The School for Early Excellence's Blog!: February 2018

We are already halfway through February and boy have we been busy. February is a month full of many holidays and fun events and we didn’t want to miss a single one. The beginning of the month was all about shadows; where do they come from, does everyone have one and will our little buddy Puxatawney Phil see his shadow when he pops his head out of his burrow on Groundhog Day?

Our shadow studies began with a discussion that not every object is able to make a shadow. If the object is transparent or see through the light will go right through it and no shadow will appear but if the object is opaque or solid a shadow will form because the light has to go around it. We then put our theory to the test by trying out different things around the classroom. We began by making our own puppets to use in our shadow box and learning different ways to move our hands to make animal shapes. We even traced our shadows with chalk outside while striking different poses! We ended the week by watching the shadow ceremony and found out that Puxatawny Phil did see his shadow and we will (unfortunately) have 6 more weeks of winter.

Up next we learned all about the Winter Olympics. This year the Olympics is being held in South Korea with 102 events, 15 different sports and almost 3,000 participating athletes! We held our own Olympics here at SEE and I’m pretty sure we have some future Olympians in our group. The SEE Olympic games consisted of the balance beam, long jump and maneuvering through an obstacle course. The kiddos had a blast showing off their skills and earning their gold medals!

This past week was all about friendship and making our friends and family feel special. The kiddos have all been hard at work making beautiful cards for their secret valentine and we got to deliver them to our friends by taking a crawl through the “friendship tunnel.” We also talked about what a compliment is and how it makes people feel. As a group we sat in a big circle and made a “compliment circle” each kiddo chose a friend and gave them a compliment to brighten their day! It was really sweet to hear the different compliments that everyone came up with.

On top of all that, we introduced our book of the month, “Stuck,” by Oliver Jeffers. This story is about a young boy named Floyd who gets his kite stuck up in a tree. He tries throwing anything and everything he can find up into the tree to try and get his kite down. When he throws up the last object, the tree becomes too full and down comes his kite. The kiddos have been getting a kick out of all the ridiculous things the boy finds to toss up in the tree and we have begun making our own trees inspired by the one from the book!

What's Up Next?
The children will be celebrating and learning about Chinese New Year traditions. It's the year of the dog, woof! We will celebrate with a special noodle snack and a lion dance at the end of the week. We will also have a special guest visit on Friday to teach us even more about new year traditions and culture. Following all of our February celebrations, we will move on to yet another celebration in the beginning of March, Dr. Seuss' birthday! It will be a week full of silly words and fun!

Thank you!
Thank you to all of those who voted for us in Wicked Local's Favorites this year! We are hopeful that we will keep our #1 status for yet another year! We are so thankful for our past, present and future SEE families and we appreciate your support of our little, local preschool!

Upcoming Dates and Reminders:

March 1: March tuition is due
April 1: April tuition is due
April 16-20: SEE will be closed for spring break
(Parent's Night Out: TBA!)

Pictures from the past few weeks: