Fireflies and Exploring with Junior Kindergarten

 

Our week began with quite an exciting discovery! The no longer hungry caterpillar full of Milkweed leaves that was hanging in a "J" shape turned into a pale green chrysalis with a beautiful gold line around the top.

The children were amazed and couldn't believe their eyes! Each stage described in the non-fiction book, "The Life Cycle of a Butterfly" was now very real to them.

After observing a real chrysalis the children made their own for their little caterpillars. First they tucked their caterpillar into a tube and cut a long strand of yarn. Then they pulled and cut a piece of masking tape to attach their yarn to the tube and began winding it round and round as they sang the song, "Wind the Bobbin" that they had learned with Mrs. McIvor.

Finally they scrunched sheets of tissue paper and placed them at either end of the tube, closing the chrysalis. Now the chrysalises are hanging from leaves on the classroom tree.

In Music class with Mrs. McIvor the children enjoyed dancing with scarves.

Keeping to the beat of the music with different instruments such as rhythm sticks and shakers was another fun activity in Music.

"Leo the Lightning Bug" by Eric Drachman was the title of the book Mrs. Gootson read to the class this week. It was about a little lightning bug that was sad because his tail did not light up like all of his friends. The other lightning bugs made fun and laughed at him. His mother kept telling him to keep trying and it would happen soon. Finally his little light came on! The boys and girls learned how important it is not to make fun of others and to always keep trying really hard at something you want to accomplish.

 

Making fireflies was a special project this week. The children cut two traced hearts from "Eric Carle" paper and attached them to a small tube.

Next they made a hole in the tube with the hole punch which took alot of STRENGTH!!

After threading a chenille stem through the hole, they twisted it tight and used their finger to curl the antennae. Finally they scrunched orange, red or yellow tissue and glued it inside the tube to make the little firefly's tail light up!

Taking turns, following directions and one to one correspondence are just a few of the skills involved when playing "The Very Hungry Caterpillar " game. Then of course learning that we don't always win, but we have fun playing the game!

Using a Q-Tip with water color to paint spring scenes, insects and designs was a new experience in the art center.

Using careful eye hand coordination to trace insects and then filling their shapes with color using different mediums was another popular activity.

On Friday morning the Lively Ladybugs joined the JK students for Exploring! Following an assembly JK students were asked to choose an Alpha student to be their partner for the morning's activities.

 

Outside of each classroom door, Alpha students learned they must take a clip before going in. If no clips were available they made another choice.

"Celebrate the Arts" t-shirts were made by choosing and gluing fabric squares to decorate their shirts.

The boys and girls thoroughly enjoyed crawling down an incline into an ant colony!

Riding down the ramp on a scooter with a beanbag balanced on their heads was quite a treat!

For snack the children spread peanut butter on a celery stick and added raisins to make "ants on a log!"

 

Prints were made by painting various bubble wrap shapes and placing paper on top to make a print. Some children painted insect stamps and printed those creating interesting works of art.

 

Fun was had by all and the Alpha students enjoyed getting to know the JK teachers and students. Thank you JK!!!