Joy School

Harrison is doing joy school again this year and is loving every minute of it. My week was the letter D and the number 4. I remember the girl who did D and 4 last year had some awesome activities and remembered she had blogged about them, so I headed over to her blog to steal some of her ideas. Thanks, Tiffany! :)

We traced the letter D, danced, made a dog craft, read dinosaur books, pulled objects out of a bag and decided whether they started with the letter D or not, ate donuts, and played dress-up and dinner party on Monday.

On Wednesday we did a flower rhyme about 4 flowers and an apple song about - you guessed it - 4 apples! We also stuck 4 stickers in the jar on their paper, made a caterpillar out of 4 circles, and made a square frame out of 4 craft sticks.

For a snack, they got 4 of everything they wanted here (of course some wanted more!):

I really had a lot of fun this week with the kids. We danced to the Hokey Pokey and on Wednesday, one of the little girl's mom asked if we had done that because her little girl came home and told her parents that she was suppose to put her bottom in and shake it all about, but she didn't know how to do that, so she didn't! Her parents got a kick out of that and tried showing her how to shake her bottom! Too funny!

Harrison's first day of school

I found out about a group of moms in the other ward who were going to do a joy school, so I contacted one of the girls and got Harrison included. It's nice for him to have somewhere to go to brush up on his letters and numbers and to socialize, but they all live 25-30 minutes away on the other side of town. So, I have to hang out and find things to do while I'm waiting since it wouldn't make sense to come home for an hour just to turn around and leave again. There are a couple schools in the area that have preschool, but I didn't know about the program until it was too late. I need to call our school to see if they 1) have it and 2) if it is possible to sign Harrison up for next semester. It would be MUCH easier if I could drop him off 2 minutes away and be able to come home and get stuff done rather than trying to find errands to run 4 hours a week on that side of town. Unfortunately there aren't many stores over there except Wal-mart, Menards, and CVS. I can only handle so much of Wal-mart in a week! It is a newer, developing part of town, so all the good shopping is closer to the more established part of town, which is where I live. BUT, I am glad that he can go and the girls I have met are super nice and Harrison is really enjoying it. The rest of the kids are 3, and it is interesting to see how Harrison is definitely more mature, can follow instructions better, and usually listens and is better behaved. One year can make a difference, that's for sure. Harrison was a lot like them last year when we started the joy school in Lafayette. I had been thinking about waiting to have him start kindergarten since he just barely makes the cut-off and the fact that he is SO SMALL, but when I was getting out winter clothes, I realized Harrison can wear the clothes Tyler wore when he was already in kindergarten and maybe even some in 1st grade! So, maybe he's not as small as Tyler was, and Tyler was even one of the oldest ones in his class. I think mentally Harrison will totally be ready for kindergarten and since he will have had 2 years of joy school, he will be ready for the real thing. He already loves being able to go to "school" like Tyler and Morgan. Plus it would make things a bit easier for me during the day too! It's kind of crazy thinking that he will be in REAL SCHOOL next year!!!!???? Where did the time go???

Joy school

Last week was my turn for Joy School. We learned the letter "I" and the number "9". We talked about ice cream, icicles, ice, and igloos. It turned out perfectly because we had our first snow of the season just in time to learn about it. The kids had a lot of fun painting with colored icicles (colored ice cubes with popsicle sticks), making glitter glue icicles, eating ice cream, and making marshmallow igloos (which I ended up finishing most of theirs!). We sang Once there Was a Snowman and learned about how icicles feel and what they look like, what they are made of, and what happens to them when they start to melt. It was a lot of fun although I was pooped after each class! Sorry the pictures aren't the greatest. For some reason over Thanksgiving and since then it seems like my camera just isn't taking the greatest pictures.