real things we might see as decorations: pumpkins, owls, skeletons etc and how they are real but they aren’t scary because they are just decorations.We also talked about witches ghosts and goblins and how they are not real at all - just for fun!

We learned a rhyme about skeletons:

Skeleton bones go rattle tattle.

Skeleton voices go BOO!

Skeleton bones go rattle tattle.

They can't scare you!

We made ourselves very big and brave and showed how they won't scare us.

And finally yes on October 30^th and 31^st we started to learn our songs and poems for the Christmas Services!

Music 4's

We entered October with gusto! We learned the jingle jangle scarecrow song like the 3's but we added a bit before.

When all the cows were sleeping,

And the sun was behind the cloud.

Up jumped the scarecrow

And shouted VERY LOUD!

Then we sang the rest of the song. We used the maracas which I told them I only let my 4's use as they are too fragile for the younger children. They sure liked having that power! We used the maracas to shake our arms and legs like the scarecrow.

I also introduced storytelling. I told them a “scary” story but I promised they would end up laughing!

The Dark

In the dark dark woods,

there was a dark dark house.

In the dark dark house,

there was a dark dark door.

Through the dark dark door

there were some dark dark stairs.

Up those dark dark stairs,

there was a dark dark room

In that dark dark room,

there was a dark dark closet.

In that dark dark closet,

there was a dark dark box.

In that dark dark box

there was........ME!

Boy would the kids jump and bust a gut laughing!

We talked about how powerful storytelling could be by acting out a story using your voice, body and instruments. We will be doing further development of the art of storytelling as we go through the year.

We are very excited about learning our Christmas Service songs and poems. We also found out that some friends get to talk into the microphone and others get to dress in costumes for the telling of the nativity.

A Note from the Discovery 2's  Danielle, Estelle, Vibha, Stephanie and Karen

What a great time we have been having in the Two's so far this year. October was our first full month together. Not only have we been busy getting to know each other, but we have been having so much fun painting, singing, reading stories and of course most importantly, playing. 

For Thanksgiving we made Turkey Hand Prints, coloured turkey feathers and talked about what we are thankful for. We sang “Dingle Dangle Scarecrow”, "5 Little Turkey's" and many more.

Halloween was such a great time as we painted spooky, sparkly ghosts, bats and spiders. We glued buttons onto pumpkins or stamped paint onto pumpkins. We even experimented with water colours on water paper to make our ghosts a mixture of colours. Of course the best fun of all was carving the pumpkin and feeling the 'gooey' stuff inside of it. We had fun at circle time with reading stories about Halloween, singing about “5 Pumpkins sitting on a gate” and listening to felt stories “Who is hiding behind the house?” and “Children, Children What do you see on Halloween Night?”

Of course we had a great Halloween party and everyone looked very cute in their PJ's. Thanks for those family's who brought snacks for the party and don't worry! Everyone will eventually get a turn to bring some treats!

Please continue to send extra clothing as there are some very enthusiastic painters and children who enjoy water play. With the cold weather here, please remember to send warm coats and hats. Our playground is shaded and tends to be cooler earlier in the day.

We have also noticed some children are having trouble walking up and down the stairs, so please encourage your child to use the stairs holding on to the railing when coming and leaving the preschool.

If you have any questions please feel free to speak to any of us.

A note from the Down Under Room 301 Gabi and Permjit

It's November already and the children have started to settle into a routine. We are all enjoying our time with friends old and new.

We are finding that the children will be enjoying a particular toy or activity and will ask for it. This is very important for them so that they can continue with play and imagination from where they left off and it encourages them to work together; negotiating and taking turns.

Thanksgiving was busy. We made Turkey paintings, covered them in feathers and listened to stories about Thanksgiving. We also played games trying to find the turkey his feathers. We discussed what we were thankful for, what we were going to have for dinner, and who was coming to dinner. Those turkeys were everywhere!

 

Next we began our preparation for Halloween. Spooky ghosts with lots of sparkles were floating on our boards. Sitting on our huge web, scary spiders were sitting waiting so quietly and you may have noticed that they did catch something.... It had a black hat and a broom!!

Our Spooky castle was sooooo scary! cats were roaming around looking for their friend the witch who seemed to be caught up somewhere in a web or was she busy picking up spooky treats??

