Feelings

We spent the week talking about different feelings. The main ones that our Experience Curriculum focused on were Happy, Sad, Mad, Surprised and Scared. 

We made mirrors for our Make & Play activity. We talked about how our face changes when we feel different emotions. We practiced making those faces. They were each given a large wavy craft stick, a blue card stock rectangle and a small mirror board. They decorated the craft stick and the blue card stock before gluing everything together.  We added some small pieces of tape to hold the mirror board down because it wasn't sticking around the corners as well as we needed it to. 

They used markers because, well, they LOVE markers! You can use anything you want. You can use sequence or glitter if you want. These kids pick markers over just about anything, except paint. 

In our Creative Corner we made Picasso Portraits. They really got a kick out of the inspiration photo with the face all mixed up. The children used a mirror to look at their own faces. We talked about the features they saw and about the shapes our faces are made up of. 

They were each given a background paper and we divided up our different shape pieces on two cookie sheets so each child could pick the ones they wanted to use. They were encouraged to make a face or whatever they wanted with the shapes. One of the first graders made something that looked like a face at the end of the project. The others wanted to add more shapes and they didn't look as much like a face when they were done. But with this activity, like all of our Invitation to Create projects, we don't stop them from doing their own thing. 

Each month we learn three new letters and Experience Curriculum includes a  Little Letter Book for each one. Each book has four simple pages to color. The cover has the upper and lower case letter and a place for the child's name. We staple the booklets together. You can choose to let the children get some cutting practice in or you can cut it and staple them before the children arrive. This is just one of the literacy tools included in our curriculum each month. At the end of the school year, the children will have booklets for the entire alphabet. 

This month, the kids didn't just get the monthly journal. They also got a Feelings Book. They were encouraged to draw a picture on each page of the different emotions. We like to keep our journals ready to work on throughout the month, so we had those out at the same time. We enjoy giving the children the freedom to work as much or as little in them during our table time. This book will also be used throughout the month. Both will be sent home at the end of week four.