I'm 23!

Happy Birthday to ME! :)

This weekend, I was able to celebrate my 23rd birthday with not only 30 preschoolers on Friday, but my whole family (besides Brie) at home on Friday night - Sunday!  I had an awesome birthday weekend that was filled with many fun filled events!

On Friday, I met a friend uptown to have a few drinks and then headed home to see my whole family (Mom, Dad, Brooke, Paul, and of course, little Emma!) On Friday night, we just hung out and talked and then went to bed to rest up for the rest of the weekend.

Saturday morning, Mom, Brooke, and I woke up and decided to go to garage sales in Conrad (nearby town) to see what we could find.  Brooke was able to find a few daycare clothes for Emma and I invested in a new UNI sweatshirt for $2!  What a bargain!  Then we came home and enjoyed sloppy joes for dinner and hung out the rest of the afternoon.  Dad was busy in the fields (because it was finally nice) and when he arrived home, I FINALLY got to open my birthday presents!!! From Mom and Dad, I got a new coffee table, a few pieces of Tupperware, a set of Pampered Chef Microwave bowls, and money for a new Vera Bradly duffel bag.  From Brooke, Paul, & Emma, I received a new wallet/clutch, an apron (so excited for this!), and money for my new duffel bag.  It was a fantastic birthday and I LOVED all my gifts.  After opening presents, we decided to go out to eat as a family for my birthday!  We went to Matt's Bar & Grill in Parkersburg, IA!  The food was delicious! :) I splurged and had a hamburger steak! Yummy!!! :)  Saturday night we came home and enjoyed birthday cake.  Check out the pictures below!

Brooke & I on the way to Matt's Bar & Grill!

My beautiful niece and I :)

I even let her dig in my cake ;) Spoiled little girl!

On Sunday, we woke up and attended church as a family.  We even got to sit by Paul, Brooke, & Emma during church ;)!  After church we went to my Grandpa Nederhoff's to enjoy some amazing cake that Brooke had made and enjoy each other's company (aka: Emma was the center of the show...such a doll!).  After lunch was over, we came home to enjoy a nice dinner.  Mom cooked pork chops for the whole family (I had a pork burger), cheesy potatoes, corn, and a super yummy salad.  After we had lunch, we enjoyed the afternoon outside (laughing at Emma who was intrigued by our puppy, Molly).  Paul, Brooke, & Emma left around 3:00 and then I dragged Mom over to Pine Lake to go for an afternoon walk.  After returning home, I kept Mom on her toes and we decided to play a couple games of cribbage (and I won both!)

Overall, my birthday weekend could not have been better spent.  Being with my family is truly my favorite thing to do and I pick them every time over my friends.  They are just truly important to me and have been so supportive throughout my entire life.  They understand me, support me, but most importantly, love me for exactly the person I am.  I love them and I could not be more thankful for the past 22 years of my life.

Well, that wraps this post up, so thank you all for listening and until next time, stay safe! <3

Wrapping up Earth Day Week!

Last week in preschool, we learned about Earth Day, recycling, had the chance to pick up trash around our school, AND celebrate Miss Brittane's birthday!! The kids were spoiled the last part of the week with gorgeous weather which also put them in a great mood! 

I was not able to get many pictures of the students, and because of privacy reasons, I cannot post pictures of students because of their safety.  So I am not able to post any pictures of us picking up trash or celebrating my birthday....

but, on Friday afternoon, we had a special visitor while playing outside.  Check out the picture below to find out who! :)

Go UNI! :)

Yep, that's right!  You guessed it!  It's T.C. from UNI (University of Northern Iowa).  T.C. stands for "The Cat" and is the mascot for UNI.  As Miss Brittane was told by many of her preschoolers, "Miss Brittane, that's T.C.! I've seen him before at football games!"  Needless to say the students were very excited to see T.C. because they all know him and are all proud fans of UNI.  I'm not sure why T.C. came to visit our school, but as I found out more information, I learned that there was a UNI Spring Football game on Friday night, so perhaps he was promoting UNI to my students (as if they didn't already know what UNI was) :)!  It made for a great Friday and a great ending to an amazing week!  The students were AWESOME! :)

Also, I want to quickly recognize my assistant, Ana.  She is the assistant teacher in my classroom and she is truly the best assistant a lead teacher could ask for!  She has been so great to me and does anything I ask of her (and some things I don't even ask and she still does them) and she has been working so incredibly hard with not only me but my students as well!  So, on Friday I decided to spoil her with a latte (coffee) from Starbucks. (her favorite!!!) She was so excited! :)  I just wanted to be sure she knew how much I appreciate her and all her hard work.  

Thanks a "latte" for all the hard work you do!

Ana and I have become very close since we have began working with each other, and just recently took a trip to Chicago together.  Check out the pictures below to see the fun we had in Chicago! :)

Ana and I waiting for the bus downtown!

