SANTA VISITS

Sure enough, he came. With the jingling of sleigh bells from the reindeers' harness, Santa came to visit the children at Salem Pre School. He thanked us for our singing and for being such good girls and boys! Tired from his busy schedule, he sat down and took out a favorite book just for us. It was "The Polar Express"! He likes it because it talks about the sleigh bells and the elves and the boy who got the first gift of Christmas. The boy could have had anything he wanted but guess what he chose, a silver bell from the reindeers' harness! On the trip home the boy lost the bell through a hole in his bathrobe pocket, but Santa found it and gave it back on Christmas Eve. That boy, unlike all the others in his family, could still hear the bell ring when he was grown, as can all who truly believe!

Before he left, Santa gave each of the children a silver bell on a ribbon necklace to remind them of his visit. Many children hugged Santa. A few gave one last reminder of what they were hoping for on Christmas Eve. The Jolly Old Soul had other places to go so he scurried off. We never even saw the reindeer! Maybe next year.

Merry Christmas!

ADVENT

Advent is a season of waiting and at Pre School, we are waiting, sometimes patiently and sometimes not so patiently. We are waiting for Santa's arrival, the Christmas parties and family gatherings. The four year olds made Advent chains to help them wait. Taking off one ring each day helps them visualize how many days are left until Christmas! As we wait we are busy as elves making Christmas surprises for our parents and decoration for our homes. Glitter is our favorite art material in December. Have you noticed? We love to use bells when we sing many of our Christmas songs like "Jingle Bells," "We Wish You a Merry Christmas," and "Ring, Ring, Ring Your Bells."

During Advent the most important thing we are waiting for is the birth of Jesus. He is the reason for Christmas. In the book, "Santa's Favorite Story," Santa reminds us that Christmas would come without packages. It is God's gift of love, Jesus, that brings Christmas. Songs like "Twinkle, Twinkle Christmas Star," "Mary Had a Little Boy," and "Away in a Manger" help us remember the story. We are thankful for you, Baby Jesus!

HOW TO BAKE A TURKEY

HOW TO FIX A TURKEY

by the Yellow Class

• Cut the turkey with a knife.
• Take feathers off.
• Chop his face off, pull the feet off.
• Take out the bones.
• Take guck out of his back.
• Rub with oils, ketchup, salt, pepper, chopped up celery
• Put tinfoil around it
• Put it in a REAL oven. Should be middle hot, about 6 to 100 degrees.
• Bake for 3 minutes or 60 or 100 minutes.
• It's done when it goes beep, beep.
• If it's not done (warm) put it back in for more hours.
• Cut it up into little pieces.
• Put on a "huge" colorful plate.
• Serve with salad, noodles, pizza, meatballs, tomato sauce, or yams.

Hope your Thanksgiving turkey worked out fine. If not, try this recipe for your Christmas dinner!

Johnny Appleseed Prayer

Several of you have asked for the words to our Pre School prayers. This seems like an appropriate time to post them. Perhaps you can use one at your Thanksgiving meal.

Johnny Appleseed Prayer

Oh, the Lord is good to me,

And so I thank the Lord

For giving me the things I need,

The sun, the rain and the appleseed.

The Lord is good to me!

Amen, Amen, Amen, Amen, Amen

A-B-C

A, B, C, D, E, G

Thank you God for feeding me!

Thank You, Thank You

(tune, "Happy Birthday")

Thank you, thank you dear God.

Thank you, thank you dear God.

Thank you for all you have given me.

Thank you, thank you dear God!

God is Great

God is great.

God is good.

Let us thank him for our food!

Amen

Thank you to all of you who came to our Fall Program. I thought the children did a wonderful job. Hope you enjoyed it.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

HALLOWEEN PARTIES

Unfortunately, I didn't make it to all of our Halloween parties but the two I did attend were nothing but fun! It always takes a few minutes of standing around staring at the others in the class before the children are ready to start the day. Costumes are a little intimidating sometimes but once we get used to the idea of dressing goofy (even the teachers) we all love it. Each class took a break from playing early in the class session to do a costume parade. We carried our trick-or-treat bags upstairs and marched through the Hermanslie Lounge where many of our church staff were awaiting our parade with treats in their buckets. They dropped surprises, from pencils to Starburt, into our bags and we tried to remember to say "Thank you." Then it was back to our playing followed by Halloween stories, pumpkin carving, games and snack. By the end of the day we were` hot and itchy from our costumes. We do love the excitement of a party though and we are looking forward to putting on our adorable costumes again on Halloween night to entertain our neighbors and friends.

