Our Focus Lesson:

This week we learned about pollinators! There are four main types of pollinators – bees, butterflies, bats, and hummingbirds. We learned that when these animals eat the nectar from flowers they then take that pollen to another flower. That flower uses the pollen the pollinator brought to create a new seed or fruit for the plant.

We also took some time to learn more about butterflies and bees. We learned the parts of these insects, their life cycles, and then followed a bee through collecting pollen/nectar and using it to make honey.

Our Preschool Lesson:

Ms. Sam taught our younger Blossoms all about insects this week. We learned the characteristics that make an insect an insect. Insects hatch from eggs, they are colded blooded, they have an exoskeleton, and they have a head, thorax and abdomen.

Ms. Sam also introduced us to a super fun work – creating insects with loose parts!

Kindergarten Lesson:

We completed our Poetry Books! We cannot wait for you to see them at Kindergarten Graduation next week!

Special Visitors!

We had a few special visitors this week! We had our very last ASL lesson for the school year. We also had a visitor come to our class that read us Brown Bear, Brown Bear in French! We were so excited to learn so many new words in new languages!

Butterfly Release!

We released the butterflies we raised in our classroom this week! It is always such a joy to observe this life cycle with the students. They are full of wonder and curiousity at each stage of the cycle!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Peek Into Next Week!

It’s the Last Week of School! We will be reading books about the end of the school year, and summertime! We will sprinkle some fun throughout all of our days that are left. What an AMAZING school year with AMAZING children!

NO AFTERCARE ON WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAY!

Wednesday – Kindergarten Graduation

Thursday – Family Picnic and Bash & Splash!

Our Focus Lesson: Flowers

This week the Cherry Blossoms studied flowers! This unit allowed us to review the parts of a plant and their important jobs – roots, stem, and leaves. We learned that flower petals are so colorful so that they can attract pollinators – which we will be learning all about next week! We also learned other parts of a flower; the calyx holds the flower to the stem, the stamens produce the pollen, and the pistil recieves the pollen from other flowers to make seeds.

We ended our week by using our 5 senses to explore flowers and then dissected them!

Our Preschool Lesson: Seeds

Our younger Blossoms learned about seeds this week! Plants all begin with a seed, so we learned what seeds need in order to grow – soil, sun, and water! We also learned about what happens when a seed sprouts into a plant – first the root grows down, then the stem grows up, and finally the plant grows leaves! We reviewed the special jobs that all of those parts of a plant do.

Blossoms also had a chance to observe different types of seeds in plants that we eat at home! We explored an apple, an avacado, a lemon, and a strawberry. We were very surprised to learn that the seeds of a strawberry are on the outside of the fruit, not on the inside like the others!

Kindergarten Lesson:

Our older Blossoms continued their grammar symbol lessons with Mr. John this week, and continued their Poetry Books with Ms. Kelley and Ms. Tonya. They are writing the final drafts of their poems and created the covers of their poetry books this week. They can’t wait to put their final books of the year together!

Picnic!

The weather was so nice this week that we had our first picnic outside!

Yoga and Music Recitals!

We had a special visit from Ms. Amanda and Ms. Brittany from The Wellness Den this week! We participated in an animal inspired yoga class and enjoyed stretching and acting like elephants, cheetahs, spiders, and much more!

Two of our Blossoms also showcased what they have learned in their piano classes this school year! We loved listening to them play and cheering them on from the audience!

Butterflies and Killdeer Nests!

Our butterflies hatched out of their chrysalis this week!!!! We were so lucky that three of them hatched during the school day and we were able to see them as soon as they came out. We watched as they dried their weeks and observed the extra color that drips off of their wet wings. We can’t wait to release them next week!

We also were lucky enough to observe a Killdeer mother and her nest this week. We watched as she puffed herself up and called to us to stay away as we walked past her nest to play in our outdoor space. Sadly, by Friday, our Killdeer mother and father birds were nowhere to be found and the nest had been abandonded. We talked about how sometimes that will happen when birds feel unsafe.

Peek into Next Week!

Focus Lesson: Pollinators

Preschool Lesson: Insects

Kindergarten Lessons: Interjections and Poetry!

Important Dates:

May 24 – Kindergarten Graduation 4pm

May 25 – Last Day of School! Bash & Splash school event!

Focus Lesson: Birds

This week the Blossoms studied Birds! We learned about Bird Classification, or what makes a bird a bird! We know that birds are vertebrates, are warm blooded, are covered in feathers, lay hard shelled eggs, take care of their babies, and have two wings and two feet! We enjoyed looking through many different bird books and learning the names of the different species of birds that we can see outside of our classroom window or at home.

