Sand Creek

Yesterday we read "A Fish Out Of Water," and learned that you can't feed a fish too much!  Great kids book!

 

Washington Plaza

Hello everyone! I hope everything is going smoothly this Halloween.  Since I know most of the kids here at Washington Plaza will be on the candy hunt today, I think it is important to go over some general rules about safety. Please click on the link below...lots of great resources for the kids:

http://www.ncpc.org/topics/by-audience/law-enforcement/teaching-children/handouts

Not only are there handouts for Halloween but other important topics as well.  I'm going to have the kids complete the worksheets today before our big party...it's all there on the website.  Even though the kids costumes can be scary, I wish everyone a safe and very Happy Halloween!  BOO!

Parksdale

The kids have so enjoyed painting and coloring.  Happy Halloween!

 

Lincoln Plaza

This week is Halloween and my students and I have really worked hard this month on creating fun and exciting projects, so because some of my students won't be able to go out trick or treating I have decided to bring it to them into throwing them a movie night. Now of course I chose appropriate Halloween movies in where every student here at Lincoln Plaza can watch them.

I did get some lets watch Chucky, however keeping in mind my younger grades, I have decided to keep it safe in where everyone can enjoy the movie night. This week the girls and I have decided to do a nail day in where the girls are allowed to bring nail polish and we can all do nails. As for the boys they are allowed to play the Wii and because the girls are doing a girl project the boys were allowed to play Super Mario brothers and have tournaments amongst each other. Since November is right around the corner we are also beginning our November projects.

This coming month of November we have many events going on here at the plaza from birthdays to thanksgiving and the Marine Corps birthday. Students here at Lincoln Plaza will be making a thank you card to our service men and I will be taking it to them two days before the Marine Corps Birthday. I find this to be excellent simply for the fact it helps students understand that we have men and women who are willing to sacrifice their lives for individuals they have never met before. I have figured out a way into tying this into my anti bullying campaign which this week our focus is Courage and Morality. Pictures will be up as soon as possible.

Sunrise Villa

The past week we had our Fall Celebration.  The students enjoyed watching a movie as they ate snacks! They also worked on making pumpkins!  Happy Halloween!

  

Lincoln Plaza

College art work!!!! Here we have Michigan, Kansas, and Texas NFL art work! Patriots, Arizona, Chargers, and Rams...Same art work but students demonstrated their awesome painting skills.

 

Scary Ghosts!

 

The students were given halloween stencils and drew what Halloween looks like to them.  My kinder group also painted what Halloween looks like to them...the witch broom bookmarks were a hit. 

 

Apple baskets finaly done and scary cats...meow:)
 

 

 

Biola Village

This week we have been working on a lot of different projects like a piñata we started from scratch...we also had a movie night this past thursday...we watched “Nanny McPhee” and we made some “Scary Suckers."  I’d also like to communicate to everyone that the kids have been doing all their homework consistently and have been getting good grades at school, so I decided to have a little meeting with the parents and we’re going to throw the kids a Halloween Costume Party next Tuesday October 30th.

The parents and I agree on helping all the kids in the apartments find a Halloween Costume.  For the Halloween Party we’re going to have a lot of different activities like:  Drawing Contest, Zombie Chase, Bobbing for Apples, Face Painting, a lot of spooky treats and of course a COSTUME CONTEST.  We’re going to give a prize to the MOST SCARIEST, THE CUTEST, THE MOST CREATIVE  & THE MOST ORIGINAL. We also  have been doing a lot of decorations for Halloween...here are some pictures I took this week...ENJOY!

 

Lincoln Plaza

Good Afternoon Coordinators,

 

Here at Lincoln Plaza we are focusing on sports again, as we approach the ending of baseball and with a football season began at full force (GO PATRIOTS) we have decided to do art work with out favorite football teams logos. My students know that I love everything Boston so they weren't surprised that I would chose New England teams. This worked well for me because the students got to learn a little bit about me more, vise versa. I showed them my piece for the the New England Patriots, followed by Boston College's logo, my painting of my New England Revolution logo, and finally I showed them a picture of my favorite football player following with an interesting fact about each team. Many of my students enjoyed this activity...they wanted to go ahead and do one for a basketball and baseball team.

