Department of Motor Vehicles

I am catching up on some older activities that I have been meaning to post about. In March, as we were learning about various vehicles, we had a day at the DMV. 

The kids needed driver's licenses for the cars we were making for our drive-through bank. I had each student take a number at the end of meeting. I taped numbers to their clothes so they could keep track of them. During play time, I was the DMV lady. I called their numbers. 

They came over to me and I asked them their eye color, birthday, if they were a boy or girl, and their street address (which we had practiced a lot during our post office theme). It was a fun way to find out if they knew these facts and to see how they answered questions. Next, I weighed them and measured their heights. Our scale runs a bit heavy, so I estimated down a couple of pounds for everyone. Then, we took their photo for the license. You may notice, none of them are very flattering--so true to the real DMV, don't you think?

An example of the resulting driver's license. I used my dog so as not to give away any personal information about kids. The last step after I printed out the licenses was to have the kids sign them. They also had to fill out the organ donor card on the back, which was a very fun conversation. They ran the gamut from, "No way," to whole body donors. They had to sign that, also. This gave them two opportunities to practice writing their names on small lines.

Spring Thaw

Today as we played outside, we noticed several large areas of water--mini lakes, actually, on the playground. The kids, of course, gravitated to them. I warned that they might be too deep to splash around in. The kids were not sure about this.  We decided to approach the problem scientifically. I got a yardstick and we measured how deep the puddle was. 

Whoa! almost 10 inches deep! Then, I compared the waterline on the yardstick to kids legs. They agreed after we checked that they would, indeed, get wet almost up to their knees and that even the rain boots most of them were wearing would not protect them from water that deep.

Flat Flatly in Chicago

 I'll be posting several of the Flat Stanley Project adventures here on the website. Our Flat friends have visited states all over the country as well as 4 countries outside the United States. When they return to the preschool with pictures, I have been sharing their adventures with the kids and posting where they went on our map just inside the classroom.

Here is installment number one:

 

The Truth About Snow

   Since we have been starting our preschool day outside on the playground this winter, we get out more days than I ever have in the past during the winter. I am a strong believer in getting outside in all kinds of weather. I have a "dream" that someday I will own enough rain boots and slickers to make going outside in rainy weather easy. I have such fond memories from my own childhood walking to and from school in the rain and playing in the puddles caused by all of the downspouts on houses.
   Back to winter in Vermont. I have noticed how kids (and I was one of them too) like to "sample" snow. As a grownup, I find this disgusting, because I know how dirty snow can be. I have had many conversations with the kids about how gross snow is, but they have not really believed me, considering how pristine and white a fresh layer of snow appears. 
We did a science experiment with snow in order for me to definitively show them that they may want to think twice before chowing down on their next snow cone.
  We got a large, empty, clean jug and filled it 3/4 of the way up with snow from the playground.  We brought the jug inside the classroom. The kids all predicted that it would melt, or change to water. We were surprised that by the end of the preschool day, there was still a lot of snow in the jar. It was slushy, but had not all melted. We decided as to let it sit inside over the weekend and we would check it on Tuesday. 

On Tuesday, this is what we found.

The kids looked in the jar and observed that there was lots of dirt and even some small rocks and pebbles in the water in the jug. They also said the water was not very clean, like drinking water. They all agreed that they did not really like to eat dirt and rocks and now they know that snow has that stuff in it. 
    The other observation that we made was that the snow had filled the jar 3/4 full, but the water that it melted into only took up a little bit of space on the bottom. I asked them what they thought made up the rest of the space in the snow--what else was in the jar? One of them realized the jar had air on top. We talked about how snow is made up of a lot of air and a little bit of water. 
   They gained a lot of knowledge in a very simple experiment of melting snow. I'll have to see if their new learning carries over to the culinary behavior on the snow-covered playground. I hope it does.

Self-Control

This story was on NPR yesterday and it connects to many of strategies we use in the Fairfield Preschool classroom. 

 Connect to the story

The teachers at this preschool in Maryland were trained by people from the Center for Social Emotional Foundations for Early Learning (CSEFEL). The folks at CSEFEL have been training trainers in Vermont. This summer and October, many teachers and providers, including me, from Franklin Central officially became CSEFEL trainers. You may recognize some of the techniques in this NPR story to what you see in our classroom everyday.

  This poster of solutions is a resource for helping the kids solve their own problems when they come up during play. We learned the words "problem" and "solution" early on in the year. We know when we have a problem we need to find a solution. Now we have a mediator (or problem solver) each day as a job in the classroom. That person helps others solve their problems with a set of solution cards they wear on a lanyard. 

 

These are the five basic rules we have for the classroom. They are stated positively (what the expectation is, rather than what we don't want to see). We review these often and they are posted near the meeting area. This helps kids understand the consistent expectations for everyone.  

This is our schedule, which helps kids know what we have done and what we will be doing. We move a clothespin along to show where we are at in the daily schedule. Our secretary (another job) reads the schedule at meeting and we always ask if we will be having a regular day or a different day, which helps kids stay grounded.

 

These are the four expectations for whole group meetings. We regularly ask the kids to check themselves when we are to the meeting area.

 

When the kids enter the room, they use this visual to know the four steps of coming into preschool each day. The goal is that they will do these on their own, without adult help to build their independence. 

Preschool Song Lyrics

Preschool song lyrics are now being posted to a page on the Fairfield Preschool's webpage. Follow this link:

Fairfield Preschool

Field Trip to St. Albans Post Office

All of the kids with Beth and a parent in front of a mail truck

Matt Durphy, the officer in charge at the Post Office showing us around.

We had a great visit to the St. Albans' Post Office. We have been learning about how mail and packages move around the country and world in preschool all month long. These boxes hold packages for people who pick up their mail at the post office.  






There are a lot of carts to roll mail around on inside the post office.

A worker sorting mail.

We saw a postal carriers sorting the mail for their routes. Each sorting carousel has slots in order by block and house. Rural carriers use cars to deliver the mail. City carriers load a mail truck, but park and walk their route with a bag.

The whole class got on the big scale. We weighed a lot, about 460 pounds.

A few of us tried out the slanted chairs at a sorting station.

We had mail to send out. We mailed Flat Stanley paper dolls to Florida, Illinois, New York, Connecticut, France, and New Zealand.

Most of them cost about 88 cents to mail. France and New Zealand cost $1.18.

We each had a valentine we made special for another student in the class. Everyone addressed and stamped their envelope to send it in the mail. We wonder how long it will take to make it to our friends' houses?