Preschool Fun

Well, I taught Annie's little preschool today and it went pretty well. We had six little ones ages ranging from nearly 2 to almost 3. Thank goodness, one of the moms was there to be my helper or I don't know what I would have done.

We started introducing the different things of the day - the color green, the letter D, the shape rectangle, and the number 4. The kids were having a hard time sitting still even for this. Oh no, I thought, how are we gonna get through all of this?

Then we started talking about pumpkins and how they are made so we could talk a little bit about fall and the harvest and how things grow. Once I got through the little story and had the kids coloring their little pumpkin worksheet, things got better. They were very content to scribble on their papers.

Then we moved downstairs to dance to a few Dinosaur songs I had prepared. You know, D for dinosaur. They really seemed to enjoy that.

Next up, reading time. I decided to read "Green Eggs and Ham" since the color of the day was green. I was worried about using this book, because there are a lot of words and I thought the children would get restless. Boy was I ever wrong. They were completely enraptured with the book. They all sat absolutely still, eyes glued to the book. It just goes to show that books are really some of the best teachers.

Then it was snack time. We had, of course, green eggs and ham. Actually it was deviled eggs which I dyed green and some ham pieces. Oh and some pretzels too. Some of the kids did actually eat the eggs, most didn't. But I think everyone tried them. So yea, a little victory.

We finished up our structured part of the lesson with an activity where the children sorted acorns and leaves in various sizes and glued them on a piece of paper. Then it was play time, which I think was the highlight for kids. It was clear that was what they wanted to be doing the whole time.

All in all, I was pleased with how it went. It wasn't perfect and we had some attention and sharing issues as is inevitable. But it was still fun and wonderful to have the other mom there to kind of control the wanderers while I focused on the lesson.