 

This not only introduced new teams to them but many of these students didn't know that college football existed. It was interesting for myself to introduce to them a team which happens to be 1-5 but at the end of the day they enjoyed researching that colleges aren’t just for learning but they do have fun extracurricular activities such as sports. This not only introduced sports but it introduced a new world to many of my students and it was interesting for them to see that education doesn’t just stop after high school. Although many of my students wanted to focus on local teams but I showed them other colleges rather than Fresno State. This is a great exercise to have them ask what has college taught us about life and what do we value most about our educational goals that we have accomplished.

 

Pictures will be up by the end of this week.

 

Casitas Del sol

 

I thought this was an AWESOME video to show to our students.  I wanted to share for the BLOG.  Livingston is a small community and the majority population is a mixture of Hispanic, Portuguese and Indian.

In the past we’ve studied the Chinese New Year, Cinco de Mayo, Dia de los Muertos...Never did I think about the Indian kids until this article was provided to our school considereing part of the video is filmed here in Livingston.

I viewed it and to my surprise I was not bored or distracted I was curious to learn their traditions!

NOV. IS CAL. SIKH AMERICAN AWARENESS MONTH- Help our Sikh students celebrate next month. November 13th is Diwali, the Sikh and Hindu Festival of Lights.

We will work with Sikh parents and members of the community to celebrate together on Tuesday, Nov. 13th.

There is a 30 minute video, some of which is filmed here in Livingston, that is provided by KVIE Channel 6 and is a good introduction to the Sikh Culture.

The link from the State Superintendent’s notice is:  KVIE Viewfinder Web pg. at click on Ctrl tab and click on link http://www.kvie.org/programs/kvie/viewfinder/sikhs_in_america/default.htm

Once your on the site you can click Video to watch it

Goshen Village II

 

Hello everyone!  This week the children created their own ocean scene in a box. Children also played basketball...the weather has been AWESOME!

Cottonwood Creek

Give every child a smooth piece of white paper, and explain to them that the paper is like a person. If the child wants to name their paper that is also okay. Then go outside to a cemented area outdoors. Ask the children about their piece of white paper before you start the activity. Tell the children to wrinkle the paper into a ball, crunch the paper, squish the paper, stomp and jump on their paper but make sure that their piece of paper does not rip or tear. When all the children are done have them carefully open their paper and ask them to describe their paper to you. After the children do that, ask them to apologize to their piece of paper, and have the children explain what happens to the paper after they apologize.

When you are done you may go back inside . Explain to the children Bullying is similar to what they just did to their piece of paper. You may say you are sorry and really mean it but the harm to the person has already been done and they are scarred and will not be the same. After the activity is complete, answer questions the children may have.

Villa De Guadalupe

 

The kids here at Villa De Guadalupe worked on making ghost's and Jack O'lanterns!  They used: Tape, Glue, Scissors, Construction paper and some used colored pencils:)  Enjoy!

Goshen Village II

Hello everyone,

For the last two weeks the children have made Halloween decorations, they played basketball outside, they made a piñata, and they colored pictures of Christopher Columbus as well as working on their homework…as you can imagine, these have been very busy two weeks.

Lincoln Plaza

We are still working on our Be A Star challenge. This whole week our focus will be not only respect but learning how to be caring and compassionate towards others as well as enjoying our arts and crafts.  Enjoy!

Cottonwood Creek

The children really enjoyed putting a race car together and painting. When they finish their boat, helicopter, airplane or race car they will be able to take it home....and we finished our Halloween creature, Ursella.  Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

Lincoln Plaza

Good Afternoon Educators,

As mentioned before, today I start educating my kids about RESILIANCY and BULLY AWARENESS. With this I have chosen an excellent program in which is funded and collaboration with the WWE. This program has been successful thanks to the efforts of the messages it teaches and tips on preventing and how to end school bullying. I have chosen to use Be a Star program and have expanded it to last for the remainder of the month. This week we will begin the first lesson in Introduction to Bullying and Explore Empathy. The best way for me to do this is show the video clip this program offers.

This week I also am focusing on some more arts and crafts with focusing on Halloween. We will be doing some more bats and witches to decorate our computer lab. So, primarily finish all of our last week’s projects this week. It’s always good to get a project that lasts more than a week so the students expand on their creativity and get their minds working so they know how creative they can get.

