Brrrr!

 

Well, we got a really cold day!  The kids all came bundled up and ready for the weather.  We began with gathering nature's bounty in our little buckets for sorting during circle time.  Everyone got a chance to put in something they had found on the ground and place it in the Venn Diagram.  Of course, the kids didn't know they were doing something so advanced as a Venn Diagram-but they liked the challenge anyway.  The choirces for sorting were "things that grow" and "things that don't grow" and "things that do both".  Ruby found some frozen hunks of dirt to go into the "things that don't grow" pile and someone found a hunk of dirt with grass growing on it.  That was what went into the "both" pile.  There was lots of seeds, lichen, moss and sticks to go into the "things that grow" pile. Then we were up and ready for our song and to get moving!

On our hike today we found some frozen puddles which were fun to slip and slide on and to break through.  Unfortunately, some of the kids without waterproof gloves got their hands wet in the puddle.  Brrr.  We do have some hand warmers but if this weather keeps up-we'll run out of them soon.  Please pop open a handwarmer when you are getting out of the car in the parking lot at Farrel-McWhirter and then they will be warm for the whole class.  And sending extra mittens or gloves is also a good idea. 

There were some interesting discussions going on with the kids on the tire swing today.  Some wanted to swirl by themselves and others wanted to go high and some very low.  I had never seen them so disjointed before. Very few of the kids could agree how they wanted the tire swings to go.  I will be interested to see if they can remember which of their friends like to go high or which don't for next week and to see if they can negotiate.

As you noticed when you picked up your kids, we had our first ever this year-lunch in the Ops building.  We went inside at noon and it helped those kids whose hands and feet were just too cold.  We will use it again if the weather stays this cold.  But be assured that we will spend every other minute exploring the outdoors.