Friday Follow Up-December 4, 2009

This week in fitness, we worked on balance, directional moving, skipping, hopping, stepping backwards, forwards, and side to side. We finished up our T-Ball unit on Wednesday by splitting into stations, doing target practice, batting practice, and catching.

We did many different dances in dance class such as, The Maccarena, The Cha Cha Slide, Cupid Shuffle, Hokey Pokey, and many more. The kids had so much fun!

This week in music, we started singing holiday songs! In all of our classes,we sang both Christmas and Hanukkah songs. In the Primary class, we sang "Rudolph the Red Nosed Raindeer" and "Dreidel, Driedel." In the Inters classes, we sang "The Chipmunk Song," "Santa Claus is Coming to Town," and "Hanukkah, oh Hanukkah." In the Uppers classes, we sang "Rockin Around The Christmas Tree," "Hanukkah, oh Hanukkah." "Dreidel, Dreidel," and "Holly Jolly Christmas." We had a great time!

We had another great Thursday of drama. We explored making big choices with our bodies and allowing the actions of those around us to affect our own creative decisions. Some of the classes also explored some new clowning exercises which we hope to use in our production of the Ugly Duckling this spring.

This week in science, we continued to discuss the human body by focusing on one of it's most important parts, our bones! The primary and intermediate classes assembled a skeleton and learned about the major bones in our body ( skull, spine, ribs, pelvic, arms and legs). We learned two important functions of bones in our bodies; 1) to give us structure and 2) to protect our organs. The uppers were excited to start their Body Building class projects. Each student had a friend trace around their body. The students will draw their bones on their body outline. Eventually, we will add additional part of the body to these drawings. What a great way to learn about our bodies from the inside out!

We had so much fun making Gingerbread pops and playing relay games, in the Buddy Program this week. The kids worked with their buddies to decorate and devour their scrumptious creations! Aaron organized some fantastic group games which encouraged the kids to work together.

The participants of the Social Club had fun decorating a snowman and using different objects to make an appropriate setting for their creation! We also talked about Hanukkah and made menorah candles. Hooray for the holidays

This week in art the students learned more about colors and how to blend them using watercolor paints. The students then helped me prepare a 'special project' for a 'secret special Diener School person' (bet you cant guess who)!? Please ask your children what they helped create - they all loved being in on the secret!

Primary- participated in weekly movement group focusing on body awareness and turn taking. Handwriting group- letter K focusing on letter formation, mature grasp patterns, and utilizing non-dominant hand as a stabilizer. Inters-J participated in weekly movement group focusing on upperbody and core strengthening, social skills, and visual motor skills. Participated in weekly handwriting group focusing on lower case e. The kids continued to focus on letter formation, spacing and alignment, pencil grasp, and posture.


K class: This week in speech group we learned how to make chocolate pudding. We covered a variety of language areas during the activity including sequencing, following directions, and turn taking.

1-2 Class (Jenni)- This week in speech group we learned how to make vanilla pudding. We covered a variety of language areas during the activity including sequencing, vocabulary, following directions, and turn taking.

We had a fabulous week expanding our speech, language, and social skills! On Monday, Ms. Kate's class read the book, The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything. We had lots of fun sharing the parts of the story-the boots that went CLOMP CLOMP, the gloves that went CLAP CLAP, etc We then worked together to sequence and paraphrase the beginning, middle, and end.

Ms. Barbara's class continued to work on our figurative language book. Thus far, each student has completed a homonym, homophone, and idiom. We will work on humor and then put the finishing touches on our book soon.

Ms. Courtney's class worked on their sentence development and using both irregular and regular past tense verb forms. We played Photo Fish and Say and had so much fun finding as may matches as we could!

NOTE TO UPPERS PARENTS-Please check your children's backpacks for letters regarding our Secret Show Owl program. Thank you and have a great weekend!

While working with Kathy, we enjoyed participating in fun but challenging social games. Our games focused on visual skills, motor planning and most importantly, proper social skills!