Exercise and Gingerbread Cookies

This unit has been extra fun and the kids really seemed to thoroughly enjoy it. Both days I taught we got to bake or cook something. Everyone especially loved making the gingerbread cookies. Rolling out the dough was almost as much fun as eating it! Elise is much more precise and pays attention to having everything done correctly. It's nice to have a little feminine influence!
We got to run and play games and truly feel the joy of our bodies! You can see the joy on their faces. This unit has been almost as relaxing as going to the park. Everything we did, sing, dance, exercise, use hands and senses for cooking, and crafts, helped them to expend energy in a healthy way. We had a wonderful time!

Here are all of the kids showing off there fantastic bodies and how they can move, exercise, jump, dance, etc. We even were very official with exercise bands. To be honest though, they really only used them for a short time and preferred their bodies au naturale! Elise was quite the mover and shaker. Ches kept moving around and I couldn't get a face shot. He was great at spinning!
Ethan liked to do a kind of jumping jack.
Mark experimented with some creative uses for the band!
What an appropriate name is Joyschool. I can't wait to continue onto the next unit!

The Five Senses

I have to tell you, I'm loving this unit. We spent the first day learning about our 5 senses by experiencing those senses. We listened to popcorn pop, smelled it, felt it, saw it, and then to everyone's joy, we tasted it! It was about the same with the chocolate pudding. At first I announced that we were going to paint with pudding. Mark and Elise seemed particularly excited. Ches gave me a confused look and said "but we're not going to eat it?" He was ecstatic when I said he could.
It has been really neat to see each of their personalities come to life.

Elise was very neat with the pudding and used her fingers to carefully make a picture of a face. I actually think it's amazing. Mark was more scientific about the process. He felt the pudding for a while, squishing it between his fingers and then tried different painting techniques from the tip of his finger to whole fisting it.

Chess spent most of the time dipping his entire hand in the pudding and licking it off and then painting a little. He finally settled on fingertip dots. Ethan was not the least bit interested in eating the chocolate (he's definitely not my son there) but really enjoyed putting both hands into the pudding and smearing it everywhere. He was of course the first to declare he was done and ready to get down!
I love having my time off when you moms are teaching but I really have to admit that I love it when it's my turn to teach. They're so full of life and excitement and it always makes me smile. At one point during free play time, Elise had a toy that Ches wanted and after he had asked nicely and she said no, his reply was "but you need to share. Sharing is caring!" I about fell on the floor.

Joy of the Body

I echo Jackie's thoughts on how bright and fun the kids are this semester. They really grew up over the summer. It was so much fun to see their happy smiling faces, and how eager they were to be at school! It just makes teaching them so much fun!! A little funny thing that happened on our first intro day was after we had just finished singing "5 little ducklings". I think the song is funny because the ducks listen to their daddy immediately. So, after it ended I asked the kids if they always listen to their daddy. Ethan said, "I listen to my mommy and my daddy." Then I asked Mark if he did the same and he said, "Yes." Then I asked Elise if she listened to her mommy and daddy, and very seriously she shook her head and said, "No." I just about died laughing.

This week we started the joy of the body. Ches was so excited when we picked up the "body books" from the library, and couldn't wait until his friends came and he could show them the books. They were a big hit. There were a couple points during the morning that all they wanted to do was sit and read the books. Well, Elise didn't think that was the greatest idea after awhile, but every time she went to get a toy the boys would say, "No toys, Elise, just books!"

We had a lot of fun with all of the songs, activities, looking at x-rays (thank you Dave Harper) and talking about our bones and bodies. The kids were so cute during snack time. I made them body and heart shaped oatmeal cookies, and while they were eating they kept commenting on how they were eating it and the food went down into their bodies, and hands and muscles to make them big and strong. We also did an activity where I would show the kids a letter and they made that shape with their bodies. They did a great job individually, and caught on pretty quick when we started doing group ones on the floor; especially after I would show them the picture I took, so they knew what they looked like.



My favorite part was at the beginning when I introduced the topic of the day and then asked who gave us our bodies, almost in unison, all the kids said, "Heavenly Father!" It was nice to see their excitement at knowing this.

Wish You Could've Seen Them Smile!!

Thank you for letting me teach the first day of JoySchool! True, I was still brushing my teeth when Gina called : ) and I was frazzled at the end, but for a completely different reason than JoySchool. Maybe I'll tell you about that later.

I wish I had taken video of the kids during the opening song, to show you their mega-watt smiles! But I am certain they will smile the same for you all when you teach... These were not the tentative, shy smiles of the young toddlers of last semester but the eager, enthusiastic smiles of confident children. It was so touching to see their eyes light up with recognition at the routine and songs. What a difference a few months makes - their attention spans are longer and they are so participative. They are growing up so fast.

It has been a while since they've all been together so we took some time to talk about their favorite things. While last semester they may have copied what the person before them said, they all answered differently today. They still have the same favorite colors - Mark likes green, Ches loves blue, Ethan exclaimed that yellow was his favorite and Elise likes orange. I think it says so much about their unique personalities!

It was funny to hear their responses for what their favorite food was. Mark hemmed and hawed trying to decide and finally said he just likes to eat. Me too! Ok, we all know that Tiana is very health conscious and doesn't feed her kids high-fructose corn syrup, so I don't feel bad writing that Ches insisted that his favorite food was "Cookies, Cookies!" Ethan immediately shared that he loved hotdogs and pizza. Elise said her favorite is oranges and apples. That's news to me! I mean we eat it often, but she for sure has a sweet tooth and I expected candy or Popsicles.

The kids were thrilled to be together today, but we did have some disagreements. But as always, Ethan was quick to say sorry and forgive! I was impressed. Once Elise threw something (I hope not with intention to hurt, but I didn't see.) and it hit Ethan. He burst into tears and I made Elise apologize. She waited till the last second and I was going to put her in time out because she didn't respond to me right away. But Ethan still crying protested, "No, she said sorry!"

I was also impressed that Mark did not participate in any tugging or hitting. When I had to scold the group they would tell me that he wasn't a part of it. Later, we discussed that there is something stinky in my house. I totally agree!! I don't know what that smell is (it smells a little like gas, but maintenance said there wasn't a problem.) So I let him smell the minty play dough and he liked that. He and Elise were so good at cutting out shapes out of play dough.

Ches was a model student as always. I can always count on him to follow directions quickly, and to be the most peaceful. He also tries to reinforce my instructions with the others. I really appreciate that! He really got into the songs about the rules and "Where is Thumbkin?" It was so fun to see him and Ethan kicking the ball around together.

Elise was just so thrilled to see her friends and loved playing the leader to show the boys where to go. Earlier in the morning, Elise screamed for joy when Tiana called because she heard that Ches was coming over for JoySchool. She also really gets into the art projects and that is always fun to see.

To celebrate the first day of school we made cookies together, we also reviewed the rules, sang some songs, made art out of shaved crayons because according to the manual crayons have to follow rules too - when they get hot they have to melt. We read "Pigs Ahoy!" by David McPhail and talked about how the piggies weren't following any of the JoySchool rules. Then we went outside and played with sidewalk chalk and kicked around a ball.

We are so happy school is back in session! We had a true blast today despite me misplacing the JoySchool box cover... Where it is is and how I managed that is a mystery.