The Halloween party was lots of fun. We all had fun wearing our costumes and some of us really enjoyed describing in great detail who we were! Thanks to all the parents who took the time to make everything look and taste so yummy; a great time was had by all!

 

Marion came in to talk to our class about fire safety and the children watched a video with Fireman Dam and his spotty dog. Then we learned what to do in case of emergency, to stop drop, roll and crawl. Thank you Marion.

Please make sure that your child has appropriate clothing for preschool, as we will go out to play when it is not raining.

 

Please come to and talk to us if you have any concerns.

A note from the Down Under Room 302  Gabi, Rachel and Sali

Wow! We can't believe how quickly the first few months have flown by. The children have already been busy practicing all their Christmas songs with Cheryl. In October the children helped us make the classroom look a lot like fall with all their wonderful art pieces; fingerprint  leaves and hand-print owls to name a couple! We also got ready for an exciting day; Halloween!! The children all looked so cute in their costumes for the party. Thank you for all the yummy snacks. A few of the Halloween art projects that filled the classroom were painted paper bag Jack-o-lanterns, the children were creative with strips of paper to create mummies, and we painted cats.

A Halloween rhyme our class really enjoyed was:

5 little pumpkins sitting on a gate.
The first one said "Oh my, it's getting late."
The second one said "there are witches in the air!"
The third one said "but we don't care!"
The fourth one said "let's run and run and run!"
The fifth one said "Let's have some fun!"
Then WOOOO went the wind.
And OUT went the lights!
And five little pumpkins rolled out of sight!

 

We are now learning about shapes and colours. If you have any questions please speak with one of us!
 

A note from the Treehouse Room 304 Stephanie and Gabi

October was a very exciting month for all of us! First we started talking about Thanksgiving and things that we are thankful for. At circle we talked about apples and the different things we can use apples for. There were so many ideas! We also cut an apple in half and counted how many seeds there were inside. One interesting thing we found out was if we cut an apple in half from the sides, there was a surprise inside; a star! We used the apples with paint to make apple prints. We talked about the different food we might see during Thanksgiving. We decorated turkeys with feathers and made turkeys using play dough. 

Then it was on to Halloween! We had such a great time talking about all the different things we see during this time. We talked about what things are real and pretend and read many stories and sang songs about Halloween. For art we decorated bats with glitter, made our own Jack-o-lanterns, made ghosts with streamers, decorated black cats, made witch hats, and painted more bats and ghosts. The one thing that the children were extra excited about was the Halloween party! When the day came it was so much fun to see all of the amazing costumes each of them had on. We turned out some lights in the classroom and played fun Halloween music. Thank you for all of the delicious treats for the party! 

Marion came to talk to all of us about fire safety. We learned what to do of fire ever got onto our clothes (Stop, drop, and roll). We also learned what to do if we were ever in a place where there was a fire. We saw what an exit sign looks like and we practiced crawling low under smoke. 

For the next couple of weeks we will be talking about colours. 

As the weather is starting to get chilly now, please dress children in running shoes and a warm jacket because we will be going outside if it is not raining.

If you have any questions or concerns please feel free to speak with any of the teachers.

A note from 401  Rachel, Sali and Karen

We can't believe how the months have passed so quickly and we are already nearing December! During October we were getting ready for an exciting day; Halloween! The children took part in many different art projects as well as helped us to turn our dramatic house corner into a spooky house! The children cut out all their own pieces of paper to create faces for their Jack-o-lanterns, they also made  spooky trees using watercolors and straws.

The children all looked great in their different costumes for the Halloween party! After the party we watched Franklin's Halloween we also had a smokey witches cauldron which was made with dry ice. 

Thank you for all the yummy snacks! 

A Halloween song our class really enjoyed was:

1 little, 2 little 3 little witches.
Fly over haystacks, fly over ditches...
Fly over moon beams, without any hitches...
Hey, Ho Halloween is here!!

We are now learning about space in our class! Please feel free to chat to us if you have any questions or concerns.

A note from 402 Treehouse/Rainbow Room Stephanie, Arsi, Karen and Cheryl

It's hard to believe how quickly October flew by in in our 402 class; we had a lot of fun and learned a lot too. The children have settled nicely and have continued their friendships from previous years as well as making new connections. It's great to come to work and see their smiling faces!

