Friday, December 25, 2009

Happy Holidays!

I hope that you are all having a peaceful time with family and friends over the break!  Here's a special "Merry Christmas" from the class:


Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Nutcracker Field Trip

The kids looked so nice all dressed up for the ballet on Thursday.  Here are some pictures from the day:



On Friday, the children drew pictures and wrote about their favorite parts of the ballet.  Check out their great work:


December Pictures

Here are a few more pictures from December:


Sunday, December 13, 2009

Gingerbread Fun




We had a great time this week reading lots of Gingerbread Man stories and baking real gingerbread cookies.  This weekend, I found some good gingerbread man resources online and wanted to share them with you.  I hope you have fun exploring them with your child!


Your child can virtually decorate a gingerbread cookie, 
then email a picture of the cookie to a friend.




Dress up a gingerbread man with lots of fun costumes.



Interactive gingerbread book on Starfall.com.



Here's some fun sites where your child can decorate a gingerbread house:






Here's an online version of the story being read aloud:



Wednesday, December 9, 2009

December . . . so far

Here's what we've been up so far this month:


November's Leftovers

Here are a few pictures that were left over from November:


Friday, December 4, 2009

Jan Brett and The Gingerbread Baby



We have been reading lots of gingerbread man stories in class, including two beautiful picture books by the author / illustrator Jan Brett: The Gingerbread Baby  and Gingerbread Friends.  Today we watched some videos of Jan Brett talking about her work.  I was having some issues getting the projector's speaker to work with my laptop, so we didn't get to watch as much as I had planned, but we will try again next week.  There are tons of great videos on her website with her talking about lots of her books.  Check them out here.

We will read more of Jan's books throughout December and January.  A lot of her illustrations feature wintry scenes, so they are perfect for this time of year.  I encourage you to explore Jan Brett's website.  There are tons of printable pictures for coloring , including lots with the gingerbread baby.  There are also some online games, including one where you can decorate a gingerbread house.  It wouldn't work on my Mac, but I've seen it on a PC, and it's really cute.    Have fun exploring the site together, and please feel free to share your family's favorite parts in a comment below.