Eco-Fair /A grand finale to our farming theme!

What could be more gratifying than to see children walking into the school with costumes that they have created with recycled materials. Bravo! Thank you, moms and dads for helping with this very satisfying feeling and enriching your children's lives. You are educating them from a very young age to know that they can have fun by designing their own outfits versus buying costumes which may give satisfaction only for one evening. We teachers had fun being creative as well. Children were artistic and inspirational to one another, making arts and crafts out of recycled materials. Here are some pictures....enjoy.

We also had time to read stories! The most rewarding thing to see was that children asked to work on their "work- books" at the end of the day. It gives me such joy to see the children so interested in their work and their studies.

Buddy time/ making butter

Every Wednesday Mrs. Carpenter's students come to our classroom, for an hour. It is very enriching and rewarding to see the students interacting with one another.For the older ones , this is the time when they can be the leaders, mentors, teachers and feel very confident about themselves. For the younger ones, thay are simply thrilled to do  everything with the older ones, they look up to them as their role models. We have done different activities , where the older ones have read to the younger ones. We went outdoors and explored nature, students made leaf- crowns, leaf rubbing activities. I had given a presentation about Nepal. We also went to Elaine's room and saw a video on Farming.Today to tie in with our Farm theme, the students made butter! Yes, real / fresh butter right in our classroom. Mrs. Carpenter brought some jars and buttermilk. She poured some butermilk in the jars. Students were shaking the jars and using a lot of their muscle.... and voila.. they made butter. They then  spread the butter in some crackers/ bagels and what a special treat it was.  They kept on snacking !What a neat avtivity this would be to do on a rainy day at home.

Veda enjoyed listening to the story and doing some puzzles in our classroom. Then she and Amelia went to the dining area to have their snacks.
Enjoy the pictures from " buddy time".

North African Feast ! What a treat!

Thank you! Chef Alex Young/ students/ Joanna/ and all the parents for organizing this AMAZING FEAST! It was nutritious/ delicious.Jan , you and the students were phenomenal ..bravo..to all who participated in the circle dance.Jesse/ Renatta ... who would have thunken? You two were awesome.Once again, it feels very special to belong to this wonderful community/ family - Summers-Knoll School.

Howell Nature center

We did it!The children were all super troopers. They were bundled up very well and I was amazed to see, that by the end of it all the adults looked kind of tired , but the children were little energizer bunnies! Thank you parents for being so supportive.
This was my first experience going to the nature center. I thoroughly enjoyed it as much as the children.It was a nice time to bond with the parents and to see the children from a different perspective!
We had signed up for  these activities:-
Wolves/ Canoeing/ Animal Tracks/ Native American Drumming.
For those parents, who would have loved to come but, could'nt , please make sure that you ask your child something about these activities.The children were very much into all of them .We all became detectives and had to solve  some mysteries on animal  tracks.It was refreshing to see how they were helping each other out.
I must say that  we all enjoyed the drumming/ dancing and making up our own beat the most. Enjoy the pictures:)
We missed those of you that could not come , perhaps another time?

Huggy Froggy

Dear Parents,
Your child is coming home with someone very special. His name is Huggy Froggy. He comes with a tooth brush, a rubber duck, and a journal. Please follow the instruction on the journal and enjoy our special friend's visit.

Tantre Farm

 The first thing that one of my students said yesterday morning, when he walked into my classroom was: "I am sooooooooo excited about going to the farm that I can't concentrate". It was a day full of hustle/ bustle:)

Yesterday afternoon the whole school went on a field trip to Tantre farm.We are getting ready for our big event- The Feast, which is coming up this Sunday. So we went to harvest vegetables. The children were thrilled to follow Deb, the leader/ owner of the farm and April one of the helpers. They were very careful not to step on those precious vegetables and herbs and freshly ploughed soil. They were extremely happy to taste and smell many special herbs. If you ask them what their favorite one is, I'm sure they will tell you. 

Words cannot describe how excited they were to pull out the carrots! They fed some of the animals as well. They were each given a bag to put their treasures in. Some children were so eager to fill their bags in, that they were pulling out grass, stones, leaves, anything that their hands could  reach for. It was great to soak in a moment with the simple pleasures of life!

Research on apples.