Lots of Leaves

The children in my preschool class love fall.  They especially love the leaves!

Here are some of the fun things we have done with leaves during the last few weeks. We wrote a list of things that you can do with Autumn Leaves.  We then made our list into a poem title "What to do with Autumn Leaves." The last line is "Sometimes you can even LEAVE them!"  The kids liked the homophone humor.  I'm not sure where I first saw it because I've been doing this for years and years.  

One of my very favorite fall projects is our melted crayon leaves.  These are truly beautiful!!  We cut leaf shapes from brown craft paper (the stuff on big rolls).    We then melt crayons (in fall colors) on sheets of foil on top of old fashioned electric warming trays (this is something you want to find at a yard sale if you don't have one).  One by one the children drop their leaves onto the melted crayon and then use a pencil to push the paper into the melted crayons.  An adult takes the leaf off of the warming tray (again with a pencil). I didn't have my camera the day the kids made the leaves this year.:(  The process is very simple and the results are truly spectacular (and last for years!)

The melted crayon leaves look especially pretty on a window because they almost have a stained glass quality.  The children also made fall trees for our window by gluing pieces of torn tissue paper to a piece of wax paper.  They then glued a trunk to the piece of wax paper.  Simple but very pretty on a window.

Another torn paper project involved making fall trees from torn pieces of construction paper. Tearing the paper is great fine motor skill work and always love the way the kids chose to place their leaves.

We also had leaves on our homemade light box.  I made the light box from a box I bought at Ikea following Kara's Classroom directions. I drew a tree on a piece of contact paper and then taped the contact paper sticky side up on the top of the light box.  I put out leaves that I had bought on sale at the Target Dollar Spot.  The kids had lots of fun sorting and making patterns on the branches.  The sticky background was definitely a big draw.  I got the idea  from Dyan here.

We also went on lots of fall walks and often collected leaves.  After reading Leaf Man, we made our own leaf creatures.  The kids used quite a bit of white glue.  I then put a sheet of wax paper between the pages and then left them under a heavy box for a week so they dried nice and flat.  

Leaf butterflies

A leaf man.

 We also picked one favorite leaf to describe for our class book about Autumn Leaves.

Since we are just beginning to work on handwriting, I wrote the word the child suggested to describe his or her leaf and then the child traced the word.

We also did leave rubbings.  The secret to great leaf rubbings with little ones is to tape the stem of fresh leaves (NOT dried at all) to the back of a piece of paper.  The back side of the leaf (with the veins) should be next to the paper.  The kids then used the side of fat crayons to make the leaf magically appear.  There were kids in my class who did dozens of leaves. 

Finally, this week we did one of my very favorite fall activities.  I found this idea on the Let's Explore blog. After reading Todd Parr's Thankful Book, I talked with each child individually about what they were thankful for.  Each child gave me a list of 6-8 things they are thankful for.  I put them into a simple poem titled Thankful and then printed the poem onto watercolor paper (I trimmed the paper to 8 1/2 x 11 so it would fit in the printer).  I then covered the poem with a piece of clear contact paper cut in the shape of a leaf.  The kids used liquid water color to paint around the leaf. When the kids finished painting (right up to the leaf), I pulled off the contact paper.  

before the contact paper is removed

These make me smile. They are beautiful both visually and because of what the children are thankful for.

Soup From a Stone...Fancy That!

         Last week was a wonderful week - all about community and sharing and stone soup.  We began the week reading the classic version of Stone Soup written by Marcia Brown. We then acted out the story of the value of sharing and coming together as a community using a big pot and play vegetables from our classroom.  The kids LOVE any time we act out stories (and were frequently seen reenacting the story during free play:)  Throughout the rest of the week we read other versions of Stone Soup and did lots of comparing and contrasting of the different settings, characters and story lines.  

The stone soup would be even better if only we had some carrots.

