Adventures In WES Preschool!

The Bikes are Out! What a beautiful day we had yesterday!  Aside from nap time, we spent the entire day outside.  The highlight of the day was riding the bikes around our path.  We saw smiles on everyone's face as they zoomed around and around our path.  There was a huge sense of accomplishment for each of the students as they pedaled the tricycles or pushed the balance bikes up the "hill" and around the loop.  Since the gravel part of our path has been taken over by grass and moss, that side of the path is quite a challenge.  Every one of our preschoolers rose to the challenge and kept working hard until they succeeded.  When not on bikes, the kids had fun playing with the dinosaurs, building with Legos and Magnatiles, and painting.     It was even nice enough to eat snack and lunch outside.   And at the end of the day we took our first trip up to the "big kid" playground where some of the students even got to play with their older siblings for a while. Today w

Fun at Southworth Park! After a long hiatus, we finally returned to Southworth Park. What a fantastic time it was! I love watching the kids play and have fun in the woods.  They try new things, challenge themselves (climbing trees, jumping off logs, walking on difficult terrain...), and mix with kids that they don't always play with on the playground and in the classroom.  We hear laughter, cooperation, encouragement and hardly any arguing.  It's wonderful!  The half mile walk there and back also helps them use up some of their endless energy in a positive, productive manner. We started by reading Miss Rumphius , a book about an old lady who made the world a better place by sowing lupin seeds all over the fields in her oceanside town.  The book is full of wonderful language that we talked about (learning what new words and phrases mean - "sowing seeds" means "planting seeds"...).  We then talked about different ways we could make the world a better place (pl