Christmas party eve

Today wasn't our class Christmas party, but you wouldn't have known it! It was a day of fun, complete with pajamas, cookie-making (and decorating!), a special Christmas movie, and even a nativity puppet show!

Our budding bakers in their pj's!

Sweet little chef in action!

Some of our friends went a little overboard with the sprinkles!

The finished products! 

Busy blessings

Here in K3, we've been so busy getting ready for Christmas! We spent a lot of time last week working toward Friday's Christmas performance ... apologies for the lack of blogging. We'll make up for it today with lots of photos! :) (And speaking of the performance Friday, weren't the kiddos wonderful? We hope to have a video very soon.)

It's so fun incorporating lessons into fun crafts. Here's a great one that uses candy cane patterns! Mrs. Connie and Mrs. LeeAnne got the pattern started -- white, red, green -- and then the children continued it. Many struggled with it at first, and it is a rather advanced concept for 3-year-olds. But eventually most got the hang of it and were able to finish the candy cane!

We just love the way these footprint/handprint angels turned out!

Here are some pictures from Thursday's dress rehearsal. It was hard for the kids to get used to wearing animal masks on their heads!

What a cute little donkey!

K4 angels and K3 stable animals.

These handpring sweatshirts turned out so cute! We hope they'll be a fun reminder of your child's year in K3 long after they've outgrown them!

All of us at Hickory Valley Christian School wish you and your families a blessed, joyful Christmas season!

Things Kids Say ...

Not a day goes by that we don't laugh at something - or things! - said by our students. Today we had two great examples.

• While reviewing the letter K, Mrs. Connie asked the children to give her some K words. They shared key, kite, and king, and Mrs. Connie was "coaching" them, trying to get them to say kitten. "It's not a big cat, but it's a little cat," she prodded. "What do you call a little cat?" Several of them stood up and screamed, "BABY CAT!"
• Mrs. Connie evidently didn't realize it was going to be so warm today - this morning she was dressed in a t-shirt with a long-sleeved shirt underneath. After running around with our kiddos all morning, she sat down to conduct morning circle time with them. "I have GOT to come out of these long sleeves," she said to Mrs. LeeAnne. "I'm so hot I'm dying." One of our little girls jumped up with a horrified look on her face and asked, "You're DYING?" We sometimes forget that three- and four-year-olds take things quite literally!

Jingle Jingle

Yesterday we made jingle-bell bracelets -- seriously the easiest Christmas craft you can ever do! (String one large jingle bell onto a red or green pipe cleaner and tie around the child's wrist. They'll entertain themselves for longer than you think.) We've had a lot of fun jingling them high and low, left and right, fast and slow. We also love to jingle them while Mrs. Connie plays for us on the piano!

We also decorated our tree with the ornaments we made Monday -- each child got to hang the ones she created!

Today we also made Santas, and we've also started on special sweatshirts we'll be showing off soon!

It's beginning to look a lot like ...

CHRISTMAS!

We spent the morning decorating some Christmas ornaments that will be used on our K3 class Christmas tree. What fun it was to get messy with glitter!

The finished products, coming soon to a tree near you:

Christmas is such a wonderful time to be working with children! We can't wait to show you all the fun things we'll do!

Thanksgiving

All month long, we've been doing cute crafts that deal with our theme of The First Thanksgiving. Little by little, we've put them up on one of our bulletin boards, each time featuring a different child's artwork.

Now, the students of Hickory Valley Christian School K-3 proudly present, the first Thanksgiving ...

The pilgrims came to America. 

They sailed across the ocean on the Mayflower.

Men built log houses for their families.

Native Americans taught the pilgrims how to fish, hunt, and grow food.

Corn was one of their best crops!

They hunted turkey.

Pilgrims and Native Americans gathered together to feast at harvest time.

We wish you and your families a very happy, blessed Thanksgiving!

Child of the Day

Every morning, one of the things the children look forward to most is answering the question "Who will be our child of the day?" (We even sing about it ... lyrics at the end of this post.) Much pomp and circumstance surrounds the morning drawing of the Child of the Day's name out of our hat -- Child of the Day is a very big deal! They get to sit in a special chair, they get to answer questions first, and they get to be the line-leader for the whole day. The whole day!