Birthday celebration at Arts & Spirits!  We got to paint our own canvases! :)

Well, that wraps up this post.  I have alot more to share I feel, but time can only allow for so much sharing.  Thank you all for listening and until next time, stay safe <3!

Earth Day: April 22, 2013

This week in preschool, we are celebrating Earth Day (today) and then the rest of the week, we are focusing on recycling: what it means to recycle and how to do it!  This is a concept very new to preschoolers, so it may be a tough concept for them to understand, but Ana and I are going to attempt to teach them this new and exciting concept!

But most importantly, today we focused on celebrating Earth Day in our classroom, which meant getting to do a fun project!  This fun project is called Earth Day Spin Art!  I really enjoyed this project for the students because it taught them that there are two things on the Earth: land (green) and water (blue).  I liked this project because both the land and water were represented and it made the lesson easy for them to understand!  It was so much fun and the students loved it!  It was super simple to make and needed hardly any materials at all: green paint, blue paint, paper plates, and white paper!  So easy but so cute!!! :)

Check out the pictures below to see the process...and at the last picture is the final project! :)

Put the paint on the bottom of the plate, two to three drops of each color.  Flip the plate over onto a sheet of white paper and start spinning with your fingers!

Such a simple project: We kept the plates for the classroom and the sheets of paper 

they got to take home to show their parents!

WE LOVE THE EARTH!  :)

I hope everyone enjoyed a wonderful Earth Day and a great Monday!  Stay tuned to see what my preschoolers learn about recycling throughout the week!

Until next time, stay safe and thanks for listening! <3

Celebrating Week of the Young Child!

This week at Community United Child Care Centers, we are celebrating Week of the Young Child.  Read below some information from http://www.naeyc.org/woyc to find out more about Week of the Young Child and what it means! :)

The Week of the Young Child™ is an annual celebration sponsored by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC). The purpose of the Week of the Young Child™ is to focus public attention on the needs of young children and their families and to recognize the early childhood programs and services that meet those needs. The 2013 Week of the Young Child™ is April 14–20.

As many of you know, I work at Community United Child Care Center, which is a NAEYC Accredited Learning Center.  Alot of daycares/learning centers are not NAEYC Accredited; therefore, they do not receive special funding as well as base their instruction around a complete curriculum.

Community United Child Care Centers is a NAEYC Accredited Learning Center that receives special funding to provide our students with the best education possible.  We also center all of our learning around a complete curriculum called Creative Curriculum Gold.  This is the curriculum I use when designing my lessons (to teach) for each week.  

Community United Child Care Centers is celebrating as a school this week, having theme days for each day of the week as well as providing special treats for the students and staff!  Here are some of the fun things we are doing this week!

Monday: Career Day (I dressed up as a doctor...thanks Brie for the white coat!) 
Tuesday: Purple Day (Purple is the theme color for Week of the Young Child)
Wednesday: Crazy Sock Day (I wore crew socks that were crazy colors and each sock was different!)
Thursday: Western Day (Dress up like a cowgirl/cowboy)
Friday: Neon Day (Wear bright colors!!!)

Those are the theme days for the week. 

We also have special treats such as ice cream for the kids, donuts and pizza for the staff, and also a nice thank you/candy treat from my bosses about the wonderful work they think I am doing for my classroom!  It meant a lot to receive such a nice thank you from my bosses after only working for them for 3 months!

Such a nice thank you!

We are celebrating like crazy in preschool this week, helping the students realize that THEY ARE the reason we teach and THEY ARE the future.  On Monday, we did a fun activity that made them really think about a certain dream they had.  I found this activity and I thought it would be great for my students because they really think about the future alot and they have great aspirations and dreams that I get to hear about ALOT :)  Below is a picture of our wall outside (decorated in purple) of the student's dreams.  I loved how this activity turned out and my students did an awesome job with it!

Some dreams that were written on their clouds were: to be a firefighter, policeman, princess, doctor, engineer, shark catcher, fish catcher, hockey player, teacher :), and one of the cutest ones that almost made me cry was said by a four year old and he stated that his dream was to save animals.  Clearly, the cutest activity I think I have EVER done with my students. :)

There is nothing like a dream to create the future.

One child's dream :)!

Remember, this is the week to celebrate kids! So get out there and support our kids in everything they do!! They are truly the best and I am lucky enough to call thirty four and five year olds MY students!!! :)

Thanks all for listening.  Until next time, stay safe. <3

Buggy For Spring!

I hope everyone is enjoying the wonderful spring weather...if you like rain that is ;)!  In preschool we have been very busy learning about different themes related to spring, such as bugs and rain!  Who knew that teaching rain last week would fit so well with the weather we received last week as well as this week! Rain, rain and more RAIN! 

My students have been very busy working and are enjoying coming to school; however, they are definitely ready to get outside and play.  Our kids recognize when they can't go outside and it is definitely affecting them in their school work.  It's making them hard to concentrate and a little silly, but overall, they have been having pretty good days and we've been very busy doing art projects, literacy projects, math projects, etc.!  

