Dear Yellow Parents,

It has been another busy week in the Yellow Room! Below is an update on what the Yellow Room children learned this week in school. But first:
  

Reminders:
 

• Oct 31:Halloween Party and Pizza Lunch(Children and teachers only.)
• Nov. 12 & 13:Parent Teacher Conferences
• Nov. 14:Picture Day in School (Children and teachers only)

 
Themes this week:
 

• Halloween and it's characters that make it spooky, mwaaa haa haa!
• We concluded our harvest study with a fun trip to the Botanical Gardens

Classroom Activites:
 

• For Math, we read “How Many Seeds In A Pumpkin?”, by Margaret McNamara and worked on our estimation skills by estimating/guessing how many seeds were in one of our classroom pumpkins. In another estimation activity, children estimated how many pumpkins tall they were.
• In writing, the kids wrote responses and drew illustrations to the response, "In the Haunted House.."
• Throughout the week, the kids were busy bees making Halloween decorations such as black cats and jack-o-lanterns to make the room "spooktacular" for our big Halloween celebration.
• In science, we learned a new term: reaction. We enjoyed conducting a simple science experiment using baking soda, vinegar, and soap. First we spooned some baking soda into our jack-o-lantern and added dish soap. We observed no changes in our ingredients until we added the.......baking soda. Then, the foam and bubbles oozed out from the jack-o-lantern's face and top. 
• In math, we voted on a graph to carve a "scary" or "happy" face for our jack-o-lantern.  You'll have to wait and find out which got the MOST votes.
• In writing, the kids thought of a word to finish a delightful rhyme about scarecrows.
• In cooking, we baked delicious zucchini muffins using the fresh zucchini we bought on our walking trip to the farmer's market.

 
Highlight of the Week:

• Our trip to the Botanical Gardens!!!!! The weather was perfect and we had so much fun planting seeds, digging for worms, tasting spinach and carrots that are grown straight in the garden. Thanks again chaperones for all your help!

 
Book we read:

• At The Old Haunted House, by Helen Katterman
• Inside a House That is Haunted, by Alyssa Capucilli
• The Sweetest Witch Around, by ALison McGhee
• How Many Seeds in a Pumpkin?, Maragret McNamara
• What;s in the Witch's Kitchen?, by Nick Sharrat
• The Spookiest Halloween Ever!, Teddy Slater

 
 
Places we visited:

• In PE we played the chase game.
• In yoga we practiced our easy, medium, and hard tree pose.
• In Art, Julia and Janae continued the artist study on Piet Mondrian. The children drew different straight lines with rulers and painted cardboard squares.

Enjoy the photos and have a great weekend.
 
Sincerely,

The Yellow Room Teachers

Dear Yellow Parents,

It has been another busy week in the Yellow Room! Below is an update on what the Yellow Room children learned this week in school. But first:
  

Reminders:

• Oct. 23:             Trip to the Botanical Gardens
• Oct 31:               Halloween Party (Children and teachers only.)
• Nov. 12 & 13:     Parent Teacher Conferences
• Nov. 14 & 15:     Picture Day in School (Children and teachers only)

 
 
 
Themes this week:

• Harvest Time. We learned that harvest time is when fruits and vegetables are ready to picked and gathered by farmers.
• The role of a farmer and his contributions to our community. 
• We investigated one specific crop, Pumpkins!

Classroom Activities:
 

• In art, we made different Harvest items that we have been learning about. The Yellow Room children decorated scarecrows faces using felt, fabric patches, burlap, yarn, buttons and raffia. Using model magic, the kids shaped the clay to look like corn. Then, they painted it yellow and added real corn kernels for a realistic look.  
• We practiced our counting skills by arranging numbered pumpkins (1-15) on a paper vine. 
• In writing, the kids thought of a response to the prompt, "I can scare........"
• In science we learned about the Life Cycle of a pumpkin. We sequenced the stages of a pumpkin: seed, sprout, vine, flower, green pumpkin, and then finally the orange ripe pumpkin.  We then recreated the stages with our newly acquired vocabulary words by sequencing colorful pictures of each stage.
• As a follow up to science, we reviewed the parts of a pumpkin. Each child received their own pumpkin diagram to correctly label with these new science words; stem, skin, ribs, seeds, and pulp.  
• The letter of the week was “E”. We followed up with a story, a jingle, and a poem. The yellow room children generated a list of words starting with the letter ‘E’. We also completed the another page in our letter journal for the letter "E". Recognizing beginning letter sounds is an important pre-reading skill. 