There will be more pictures of our parties in the slideshow at our four year old program on Nov. 11. :)

Signs of Fall

This month the students at Salem Pre School have been learning about the signs of fall. The apple harvest, which began in late summer, continues into fall. We enjoyed a trip to Aamodt's Apple Farm and we loved the applesauce we made at school as a part of our apple unit.

As we look around our Pre School area we are noticing other signs of fall. The leaves on the trees are changing to beautiful colors are drifting softly to the ground. When we walk through the woods to the park we sometimes find dog stickers and other seeds stuck to our clothing! Picking them off can be time consuming! Our Pre School garden is ready to be harvested. The carrots, which have been in the ground since last May, have become "gianormous" as the kids would say. We'll be eating them for snack and as a part of our Thanksgiving Feast.

Halloween is coming soon and we hope to decorate some of the pumpkins at our parties. I'm sure costume plans are being made in many home these days. Visit our blog again at the end of the month for some examples of these beauties!

HARVEST

School has begun! This week we have been talking about families and what some of the chores are that mommies, daddies and children do around the house. If we lived on a farm or if your family has a garden, there are many garden chores to do in the fall. This week some of our classes went on a potato and carrot hunt. Using a garden fork we loosened the soil and pulled up potatoes and some really big carrots! Oooh! Ahhh! The pumpkins are looking good too, perfect for Halloween!

PRE SCHOOL GARDEN

While our staff and students have been at home enjoying their summer vacation our garden has been growing like crazy! The sunflowers are much taller then an adult. The pumpkins vines are EVERYWHERE! Pumpkins are beginning to develope and the zinnias are going nuts. If you look closely at the picture of Kai you can see two carrots that we picked just to see how they are doing. Can't wait for the children to see what they planted last spring!

MAY COMMUNITY HELPERS

Summer is a busy time for all of us. As we work and play we want to be safe. To remind us of some safety tips, we were visited by several community helpers in May. Officer Kim Boyd (Piper Boyd's mom, Red Class) came from the New Brighton Police Department to talked to us about bike safety, playground safety, and using 911 for emergency calls among other things. Kim showed us all of the equipment she carries on her belt, even her hand cuffs! She reminded us that police officers are our friends and they are here to serve us. After her talk, Officer Boyd showed us her police car. We got to crawl through the back seat. We even saw the lights flash and heard the siren roar. Did you know there are several different sounds the siren can make?

The New Brighton Fire Department also paid us a visit. They, of course, talked to us about fire safety. Firefighters Ed and Andy reminded us to check our smoke detectors and told us never to play with matches! If our clothes catch on fire we must stop, drop and roll. To get out of a burning building always crawl to safety. Then Firefighter Andy put on his pants, boots, jacket, helmet, air tank and mask. He wanted us to see how he looks in a fire and to remind us he is not scary but just a regular guy dress up for a fire. Don't be afraid of the firefighter if you are in a fire. Go to the firefighter! At the end of the visit, we got to see the fire truck!!

Do you always wear your seatbelt in the car? Julie Philbrook from Hennipen County Medical Center reminded us that it is the law! And, it keeps us safe in an accident! Even if we are only going one block, we need to wear our seat belts whether we are children or adults.

One last safety reminder. Always were a life jacket in a boat! They may be bunchy and warm but the keep you safe on the water!

Have a safe summer!

SILVERWOOD PARK

Silverwood Park hosted our field trip for the Blue, Purple, Red and Yellow classes this month. They did a quality job teaching us about what prints are, what/who can make a print, how to make a print of our own, how to move like an animal in nature (making prints in the mud) and how to love the outdoors! Here are some photos to show you what a great time we had.

Garden and Ocean

Our garden is beginning to take shape. It takes courage to plant in April but this has been an unusual year. The Blue Class was the first to take the plunge. On a warm April morning they planted carrot and radish seeds in their garden plot. (The rest of us planted indoors in peat pots.) They have been very faithful about watering their seeds. Six children are given the task each day they are in session. They are hoping the radishes will be grown by the time school ends!

Our other classes have now begun to plant their small plants outside. One class is growing sunflowers, which are growing super fast! Another class is growing zinnias. Another cosmos. The three year olds (okay, some have turned 4) are planting pumpkins which they can harvest in the fall.

This week we are learning about (Can you guess by the photos?) the ocean! We are all familiar with Nemo but there are many more "cool" things in the sea. However, we haven't seen any mermaids yet!