There are often tears when a child's name is not drawn, but the sadness quickly dissipates as we take turns sharing the things that, in our opinion, make the Child of the Day special. Answers range from "He plays with me" to "She is pretty" to "God is in her heart" to "He's kind to me at lunch." We're trying to show the children how we all have unique qualities that make us special. The smiles on their faces as they hear affirmations from their classmates is priceless!

Child of the Day listens to what his friends have to say about him.

Each day, Mrs. Connie makes a big deal out of "dubbing thee Child of the Day." Looks like royalty to us!

The Child of the Day chair.

Rest assured, it's all very fair. Each child has one of these "stick children," which we made at the beginning of the year. Once a child's name is drawn, it's removed from the hat until everyone has been Child of the Day. Then we refill the hat and start all over! So even though to a three-year-old, it may feel like "I never get to be Child of the Day!!!!" everyone gets the same amount of turns!

Here are the words to our Child of the Day songs. We've heard rumors that some of our kiddos are playing Child of the Day at home with their parents and grandparents. We love it!

(to the tune of "London Bridge")

Who will be our child of the day, child of the day, child of the day?

Who will be our child of the day? They're so special!

Connie is our child of the day, child of the day, child of the day!

Connie is our child of the day! She's so special!

Crafty K3's

We've been having a lot of fun with our fall crafts! Here is a peek at some of them ...

This letter F activity is GREAT for fall! Our fall tree features the children's handprints in brown as our tree and their fingerprints in red, yellow, brown, and orange as the fall leaves. We finished the project with a few shiny leaf embellishments.

Pumpkin collages ... students tore orange paper into small pieces (great for improving fine motor skills!) and glued them into a pumpkin shape. 

We spent all of October reciting and acting out this cute pumpkin poem, which is great for counting and learning ordinal numbers. The students painted the fence, the moon, and the pumpkins, and Mrs. Connie added the vine later.

Remember last week's fall treasure hunt? This is what we did with our beautiful discoveries! We love these fall wreaths, and we hope they last until Thanksgiving!

G is for ghost!

H is for hungry hippo! We used marshmallows for the hippo's teeth, and the students practiced their counting skills as we glued the marshmallows down.

Halloween!!

Halloween is so much fun when you work with little ones! Mrs. Connie and Mrs. LeeAnne absolutely loved seeing all of our kiddos in their costumes! We spent the morning parading through a few offices and classes, snacking on special holiday treats, and watching Dora's Halloween. Here are some pictures of our fun ...

Parading through Mrs. Aytes' room. 

Parading through the main office (& check out Mrs. Esther as Queen Esther!!).

Snack time!

There are more pictures on Mrs. LeeAnne's good camera, including some group shots - we will get those up soon!



Fall fun

Today we went on a fall treasure hunt! This was similar to last week's leaf hunt, except we were looking for more than leaves! Today was better because we were able to find a bigger variety of colors in our leaves, plus pine cones and other seeds. 

Mrs. Connie explains each new discovery.

As you walk through life, it's always best to hold hands with a buddy!

We engaged our sense of hearing by crunching through the leaves!

Each child got their own bag in which to keep their treasures.

So much fun!

Taking a quick break ...

As we finished up, we stopped to check out the school garden. We enjoyed sampling some mint, which has been thriving all summer!

Getting a group shot is NOT easy!

We also got a chance to sample homemade roasted pumpkin seeds. One girl didn't like them, but everyone else asked for seconds! 

Leaf hunt

Today we went on a leaf hunt!!! We started by making a leaf identification book ...

Next, we paired up and walked across the side street to a gorgeous maple tree whose colors are just beginning to turn. 

The kids were told to pick the BEST yellow leaf they could find. What fun we had!

Getting these active kiddos to sit still for a group picture is even harder than it sounds!

So we gave up and let the kiddos jump and toss leaves. :-)

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em!

On the way back, some of our pairs turned into trios ... so cute!