November - The First Snow

The weather surprised us this week... King Winter came early! I had to adjust all of my plans for Autumn stories and activities. Here's what we did:

We continued with our Songs, Verses & Movement for classroom routines.

Circle Time

#1 - "Good Morning, Dear Earth" verse

#2 - "Morning Verse"
from A Child's Seasonal Treasury, page 13

#3 - NEW - "Autumn Wind in the Fir Wood" verse
from Gesture Games for Autumn and Winter, p.60

#4 - NEW - "Autumn Wind by the Oak Tree" verse
from Gesture Games for Autumn and Winter, p.63

#5 - "We are Walking" song
from The Singing Year, page 71, track 62

#6 - "Johnny Hammers with One Hammer" verse
from The Children's Music Studio, page 104

#7 - "Hop Old Squirrel" song
from The Singing Year, page 77, track 68

#8 - "Looking through the Garden Gate" verse
from The Breathing Circle, page 94

Monday, November 11

• read Winter, Awake! by Linda Kroll
• wrap wood pieces with yarn
• tear paper off crayons
• make Persimmon Jam and Cornbread

Tuesday, November 12

• read Snowballs by Lois Ehlert
• play in the snow
• sprinkle ice with salt
• look at fir cones

Thursday, November 14

• read "The Snowflake and the Leaf" from Tell Me a Story, p.29
• do Broccoli Stamped Fall Tree art
• fill bird feeders
• paint ice with salt and watercolors

It was a lovely week. A few highlights: helping older students sort crayons by color and then tearing the paper wrappers off all of them (preparation for a batik project in the Elementary art class where all of these crayons will be melted down into little glass jars of hot wax)... homemade persimmon jam on hot fresh-from-the-oven cornbread... looking at tiny fir cones which came all the way from Latvia (and finding the red continent -- Europe -- on the Colored Globe of the Continents)... taking the large piece of ice out of the bird bath, so that I could fill it with fresh water, and putting the thick curved chunk of ice in a sensory bin... sprinkling the ice piece with salt to help it melt, and seeing the delicate intricate channels which the salt carved out... painting the ice with watercolors... playing in snow... filling bird feeders.

We also carefully carried all of the jack o' lanterns out to the compost pile. Goodbye, Autumn. Hello, Winter!

And, of course, we have our tradition of making Stone Soup on Thursday. Thank you to everyone who sent in a donation. This week, because the Elementary class was on an Art field trip to Alto Clay Works in Alto Pass, we had only a few veggies (carrot, radish, broccoli) and they were all salad friendly. So we did a Chopped Salad! Adding donations from my fridge, we ended up with a delicious salad. Romaine lettuce, baby spinach, purple and white and orange carrots, radishes, celery, fresh local tomatoes, broccoli, green onion, fresh parsley, and chopped black olives. Yum!

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