Raccoons are wild animals that can bite and carry diseases.  These nocturnal animals sneak into orchards at night and eat the fruit. 

We made a raccoon mask, cut out a black tail and painted with white paint.  
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For fine motor they could tear or cut paper to make a collage.  We also drew triangles and squares to make houses and cut straight lines.  The younger children created their own art in their journals.  If the younger kids want to participate they are given their journals and encouraged to color the page!  

Certain bugs can help or harm an orchard.  Bugs such as moths, caterpillars, worms and mites eat the trees and fruit.  Spiders can help an orchard by trapping harmful bugs in their webs.  Ladybugs also help by eating pests that can ruin an orchard. 

Letter Ii we wrote a letter I in our journals, counted and drew six legs on the letter to create an insect. 

We took turns drawing a letter and matching with uppercase the letter.   

Fine motor practice we used roller paint brushes.  

Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving break.  We are starting back up with animals in the orchard.  Before break we talked about porcupines.  A porcupine has sharp quills on its body to protect it from predators.  A baby porcupine has soft quills.  They are nocturnal and will sneak into orchards at night to look for food to eat. 

Today we learned about birds.  Birds are the only animal with feathers.  All birds have wings, but some cannot fly.  Some birds love to eat fruit from orchards, which can destroy the crops. 

Wherever Johnny Appleseed went, he planted apple seeds and was known for being kind to animals.  Today we made a Johnny stick puppet and listened to a story about his life. 

Thank you to all you Veterans for your service! 

Cherries are known as a "stone fruit."  Their skin can be a variety of colors, from dark red to yellow orange.  They can taste sweet or sour.  A cherry has a pit in the center.  We made a cherry tree collage using paper and heart confetti.  They traced their arms and cut out for the tree trunk and branches and added cherry blossoms using heart confetti. I placed cherry letter cards face down, they took turns picking a card, identifying the letter and matching to the letters on the cherry tree.  
We built the letters E, I and L using shape mini erasers. 

Apples are the fruit of an apple tree.  There are thousands of different types of apples grown around the world. Apples are nutritious and are filled with vitamins and antioxidants.  We have been reading Bear Waits, book about patience.  Today we talked about what is hard for you to wait for?  They were asked to draw a picture of Bear or themselves waiting for something.  I set out design mats and shape links; the kids were encouraged to choose a design then copy it with the shape links.  We used strips of paper to make the letter E in our journals. 
For fine motor practice we drew triangles to create mountains!

Leaves come in all shapes, colors and sizes.   Some animals build their homes or nests in piles of leaves.  Trees shed their leaves so they can save energy and water to help them survive the winter.  Today we made hungry caterpillar beads.  We talked about what animals like to eat leaves.  They threaded beads onto yarn to make a caterpillar.  I put real leaves out for them to explore and encouraged them to draw on their paper leaf.  
I hid letter eggs in leaves and we took turns picking an egg and identified if the letter printed on it is or isn't the letter E.  If it was an E we wrote an E in our journals.  For the younger kids I printed the E and they traced.  
For their names they found the apples with the letters in their name and put into the basket!  
For fine motor today we cut and pasted.  We also practiced cutting strips of paper. 

Branches grow from a tree trunk.  The largest branches on a tree are called "boughs" and the smallest branches at the ends are called "twigs."  We put paper tree branches in order from shortest to longest and longest to shortest.  Of course, we also put our friends in order tallest to shortest!  We measured branches with Duplo blocks.    
Today we made an Ee book.  We made the letter Ee with twigs and yarn and made Ee puzzles with paper.  
We searched for letter Ee's and pasted into our journals.  For our names today we searched for the letters and pasted into our journals.  This was a great exercise for all the kids to work together and help one another.  

The trunk is the body of the tree.  It is covered in bark, which helps protect the tree.  Inside the tree there are rings showing how old the tree is.  Today we made a tree shaker, using a tube, paper tissue fringe, markers, and beans.  We made a tree ring model with paper strips and also drew what the inside of a tree may look like. 
For fine motor we used q tips to paint a tree.  
We used shape links, tree branches and play dough to make trees!  They were given the option to roll dice and place that many pieces of fruit (shape links) on their tree or explore on their own.  

Roots hold the plant in place as the stem grows through the soil.  Some tree roots can grow over 20 feet down into the ground!  Roots drink up water and nutrients for the plant. 
Today we drew a picture of a plant with roots on the cover of our journals.  We also made the letter Ee with yarn (roots) and with letter builders.  
For fine motor we used glue to trace a cake and used sprinkles!  Lots of pinching and squeezing. 
Square is the shape and red is the color of the month.  We built our names with red squares.  The older kids count out the number of squares and write their name.  The younger kids match the squares to the letters on their strip.  Some have advanced to no longer needing me to write their name and they glue in order. We say the letters and count how many letters they have in their names daily!