Happy Holidays

Wishing all of our families a Holiday Season filled with joy and cheer!  See you in 2014!

December classroom pictures have been uploaded.  You can view them under the PICTURES tab above or click on the link here.

Holiday Week

HOLIDAY FUN WEEK

Please join IPS in a week full of festive cheer!

Monday:  Wear your Christmas hat, headpiece, tie, etc.

Tuesday:  Wacky Christmas/Ugly Sweater

Wednesday:  Christmas pins, scarves, or socks

Thursday:  Wear red or green

**Friday is pajama day…don’t worry though, preschool will have a pajama day in January!

Preschoolers will learn the letter Hh this week.  Who says "Ho ho ho?  Dear Old Santa!  We will be writing some letters to Santa Clause too!  If your little one has been singing some songs, we have been practicing some fun non-traditional songs.  The boys and girls at IPS have been looking for Elfie everyday.  He has been up to some mischievous things lately…..fishing in Mr. Dave's fish tank, decorating the Christmas tree with toilet paper, taking some pictures with Mr. Gruber's camera, and taking a bath in a cup of marshmallows.  Elfie must be bored when all the children are home and he has no elves to play with at school!

Holiday Party is Thursday.  If you have questions about the party please contact the head room parent. 

AM:  Jackie Mack

PM:  Amanda Jaronowski and Jennifer Krysiak

Catch Me If You Can….

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This week is Gg week so we have lots of fun activities planned with the Gingerbread Baby! We will read the story by Jan Brett (check out wesbite here), make gingerbread cookies, and even make a scratch and sniff gingerbread baby craft. Can't wait…so much fun!  

Check out some really cool Holiday Activities here.

Winter Holidays

We will spend the entire month of December on Winter Holidays. This is such an exciting time of year for our little ones and they have much joy and cheer!

Our letter this week is Qq for queen.  We have been busy little elves making lots of crafts...stocking, christmas trees, and other fun things! We started learning some holiday songs so if you hear us singing some silly Santa songs you know where we learned them.

Our preschoolers will be going to the Santa Shop next Thursday.  You are welcome to join us for the shopping time (9:00/12:30) or there will be "Parent Elves" available to help them.  All gifts are fairly inexpensive….ranging from 50 cents to $5.  Students are limited to purchasing 6 gifts.

ECO EXPLORERS DAY

Today we had Ms. Bev from the Cleveland MetroParks visit our preschoolers.  She taught us the difference between living and non living things.  We learned that living things need water, air, food, and sunshine to grow.  Living things such as butterflies and plants change as they grow too!  Ms. Bev had a turtle that she shared with us!  We used our "Eco Tools" (eyes, ears, hands) to observe some living things outside and even had our own pair of binoculars to help us see.   Ms. Bev gave everyone a sticker to put on their light switch at home to remind us to turn off our lights so we can help protect our beautiful Earth!

**Check back on Friday and I hope to upload some pictures from today's Eco Explorers Adventure!

Happy Thanksgiving

Thank you to all of our families for making our Thanksgiving Feast such a wonderful event.  Pictures and the video have been uploaded.  

You can view/print/download the pictures from the November Class Picture Album or click here to open the album.

You can view the video here.  Feel free to share it with your families by sending them the link:  http://vimeo.com/80477042.  It can be viewed on any phone/tablet/computer with internet access. 

Also, THANK YOU for all of your Coins for Cornerstone donations.  Our preschoolers earned/donated $69.55 to help provide ornaments for the Cornerstone of Hope's Ornament Decoration Event next month.  

PEER APPLICATIONS FOR 2014-2015

2014-2015 Peer Information

**Peers who are currently enrolled/attending the Independence Preschool Program do not need to re-apply.

Deadline for application is Jan 31st, 2014. 

Click to download:

Preschool Peer Flyer
Preschool Peer Pamphlet of Information

Peer Application

If you have any questions, please contact Tara Kieser: 
216-642-5870 x 1412 

 tkieser@independence.k12.oh.us

Turkey Talk

This week is Thanksgiving in Preschool.  We are busy getting lots of things ready for our Feast next week....singing songs, learning the Turkey Tango, and making crafts.  

Ms. Karen (a grandparent of a student) was kind enough to bring in a real turkey for us to see.  Tom the Turkey made a guest appearance on Monday.  It was fun listening to his gobble and seeing what a real turkey looks like.  Don't worry...Tom is not a turkey that you would he.  He is a pet turkey.  

Check out the photos from Tom the Turkey and Firefighter Frank in our November picture album.  

Feast Reminder

Preschool Thanksgiving Feast

Tuesday, November 26th

IPS Cafeteria

AM:  10:00-10:45

PM:   2:00- 2:45

**Please arrive at least 10 min prior to start as we will begin our singing promptly at the scheduled time.

Looking for Some Fine Motor Help?

Check out these fine motor ideas......

• 30 Activities to Promote Fine Motor Skills

• Ultimate List of Fine Motor Activities

• Power of Tracing the Alphabet

• Helping your Child with Pencil Grip

• Activities to Promote Scissor Skills

• Info on Scissor Skills (scroll past first few pages)

• Let's Talk Scissor Skills

• Fine Motor in Play

DOWN ON THE FARM

Moooo-ve over ghosts and goblins, the farm animals are here!

This week we began our unit on farm animals and harvest. 

Our letter of the week is Cc for cow. Old MacDonald is our song of the week as we learn about farm animals and the sounds they make. During centers on Tuesday we will be working on sequencing (Three Little Pigs), writing letter Cc, and playing Farmyard Memory (concentration game). This week the children will be doing their chores to help take care of our farm animals using the iPad. A few of our chores include shearing the sheep, washing the picks, hatching the chick eggs, & feeding the cats. What fun!! If you have an iPad or iTouch check out Injini. It is a little pricey but a great APP for preschoolers.


**Firefighter Frank was not able to come last week.  He will be visiting us this Thursday to talk to us about Fire Safety.  

Reminder: Parent Teacher Conferences continue this Thursday PM and Friday AM.