We also made Stone Soup collages.  I cut out rectangles and squares.  The children cut the corners to make circles (onions), ovals (corn and potatoes), cut a diagonal line to make triangles (carrots) and in half to make rectangles (green beans).  The kids then used a marker to add details.  We added a real rock to our Stone Soup collages.  The kids also wrote the words Stone Soup on the top of their pots.  I loved this project because it involved cutting and handwriting practice as well as practice following directions.  However, despite the guided nature of this project, a lot of the kids personal touches came through on the final product.  I found these adorable collages on Mrs. Solano's Kindergarten Blog.

The final activity for our Stone Soup week was our actual stone soup.  I put a sign up sheet on line asking for the stone soup ingredients.  I supplied a special stone from our lake house.  Next year I will collect the vegetables on Thursday and parboil the vegetables.  The potatoes and carrots were hard to cut with our child safe knifes (they are like pumpkin knifes and required more sawing than cutting).

Many kids originally said they didn't want to try the soup but almost everyone did and they were very pleased with their cooking ability.

The final thing we did was write out the recipe.  It was so cute because the kids wanted me to post the recipe on our school website so their moms could make the soup at home. That print motivation is such an important early literacy skill.

A Quick Halloween Project

I wanted to do something new for Halloween this year. These simple pumpkin and ghost candle holders that I saw at a friend's house were the perfect thing.  Luckily, we have a closet filled with art supplies and recycled items so this morning I was able to grab 18 glass jars, white, orange and black tissue paper and white glue.  I cut the tissue paper into little squares and the kids used watered down glue to cover the jars with the tissue paper.  They then cut out the facial features from little squares of black tissue paper.  I can't wait to put battery operated candles in them tomorrow, turn off the lights and tell our "scary stories"  (we LOVE telling "In a dark, dark woods..." with very scary voices). 

Last year I blogged about more than a dozen wonderful halloween projects that we do at our school. Check out that post here.

Count and See

Last week I read the book Count and See by Tana Hoban to my little ones.  It is a very simple book that uses only black and white photos and numbers.  I have wanted to make a similar class book since I first saw Tana's book.  On Friday, we went out to our playground and then walked around the college campus where our school is located.  There was LOTS of counting as the kids pointed out things I could take pictures of for our book. I used my iphone to take the pictures and then used the free iphone  app A Beautiful Mess to make the photos black and white and to add numerals and text to the photos.  It was incredibly easy. I can't wait to share the resulting book with the kids.  I love it.  Here are a few pages:

I think we may have to share this book with the younger classes at our school.

My Parenting Philosophy in a Picture Book

        This week I read a book to my kiddos that I wrote as a class requirement when I was getting my Masters in Elementary Education.  My own kids were still in Elementary and early Middle School and the requirement was to write, illustrate and bind a children's book.  Since I am not much of an illustrator, I decided to use photographs.  Here is the book:

        When I read the book to kids we always talk about what they will let their kids do when they grow up.  Even my little ones understand the power that they will have and some get great joy from suggesting that they will let their kids stay up late or eat candy or play computer games.
        What I love about the book is that it actually pretty much summarizes my parenting philosophy.  With the exception of the line about not making my kids keep doing things they don't like (I have been known to say, "you owe it to your team to finish the season") I really do think that most of the sentiments are a good way to raise a child.
        For example, I think that children should be allowed to decide if they are going to wear their coat outside.  I always make my students bring their jackets outside but I let them take them off and put them on the bench if they don't want to wear them.  Sure I've seen kids take off their coats just because a friend doesn't wear a coat.  I've seen kids look cold.  I've also seen kids realize that they wanted to wear a coat even though their friend isn't wearing one.  I've never seen a kid freeze to death (well except my own coatless son who would almost freeze in the morning because his elementary teachers made him wear a coat, if he had one, at afternoon recess when it was much too hot for him).  Allowing a child to decide whether to wear his or her coat is a simple way to give them control of a decision that matters to them.  The downside risk is nothing (they will put on an available coat when they are really cold ;).