Preschool Lesson: Eggs

Preschoolers learned some very big words with Ms. Sam this week. They learned the word Oviparous – which is an animal that lays eggs! We learned that fish, birds, amphibians, reptiles, and insects are all oviparous. But mammals, including humans, are Viviparous – they birth live babies! Our favorite work activity this week was sorting the animals in our science area by weather they lay eggs or don’t lay eggs.

Kindergarten Lesson:

Kindergarteners learned about conjunctions with Mr. John this week in Kindergarten Lesson. Conjunction Junction, what’s your function? I hope you sang that! Writer’s Workshop and Reader’s Workshop continued writing their poetry.

We Are Proud of Our Hard Work!

A Peek Into Next Week!

Focus Lesson: Flowers

Preschool Lesson: Seeds

Kindergarten Lessons: Prepositions, Writing Poetry

Important Dates:

Our Final Bring Your Parents to Work Day is May 10!

Kindergarten Graduation – May 24

Last Day of School – May 25

Ms. Tonya’s Lesson:

Our Cherry Blossoms began some zoology units with Ms. Tonya this week. We currently have both tadpoles and caterpillars in our classroom! We started the week reviewing the life cycle of a frog from eggs to tadpoles, to tadpoles with legs, to froglets, and then to adult frog. We are using a magnifying glass to observe the tadpoles in the observation container in our classroom and are enjoying feeding them fresh lettuce each day after we have lunch! We also began our life cycle of a butterfly observation booklets. We currently have 5 painted lady caterpillars eating and growing within our classroom. We look forward to watching them complete their whole life cycle before the end of the school year! Lastly, Ms. Tonya introduced the Blossoms to some interesting landforms, animals, and cultures that can be found in the continents of Asia, Africa, Australia, and Antarctica!

Ms. Sam’s Lesson:

Ms. Sam also focused her lessons on the seven continents this week. She reviewed the globe with the Blossoms and introduced them to some vocabulary words such as Equator and Prime Meridian. She also introduced the class to interesting landforms, animals, and cultures found in North America, South America, and Europe! Ms. Sam has been to Europe, so she brought in some objects from her travels for us to observe this week. We loved the nesting dolls, jumping toys, and the Christmas Pyramid!

Kindergarten Lesson:

Kindergarteners continued their study of grammar symbols both in the classroom and with Mr. John this week. They were introduced to adverbs this week. With Ms. Kelley, in Reader’s Workshop, Kindergarteners wrote an Acrostic poem this week with a focus on adjectives. With Ms. Tonya, in Writer’s Workshop, our young writers wrote a List poem about a noun, focusing on using pronouns throughout the middle of their poem.

“This gym is huuuuuggggeeee!”:

We were able to use the gym this week during recess. We played dodgeball and Duck, Duck, Goose with our Aspen friends!

A Peek Into Worktime:

Buddy Works are our favorite works!

A Peek Into Next Week!

Focus Lesson: Birds

Preschool Lesson: Eggs

Kindergarten Lesson: Grammar Symbols and Poetry

Welcome Back Blossoms!

We are so excited to be back together at school! Also, I apologize for the delay in getting the blog out to you – I was experiencing some technical difficulties. Everything should be good to go now!

Ms. Tonya’s Lesson: Spring

Ms. Tonya led a discussion about the season of Spring this week. We reviewed the 4 seasons and then discussed the characteristics of spring. Spring brings lots of rain, but it also brings flowers! Lots of animal babies are born in the spring. Spring is a good time to begin your vegetable garden, and farmers are planting seeds as well. We took a close up look to some of the best spring flowers – tulips and daffodils! We also explored some cherry blossoms!

Ms. Sam’s Lesson: Earth Day

Ms. Sam introduced our Blossoms to Earth Day this week. We learned about different ways we can take care of our planet. We talked about ways to Reduce our impact. We explored items that can be Recycled and sorted them by the materials they are made out of. We practiced Reusing by making bird feeders out of toilet paper tubes. We hung the bird feeders outside so that we can meet the birds that live outside of our classroom window!

Our Kindergarten Lesson: Grammar Symbols & Poetry

Kindergarteners dove into Grammar Symbols this week, both in Kindergarten Lesson and the classroom. They practiced finding nouns, verbs, articles, pronouns, and adverbs within sentences. Reader’s and Writer’s Workshop continued their study of Poetry. Kindergarteners wrote acrostic poems and color poems this week!

Enrichment Spotlight: Music, Art, & Science!

Music with Ms. Lisa, Art with Ms. Varela, and Science with Mr. John all resumed this week in their new spaces!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

A HUGE Happy Birthday to all of our April birthdays!!!!

