Mrs. Rachel's Three's Class: Our Class Was a Zoo!

What a fun week we had learning about zoo animals! As their teacher this year, I am realizing sometimes it is the simplest things that bring the most joy and the most fun! Mrs. Nicole and I are truly blessed to be their teachers.

We enjoyed reading about fun at the zoo this week with the books Goodnight Gorilla!, Walking Through the Jungle, and Curious George Goes to the Zoo! We also sang fun animal songs, including "Let's Go to the Zoo!" (for anyone who wants to pull it up on their computer at home for a few minutes). Our letter of the week was the letter Zz. We had fun making our letter Z zebras (which we saved for our portfolios). All of the friends in our class are doing very well identifying the letters, tracing them, sorting them, and remembering the sounds. For those of you wanting to review what we have learned so far at home, the letters we have done to this point are as follows: M, P, F, A, Z, and E. Some fun activities to practice these letters include laying out or writing letters on a mat or tray and having them find the letter you say or the sound you say, letting them trace letters in shaving cream, building letters with small pieces of food (such as cereal or raisins), and looking for these letters in books.

To go along with our zoo theme, we also practiced matching numbers and counting animals, played giraffe dice games, made animals out of pattern blocks, practiced lacing zoo beads, continued to practice tracing with animal shapes, and built our names with animal name puzzles. We even painted and made gorillas to go along with Goodnight Gorilla! (These weren't quite dry enough to send home Friday!) Everyone is enjoying our end-of-the-day table trading time! You might enjoy trying pattern and sorting activities at home as well (even as simple as putting Fruit Loops in patterns or separating them into color piles).

We continued to practice our verse of the month (Proverbs 3:5). Ask your child if they can say their Bible verse with the motions! We also focused one more week on Adam and Eve in the Garden. You might ask your child a few more questions about the story... We had good discussion about it this week!

Thank you for giving me the joy and privilege of being your child's teacher. I look forward to seeing them Thursday! Give them a hug from Mrs. Rachel.