Tip of the week, at the end of the day I understand cleaning up is always hard for one person...the best thing I have come to do with my students is assigning each student a chore and rotate chores every week. This not only teaches them responsibility to clean up after themselves and how to keep our centers clean; but it teaches them respect in having some sort of respect for the center and how to appreciate it.

Have a Good Week!

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” – Nelson Mandela

Casitas Del Sol

Do raisins float or sink?

It was our Science focus and the required items were  FRESH RAISINS, GLASS, CARBONATED -CLEAR SODA.

The glass was filled half way with soda and then the kids dropped raisins into the glass…. They had to observe the experiment over a few minutes…..as the raisins quickly sank to the bottom after a few minutes the raisins started to float back up to the top of the glass and then quickly drop again to the bottom.  Kids learned that bubbles form inside the raisin and the CO2-carbon dioxide makes the rain float to the top of the glass once the raisin gets to the top bubbles POP and causes the raisin to loose the ability to float.

I also took in very old raisins and tried the experiment out of 5 cups of experiments only one raisin floated to the top only once so my recommendation as lesson reads fresh raisins work best.

Carbon dioxide gas dissolved in soft drinks gives them their fizz. You can use the carbon dioxide fizz from a soft drink to make raisins dance.

For this experiment you will need:

• a can of colorless soda (e.g., 7-Up or Sprite)
• a tall, clear glass or plastic cup
• several raisins (fresh raisins work the best)

 

Pour the can of soda into the tall glass. Notice the bubbles coming up from the bottom of the glass. The bubbles are carbon dioxide gas released from the liquid.

 

Drop 6 or 7 raisins into the glass. Watch the raisins for a few seconds. Describe what is happening to the raisins. Do they sink or float? Keep watching; what happens in the next several minutes?

 

Raisins are denser than the liquid in the soda, so initially they sink to the bottom of the glass. The carbonated soft drink releases carbon dioxide bubbles. When these bubbles stick to the rough surface of a raisin, the raisin is lifted because of the increase in buoyancy. When the raisin reaches the surface, the bubbles pop, and the carbon dioxide gas escapes into the air. This causes the raisin to lose buoyancy and sink. This rising and sinking of the raisins continues until most of the carbon dioxide has escaped, and the soda goes flat. Furthermore, with time the raisin gets soggy and becomes too heavy to rise to the surface.

 

You might want to try other objects to see if they exhibit this behavior. Any object whose density is just slightly greater than water’s and has a rough surface to which the gas bubbles can attach should be able to dance in the carbonated water. Some of the more common dancing substances are mothballs and pieces of uncooked pasta. Try putting other objects in the carbonated water. Can you find other substances that dance?

 

Carbonated beverages are prepared by putting the beverage into a can under high pressure of carbon dioxide gas. This high pressure causes the carbon dioxide gas to dissolve in the liquid. When you open a can of soda, the noise you hear is produced by the carbon dioxide gas as it rushes out of the can. When the can is opened, the decreased pressure allows some of the carbon dioxide gas dissolved in the liquid to escape. This is what makes the bubbles in a soft drink.

 

 

Cottonwood Creek

The children and I are going to make a Halloween person.  We are going to have a pair of pants, shirt, and some accessories.  The pants and shirt are going to be stuffed that way it looks like a person. When we complete this I will send a picture to post. The children will name the Halloween person and write about it.

Happy Halloween!

Parksdale

It's almost Halloween and the kids are having a great time coloring spooky ghosts...BOO!

 

Lincoln Plaza

 

Here at the Lincoln Plaza we have been working on many activities and preparing ourselves for Halloween.  However, here we have encountered a few issues involving bullying so, I have decided that we all take the Be A Star Pledge, which is an alliance organized by the WWE.  All the students here at the plaza have taken this pledge and will do a week long course in order to give them advise on bullying as well as tips on preventing it. http://www.beastaralliance.org/ everything can be downloaded on the website and its a very good resource for anti bullying.

 

This week we focused on Halloween crafts such as ghosts, witches, and scarecrows.  Pictures will be up as soon as possible and whenever they are dry.  All of our projects consisted of a lot of glue usage.

 

Biola Village

Here are some of the activities we've been working on this week.  I have a surprise for the kids tomorrow, I bought pumpkins for each one of the kids and they are going to get to transform their pumpkins...

I also came out with the idea of making a “Suggestion Box” This box stays in the class and all the kids are allowed to write different ideas and activities they would like to do at the Program.