To share some of our artwork, I decided to make a bulletin board using the lady bugs we made out of plastic bowls and paint!  They turned out super cute and the students loved them!  Check out the picture below to see our Spring bulletin board!!!

We're BUGGY for SPRING!!! :)

I hope you enjoyed this short but fun post.  Until next time, stay safe and thanks for listening! <3

April News!

Each month, I am responsible for sending out a classroom newsletter, explaining what is going on in the school as well as in our classroom.  Check out below what's happening in April in the Bear Room! :)

Until next time...stay safe! <3

Easter Excitement!

Happy Belated Easter! :)

I hope everyone enjoyed a wonderful Easter weekend and remembered the reason for the season <3.  I truly had a great weekend, spending it with my entire family...getting together with the Nederhoff side on Saturday night and the Manlick side on Sunday afternoon.  It was a much needed weekend with friends and family and a weekend back at home.

Not only did I get to celebrate Easter with my friends and family, but I had the privilege of celebrating Easter with 29 smiling faces...aka...my preschoolers :)!  We had a great week in preschool leading up to the Easter holiday.  The students got to do many fun things (all thanks to Miss Brittane & Miss Ana...woot woot!)  Our "Easter" themed-week consisted of doing many different activities such as Jelly Bean Graphing (picture to follow), Bunny Bags (picture to follow), Easter Egg Hunt (picture to follow) and many more activities!  The students loved celebrating Easter and couldn't wait for the "Easter Bunny" to come!  They were so excited!

One of the fun activities we did during the week was Jelly Bean Graphing.  The students have been working on sorting things and then graphing them according to the way they sorted them.  Seems crazy that 4 & 5 year old's can do this right?!   Funny thing is... THEY LOVE DOING IT!  The students are very bright and can do this skill quite easily for only being exposed to it a couple times in the past few weeks...which means...it's time for me to challenge them.   Since we were graphing jelly beans, the students were instructed to first sort the jelly beans by color, and then color and graph them.  If they got done early, I asked them to circle the group that had the most jelly beans and put a square around the group that had the least jelly beans.  They did awesome with it.  Here are a few pictures to show the student's work...

First they sorted....

And then...they graphed!  Awesome work done by a 4 year old!!!

Another activity we did during the week was preparing Bunny Bags for the student's Easter Egg Hunt!  I explained to them that if they were good....the Easter Bunny would come and bring them special treats...but that they needed something to collect their special treats in...so we decided to make Bunny Bags.  This activity turned out SO CUTE and I was so proud of it, as were the students.  There were a few different steps to this activity but the students did very well with it as they were able to follow directions and listen to know what they had to do in order to make a Bunny Bag just like Miss Brittane's! :)  Here are a few pictures to show the student's work...

Painting the bunny ears...

Making the bunny face....

FINAL PRODUCT!  SO CUTE :)!

And last, but not least...EASTER EGG HUNT TIME! Oh boy....were the students ever excited?! I really wanted to do the Easter Egg Hunt outside, but because of staff switching and scheduling issues, I had to settle with doing the Easter Egg Hunt inside, which worked out okay.  The students were excited and enjoyed it either way.  Here are a few pictures showing the students on their Easter Egg Hunt...!

Go, Go, Go!!! :)

Still hunting....

Time to see what's inside!! :)

The students loved celebrating Easter and couldn't wait to come back from the weekend and tell me what the Easter Bunny was going to give them!  :)

Again, I hope you all had a great Easter.  Until next time, stay safe and thanks for listening <3!

Hands-Up for Spring!

Wow, I can't believe winter is FINALLY leaving us and Spring is now approaching.  It feels so great to be able to see sunshine again and warm weather along with that sunshine!  However, if you think I'm excited, you should come enter my preschool room where my students literally can't sit still because they are so excited about the SUN and warm weather!   They are loving it!  

Two weeks ago, we opened up the Spring season by discussing, studying, and learning about Spring!  A few fun things we did for our "Spring"-themed week were making name kites (students had to arrange the letters of their name and then make a kite), clothespin butterflies made out of three simple materials...coffee filters, clothespins, and pipe cleaners (picture to follow), and a "Hands-Up For Spring" bulletin board-where the students got to paint onto the bulletin board! (picture to follow)  They LOVED IT :)!  Needless to say, Miss Brittane is the coolest teacher they know ;)!  Haha.

A few pictures to add to our FABULOUS Spring week!  

Clothespin butterflies

"Hands-Up For Spring" bulletin board (Painted with student's hands)

Miss Ana and I had a great time introducing the Spring season to our preschoolers and we are excited to see what the next few months of Spring bring us!  The students are in great moods because of the sunshine and they have been so happy lately and so ready to learn!  I am truly blessed with a great class.  As crazy as they are sometimes, they are such great kids and I look forward to going to school every day.

That'll wrap up this post for the time being!  Thanks so much for listening!  Until next time, stay safe....and....Happy Spring! :)  <3