We LOVE Our New Space!

Your children have had an amazing first week back to school! We love our new classroom and the extra space that it gives us. We absolutely love the view of the wildlife we see outside – horses, birds, and squirrels right outside of our classroom window this week! The field that we visit during our recess time is so big and giggles were had by all as they ran back and forth!

Our Focus Lesson: Outer Space

This week we learned all about Outer Space! We studied the eight planets found in our solary system, learned about orbits, talked about the sun and the moon, were introduced to asteroids and comets, and were in awe of pictures of our galaxy. Your children now know that Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars are rock planets while Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune are gas giants. They know that Saturn’s rings are made of pieces of rock and ice, Venus is the hottest planet, and that Pluto is now one of our Solar System’s dwarf planets. We really loved our lessons this week!

Our Preschool Lesson: Layers of the Earth

Ms. Sam and our preschool students took a deep look at our planet, Earth. They learned the layers of our planet from the crust that we live on to the incrediably hot inner core! We ended the week taking a look at the Stromboli Volcano off the coast of Italy. Preschoolers learned that the mantle is made up of magma, but when it comes out of a volcano we then call it lava!

Kindergarten Lessons:

During Kindergarten Lesson this week, our older Blossoms were introduced to nouns and verbs. We know that nouns are a person, place, or thing and that verbs are action words or something that you do. During Reader’s and Writer’s Workshop, kindergarteners continued their study of poetry with Ms. Kelley and Ms. Tonya. They practiced writing an Alliteration Poem about Spring together as a group, and created a rough draft of their 5 Senses Poem about a topic of their choosing!

Indoor Recess Skills

We practiced some different gross motor skills in the gym this week during Indoor Recess. We participated in a bean bag toss game, practiced our hula hooping skills, had fun bouncing and catching a ball, and learned how to jump rope! We also danced around to Baby Shark!

One Last Cozy Day Before Spring Break!

Peek Into Next Week!

NO SCHOOL NEXT WEEK – SPRING BREAK

School resumes on Monday, April 3!

Focus Lesson & Preschool Lesson: Continents

Kindergarten Lesson: Articles

Important Dates:

Friday, April 7: Early Release 12pm for Good Friday

Monday, April 10: No School for Easter Monday

Wednesday, April 26: International Festival Rehearsal

Friday, April 28: International Festival!

Bring Your Parent to Work Days: There are only 4 more Bring Your Parent to Work Dates this school year! Sign up and come observe your child at work!

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/4090b48a8a92da6f94-cblossom#/

Focus Lesson: Weather

This week, we learned about Weather in the Cherry Blossom classroom. We discussed what types of weather we find here in Ohio, such as sunny, rainy, snowy, and windy. We learned that countries closer to the Equator have different weather patterns than we do and that we live in a temperate climate. We spent our week keeping a Weather Journal and were lucky enough to witness 5 different types of weather this week! Yay Ohio!

We also learned about the Water Cycle. Ask your child about evaporation, condensation, and precipitation. We ended the week learning about different types of clouds and the messages that they give us. Cumulus clouds tell us that the weather is good, and Stratus clouds tell us it is either going to rain or snow. But did you know that if you see Cirrus clouds that it will rain or snow within 24 hours?

Preschool Lesson: Colors

Our younger Blossoms learned about Colors this week. We reviewed Primary and Secondary colors, discussed hues and shades, and practiced our Rainbow order. We built rainbows, colored rainbows, mixed paint, and ended our week with a Green Scavenger Hunt!

Kindergarten Lessons:

Our older Blossoms learned to differentiate between consonants and vowels this week during Kindergarten Lesson. In Reader’s and Writer’s Workshop, our kindergarteners have started their poetry unit. They worked as a group to write these poems about a butterfly and flowers!

Enrichment Spotlight:

In Music class with Ms. Lisa, our Blossoms were introduced to the piano. They each had a turn to play a duet with a classmate!

Special Visitors:

We had two special visitors to our class this week! Elementary students came to show us their Science Experiment. They put rice into cups and then spoke nicely to one cup of rice and spoke meanly to another cup of rice. The cup they spoke kindly too grew a little bit of mold, the cup they spoke meanly to grew a lot of mold! Next, they are going to try the same experiment with plants!

One of the parents of an Aspen student gave us a presentation about Pakistan! She showed us the map of Pakistan, the clothing people wear there, what their schools and vehicles look like, and what sort of food they eat. We loved learning more about this country found in Asia as we begin preparing for the International Festival!

If you or someone you know would like to also come talk to us about another country, we would love to have them come visit us!

Indoor Recess:

As much as we love to go outside and play on the playground, we also have so much fun in the gym during Indoor Recess! This week we built an obstacle course! There was balancing, jumping, and running!