In October, we started with Thanksgiving, discussed Johnny Appleseed (his real name being John Chapman) and how he planted apple seeds everywhere he went so that people wouldn't go hungry. We also talked about why we sing the Johnny Appleseed grace song before snack time because we are thankful.

Next we talked about what foods we traditionally eat for Thanksgiving such as turkey, corn, potatoes etc. Since corn was a popular item, we decided to do corn-roller painting and also a popcorn science experiment with blue and green food colouring. We dyed two containers of popcorn kernels with blue and green food colouring, then we asked the children if they thought the popcorn would pop green and blue when they popped and they thought that it would! When the time came to pop the kernels, we discovered that in fact the kernels popped out white!! We were all surprised, but it still tasted delicious!

Another fun thing we did was to make a cornucopia using waffle cones, vanilla frosting, and fall shaped candy. Th children really enjoyed making these as they go to taste what frosting ended up on their fingers!

Before we knew it, it was time for Halloween, with all the fun of stories, songs and art projects. For art we made skeletons out of Q-tips, spiders and spider webs out of glue and black sparkles, Frankensteins out of paper bags, Jack-O-lanterns and witches hats.

On Halloween day the children came dressed up in their costumes. We had princesses, super heroes and some story book characters too! Our party was so much fun with Halloween music and delicious treats, we even had a witches cauldron with spooky smoke!

We would like to thank the parents who bought in the food and beverages for our Halloween party, they were yummy!

During October we also had Marion talk to our class about fire safety. We watched a very important video which taught us to STOP, DROP and ROLL if fire gets on our clothes as well as practicing CRAWLING LOW UNDER SMOKE.

 

Elmer the Safety Elephant dropped by as well and talked to us about the importance of pedestrian safety and traffic safety. He showed us the correct way to cross the street, traffic light safety and how to play safely outside.

It's been a fun and busy October and now we're looking ahead to November where we will discuss Remembrance Day and focus on some popular children's book authors such as Lio Lionni.

If at anytime you have any questions, please do not hesitate to speak to us.

A note from 403 Treehouse Room  Permjit, Stephanie and Gabi

Well! It seems a long way from September when we started school, but we have really begun to settle in and  enjoy our time with friends old and new. On-going are the rules of the classroom "No One Gets Hurt" and talk about how to get along with all our friends and that we all have different needs, ways of doing things and have the right to be respected. These rules are on-going throughout the year and afford lots of opportunity for timely discussion when required.

Thanksgiving was busy. The children made paper bag turkeys and read the story Thanks for Thanksgiving and we asked the children what things they were thankful for. The children made applesauce and they had fun cutting the apples and then some of us enjoyed eating it while others just did not like the taste and some were not too sure about it at all! It was fun to see all the facial expressions when it came to tasting! We watched a video to learn all about Johnny Appleseed.Turkeys and Apples were everywhere!

Next we began our preparation for our Spooky Halloween. Witches flying on their broomsticks, ghosts floating around and scary spiders sitting quietly on their spider webs!These were just a few of the spooky activities we did. We read lots of fun Halloween stories and had felt board guessing games and felt stories. We talked about what was real and pretend. Children had so much fun and excitement about what they were going to be dressed up as. We talked about the rules of being safe when trick or treating and before we knew it, it was Halloween party time! Everyone enjoyed the bubbling cauldron, especially when the lights were dimmed it was so awesome, the children just kept asking us to keep it bubbling! We watched Franklin and his Halloween adventure on video after our party.

 

Thank you so much to all the parents who bought in yummy treats for the party. We all enjoyed them very much!

Please make sure that your child has appropriate clothing for preschool, as we will go out to play when it is not raining.

Dates to remember:

Wednesday November 20: Pizza Night, Cake Walk, Cake Auction and Scholastic          Book Fair:  5:30-730pm in the gym! 
Thursday and Friday November 21/22: Scholastic Book Fair in the gym.

Monday November 25: Final Day to submit December Scholastic Orders.

Wednesday November 27: Last day to order Purdy's Chocolate.

Please remember to visit www.stelladot.com and www.GooseandMoose.ca for great Christmas gift ideas and to help fund-raise for our preschool.

For questions or general information please see Jen, Tina or Marion in the office or contact us:

Tel: 604-980-1326
Fax: 604-982-3277
Email: stcpre@telus.net
Website: www.stcatherinespreschool.com
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