Tally Mark Math

Spring is right around the corner, and that means that it is time for our Spring on the Farm unit.  The Rainbow 4s kicked off this unit with a silly, fun story, The Cows Are in the Corn.

In the story, the animals are all out of their pens. 

In order to get them all locked up, we needed to build a fence or them.

This was a fun way to introduce tally marks, and counting by 5.  Each child practiced on the board. 

We talked about using tally marks as one way to help us be organized when we count.   

Next, we colored our own farm animals.

And used popsicle stick tally mark frames to "lock" our farm animals up.

This is such a fun, simple way to introduce this concept to children!

Rocky!

This week at preschool, we are learning about community helpers.  We shared the story Office Buckle and Gloria with our 4 year old classes.  Today, we were treated to a special visit from Rocky and his handler, Sgt. Blanton with the Wallace Police Department.  

Rocky is a good friend and helper to the Police Officer.

He is 3 year old black lab.

Rocky can find bad drugs.  He showed us how.  

Rocky loves to meet new friends.

 Children who wanted to, got to pet Rocky.  

We are so thankful for the special opportunity that we had today.

We sure hope that Rocky will come back to visit with us soon!  

We know he will, because we gave him a band new package of tennis balls, his favorite toy.

Food Paint

Today we had a very fun snack at preschool.  On this month's newsletter I shared a recipe for "Food Paint".  Really, it is not so much a recipe, but an idea.  Regardless, Windsor was the snack helper today, and I thought we might give it a try.  I must say that the thought of fourteen 3 year olds wielding paintbrushes and very sticky food paint, during a full moon, really had me wondering "what in the world was I thinking".  I am pretty sure Miss Ashley was wondering too, but she was kind enough not to ask!  

Truth be told, I think it was our best snack time to date.  Everyone was so focused, involved and interested that we had zero issues. I took pictures to prove it!

First of all, before school, Winds and I poured a little sweetened, condensed milk in a muffin tin.  Then we had fun adding food coloring and seeing what happened when we mixed red and blue, and red and yellow!

At snack time, we served each child  a "blank canvas", marshmallows, popcorn, and peeled apples.

 You could also do crackers and bread... 

We gave out new paintbrushes and some serious instructions about not licking them :)

Just in case, we promised each child that if they forgot, that they could have a new one.  We had 2 or 3 that had to take us up on that offer, but they were so precious and honest!

 We ended up needing to cut the muffin tin in thirds to help each child be able to reach the "paint".  

 They had a great time, did some wonderful sharing, and thoroughly enjoyed their snack.  

We were so surprised at how little mess there was.  

We did keep the baby wipes close by, but we didn't really need them.

If you haven't tried this at home yet, you should!  Happy painting...