St. Patrick’s Day Shenanigans!

Happy St. Patrick’s Day from the Cherry Blossom Classroom! We built a trap as a class to catch that pesky leprechaun but Sean O’Keefe tricked us again! He ate all of the Lucky Charms we left for him, and left us a pot of chocolates to share! He also pulled out all of the green materials in our classroom and threw them all of the room!

Peek into Next Week!

Focus Lesson: Outer Space

Preschool Lesson: Layers of the Earth

Kindergarten Lesson: Nouns and Verbs

Important Dates: Spring Break – No School – March 27-31

Our Focus Lesson: Read Across America/Dr. Seuss

“Congratulations!   Today is your day. You’re off to great places!  You’re off and away!

You have brains in your head.  You have feet in your shoes.  You can steer yourself any direction you choose.

You’ll be on your way up!  You’ll be seeing great sights!  You’ll join the high fliers who soar to high heights! 

Wherever you fly, you’ll be the best of the best.  Wherever you go, you will top all the rest.

Oh, the places you’ll go!  There is fun to be done!  There are points to be scored.  There are games to be won. 

You’ll get mixed up, of course, as you already know.  You’ll get mixed up with many strange birds as you go.

So be sure when you step. Step with care and great tact and remember that Life’s a Great Balancing Act. 

And will you succeed?  Yes! You will, indeed! (98 and 3/4 percent guaranteed!)

KID, YOU’LL MOVE MOUNTAINS!

You’re off to Great Places!  Today is your day! Your mountain is waiting. 

So… get on your way!

– “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!’ by Dr. Seuss

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

It’s Time for International Festival!

The Cherry Blossom Class will be studying the continents of NORTH AMERICA and SOUTH AMERICA for the International Festival.  We have already started our research so make sure your child signs up for the country that they would like to represent by Friday, March 10th!  

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/4090b48a8a92da6f94-country5#/

Peek into Next Week!

Focus Lesson: Fish

Preschool Lesson: Land and Water Forms

Kindergarten Lessons: Geometric Solids & Poetry

Important Dates:

March 27-March 31: Spring Break

April 7: Good Friday – Early Release 12:00pm

April 10: Easter Monday – No School

April 26: International Festival Rehearsal

April 28: International Festival

Our Focus Lesson – Winter

We have spent the past two weeks learning about the season of Winter… which was a tad challenging this year with our current weather. However, we made the most of it! We reviewed the Four Seasons and talked about what is special about Winter. The cold temperatures, the snow, how trees are dormant , and what different animals do.

We also read some fun books about snowmen and The Mitten by Jan Brett!

Preschool Lesson – Hibernation, Migration, Adaptation

Ms. Sam taught us all about hibernation, migration, and adaption over the past couple weeks! We read the story Under and Over the Snow as we learned what types of animals sleep all winter long, which animals fly south for the winter, and which animals stay here and adapt to the cold weather. We enjoyed watching our fluffy sparrows outside at our bird feeder adapt to the temperature. We also thought about why we would love to hibernate. But alas, people adapt.

Kindergarten Lessons

Kindergarteners were introduced to Fractions this week during Kindergarten Lesson. They also ended the week with a special Skittles surprise from Mr. John!

Reader’s and Writer’s Workshop celebrated this week with an Author’s Share! Each Kindergartener chooses one book that they have written recently, sits in the Author’s Chair, and reads their book to the class. They did so well reading to their friends!

Enrichment Spotlight – Art with Ms. Varela

Peek into Work Time

Peek into Next Week!

Focus Lesson: Dr. Seuss/Read Across America Week!

Monday: Wear crazy socks!

Tuesday: Wear your favorite hat!

Wednesday: Dress wacky!

Thursday: Wear green!

Important Dates:

March 26-March 31: Spring Break – No School!

Our Focus Lesson & Preschool Lesson: Dinosaurs

We learned about Dinosaurs this week! Our new vocabulary that we were introduced to is herbivore, carnivore, extinct, paleontologist, and fossils. This was certainly a favorite topic for our kiddos! We spent the whole week asking questions and sharing what we know about dinosaurs with our friends. We read books, watched paleontologists at work, and discussed our favorite dinosaurs. Everyone has a favorite dinosaur, what is yours?

Enrichment Spotlight:

Valentine’s Day!

Peek Into Next Week!

Focus Lesson: Winter

Preschool Lesson: Hibernation, Migration, and Adaptation

Kindergarten Lesson: Division

Important Dates:

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 17 – NO SCHOOL, Teacher Inservice Day

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 20 – NO SCHOOL, President’s Day