West Richmond Preschool

It has finally begun to feel like Spring.   The weather has started to cooperate and we have been enjoying our time outdoors.   Our class has been very active these days with many projects and activities tying into Spring.   We have been gardening in our garden boxes out on the patio with the guidance from our parent helper, Tina.   She is Chloe and Olivia’s mother.   The children were fully engaged planting our mini vegetable garden.   Tina provided the children with very hands on information which involved getting our hands right into the dirt.   They each got to plant seeds right into the soil and now they are all sprouting.   It’s a great way for children to learn as they are part of the process and visually can see what is happening. As they were planting, a lady bug appeared and added even more excitement to the day.   The children were very curious about the unexpected visitor. Another learning moment came upon us spontaneously and we will be exploring that avenue t

The sun gods were watching over us on Wednesday April 18 th as we ventured out of our classroom to embark on our Wee Walk.   To make our walk more interesting we decided to do a little scavenger hunt along the way.   Our mission was to find a blue car, a tree with pink or red flowers or leaves, a grey squirrel, a baby stroller and some pine cones.   We were successful in finding all of the items except for the grey squirrel.   We did however spot a black squirrel so I’m going to call it a win!   The children were all so excited to explore a different environment and participate in the scavenger hunt.   However, I believe that the highlight of the walk was stumbling over this tree with a face on it.   Some children were so perplexed as to how the tree had a face and others just giggled and thought that it was the neatest thing.   Everyone was such troopers that we finished before expected, so to burn off the rest of our energy we decided to play a game of tag in the soccer fie

For art today, I decided to do something basic. We used paint brushes and paint. The children were focused on creating their own masterpieces. Once they were done, I encouraged them to tell me something about their paintings. The children’s story behind their paintings, gave me a chance to get to know them better and understand things through their perspective.    Linden: This is my rainbow box.       Jayden: My easter egg.   Mia: This is you, Teacher Patricia, in pigtails with a heart. Because you are happy. Fraser: This is the ocean. Jerome: Me playing under the rainbow and a fire truck. Chelsea: I used red and blue because they are my favorite colors.     Keane: This is fire outside and the fire truck needs to come.     Elliot: I used all my favorite colors to cover my paper.       Until next time, Patricia                                      

Since Spring has arrived and warmer days are on the way, we thought it would be enjoyable for the children to explore fish and their habitat in many multi-sensory ways. Prior to our approaching field trip to the Britannia Shipyards, we wanted to extend different sea life opportunities to each preschool student in the classroom.   Last week the boys and girls spent time building sea life puzzles as well as manipulating marine blue playdough, plying and moving the soft substance side by side.   A collection of sea life puppets were provided to stimulate their imagination and encourage collaborative dramatic creativity amongst them.   The fishing game provided in the water was enjoyed by many as they used fishing rods to retrieve the colorful sea creatures! We were able to provide artistic opportunities for the children to collaborate and create “water waves” with large pieces of paper and various brushes and their hands to resemble rolling water (see our bulletin board!).   It was wo

Our Four-Year-Old Class recently learnt about printing, during an engaging and interactive visit to the Art Gallery. They also toured and viewed the gallery's Art Showing called 'Transference'. The field trip was led by Melanie, the Gallery's School Program Coordinator, who did a wonderful job engaging the children throughout the visit.   The children created monotype prints using a printing press. Melanie led the children in a discussion about prints and how they are all around us... in books/comics, on signs, labels, and endless more items. As Melanie pointed out, you could even see a print on the T-shirt that Matius was wearing! He had a print of a dinosaur on his T-shirt. That had all the children looking down at the clothes they were wearing, and calling out the prints they could see. The various ways prints can be made were discussed (hand-prints, stamps, potatoes, etc.) and the children had their own ideas about what could make a print, “a shoe”,