 
 
Highlight of the Week:

• Walking trip to the farmer's market! We looked around and saw all of the harvested crops of the season. Luckily, we found our next crop to investigate and learn about, ZUCCHINI!

 
 
Book we read:

• The Little Scarecrow Boy, by Margaret Wise Brown
• From Seed to Pumpkin, by Jan Kottke
• Pumpkin Circle, by George Levenson
• A Day at the Pumpkin Patch, by Megan Faulkner & Adam Krawesky
• Pumpkin Eye, Denise Fleming

 
 
Places we visited:

• In PE we worked on our skipping, marching and jumping jacks.
• In Art, Julia and Janae began an artist study on Piet Mondrian. The children drew different straight lines with rulers and painted cardboard squares.
• In Library, Lindsay read Grandfather's Journey, by Allen Say

 
Enjoy the photos and have a great weekend.
 
Sincerely,

The Yellow Room Teachers

Dear Yellow Room Families,
 

 
Once again, thank you everyone for coming to our classroom presentation on curriculum night, for your kind words and the support you have shown us.
 
Busy week in the Yellow Room. First..

Reminders:
 

• Oct. 8 & 9:         School Closed (Columbus Day and Staff Development
• Oct. 12:             Trip to the local Firehouse (Children and teachers only.)
• Oct. 23:             Trip to the Botanical Gardens
• Oct 31:               Halloween Party (Children and teachers only.)
• Nov. 12 & 13:     Parent Teacher Conferences
• Nov. 14 & 15:     Picture Day in School (Children and teachers only)

 
 
Themes this week:

• Fire Safety
• Firefighters

 
Classroom Activities:

• In preparation for our trip to the firehouse, the Yellow Room children spent the week learning about fire safety and prevention. We read books about firefighters and learned in more detail what their job entails. We used the SMART board to dress a firefighter in her special clothing and equipment that firefighters use to keep themselves safe.  
• For our writing activity this week, each child wrote one fire safety tip they learned and wanted to share with others. The children were so inspired by one particular fire safety tip that they practiced “Stop, drop, and roll” on the rooftop playground. We also learned if there is a fire it will create smoke and to get out safely from the smoke we practiced “Get low and go!”.
• For Math, the Yellow Room children practiced their number recognition and counting skills by choosing a numbered card, naming the digit and adding that number of spots to their own Dalmatian fire dogs using a Q-tip and black paint.
• We also used pictures of firefighter tools to create patterns. 
• In Science, we used a candle to learn about what a fire needs to live. Using the candle with a wick as the fuel, we observed what happens when you take away the heat from a flame by pouring water on it. Then we predicted what would happen if we covered the flame with a glass jar. We observed how the flame went out and concluded that by covering the candle with the jar, we took the air away and the flame could no longer live. We learned that fire needs three things to live: heat, fuel, and air.
• As a whole group, we sorted pictures of household items that are safe and not safe for us. 
• The letter of the week was “F”. We followed up with a story, a jingle, and a poem. The yellow room children generated a list of words starting with the letter ‘F’. We also completed the second page in our letter journal for the letter "F". Recognizing beginning letter sounds is an important pre-reading skill. As the week progressed, we continued to detect words with that beginning ‘F’ letter sound.

 
Highlight of the Week:

• As a group, we practicing dialing 911 ONLY in an emergency using an interactive pretend phone. The kids enjoyed taking turns in front of the class and finding the 911 buttons to press and saying "Help! There is a fire and come quick." 

 
Books we read:

• Busy People: Firefighter, by Ando Twin and Lucy M. George
• Stop Drop and Roll, by Margery Cuyler
• A Very Busy Firehouse, by Alyse Sweeney
• Let's Meet a Firefighter, by GIna Bellisario
• Firefighters, by Jacqueline Laks Gorman
• The Fire Station, by Robert Munch and Michael Martchenko

 
Songs we sang:

• Jolly ‘F’ Jingle
• The Fire Safety Song
• Feeling Groovy
• Simple Gifts

Places we visited:

• In Library, Lindsay read The Little Engine that Could, by Watty Piper. 
• In Yoga, we stretched and worked on our tree poses.
• In Art, the children created collages using various black, white and grey materials.

 
Have a great weekend,

The Yellow Room Teachers