Fun with gingerbread!

Back before Christmas, we had a little fun with a brief gingerbread unit. Two of our activities were making a gingerbread counting book (while pretending to eat the gingerbread man throughout the book) and conducting a science experiment with real gingerbread cookies!

Working on gingerbread books. Cutting out so many gingerbread men was great for our fine motor skills!

Next, we decided to see what would happen when we mixed a gingerbread cookie with a liquid. Each child got one cookie, a cup, and a sheet on which to record his or her results. First, we drew pictures of what the cookie looked like before going into the cup. Then we placed the cookies into the cups and poured water over them.

At first, there wasn't much of a visible change. As the teacher, I could tell that the cookies were absorbing water, but to the kids they looked more or less the same. We recorded these observations on the board.

What's a teacher to do? Get out some craft sticks and let them start poking and stirring!

After recording our "with water added" results, there was one final step ... EATING! (No, not our soggy cookies, but fresh ones.) 

Learning is fun ... and delicious!

Elf trouble

Santa sent someone special to our K5 class last month -- an elf named Spirit! (He's even blue and white, just like our school colors!) Spirit got into a little trouble while he was visiting; one day he knocked over the chairs in our rooms, and one morning we arrived to find a note saying he'd made it snow!

What fun we had rubbing the "snow" on our hands, spreading it on the tables, and making designs. And for the rest of the day, Mrs. Viall's room smelled suspiciously of menthol and aloe. 😉

Scavenger Hunt

We took advantage of some warm weather before Christmas break to do an alphabet scavenger hunt. We headed outside with our clipboards and searched for various items in nature. We had to identify what the item was, what letter it started with, and then draw a picture of it.

Getting outside is so important for young children, so we love it when we can combine learning with the outdoors!