Preschool Letter T

Sadly, this was my last week to teach preschool.  I really wish I could get a group together for next year, but so far, I haven't found any takers.

We started off the day with puzzles.

Then we read T books and made T trees.  We also made T-books (and the kids cut it out themselves!) and made "t"-shirts, where they tried to draw as many T's as they could on the T-shirt. 

The first day we ran with the theme Teddy bear.  We ranked the teddy's, hid them, counted them, named them, played Ten in the bed (rolling them one-by-one off the love sac) and then invited them for a "T" Party.  We had a small set of T cups for the bears and a larger set for the kids.  We poured pretend T and real T (gatorade) and ate Toast, Tomatoes and Teddy grahams (is that canibalism?)  I knew this would be Jackson's favorite part.  He loves acting things out and being the adult and getting everything set up for his bear was a treat.
We also talked about Telling the Truth both days.  I had a book to read each day and then we used sheep sticks and lions sticks to show if the line I said was the TTTtruth or Ly-ing (Lion).  The kids even came up with some on their own.  

(Have I mentioned that Hallie loves preschool and surprisingly likes to do everything the kids do?  She knows how to wait her turn on a mat, color, listen to a book, etc.)

The second day we went with a Tooth theme.  We read a book about the dentist and caring for our teeth.  Then each kid got a mask, rubber gloves, a dentist mirror, a pompom toothbrush and pipe cleaner floss.  They each got a very dirty set of teeth (the pompom balls were chunks of food and the teeth were written on by a dry erase marker) to clean off.  They worked so diligently cleaning and flossing.  One student used the mirror like a magnifying glass, another used it to 'floss', It was funny to see their creativity.
Our snack was Oreos (sans milk) and we saw how messy and dirty our teeth got.  Then we tried apples and milk and they got all cleaned up.

Our final activity was a train game.  I set up 4 boxes before class (Jackson helped me) and he had the genius idea to add steering wheels.  The kids got a ticket with a number on it and had to find the corresponding box.  Then I punched their tickets and we created a place to ride our trains to.  We visited the zoo, park, swimming pool, shopping mall, jungle and jungle tree (they got different tickets each ride).  Then I taught "I've been working on the railroad" song as we used out hands to hammer and 'fix' our train.

I ended with an experiment with eggs in vinegar, coke and OJ to show what different drinks can do to our teeth over time.  Then each kid got a toothbrush.  I purposely gave the other two boys a blue brush and Jackson a yellow brush, because Jackson is pretty good about "you get what you get and you don't throw a fit!"  But it turns out that one of the boys' favorite color was yellow and he really wanted yellow.  If you know Jackson, you know that he always wants anything that someone else wants/ has.  So suddenly Jackson's favorite color is yellow and he is chanting 'you get what you get . . .'.   I tried to tell him that it would make the other boy so happy and even though it is hard, it is what Jesus would want him to do to sacrifice to make someone else happy.  Despite my best efforts, Jackson decided he wanted yellow.  I disappointedly said, "I guess you made your choice."  I left the room for something and I felt so frustrated.  I wanted to take the toothbrush and give it to the other kid and FORCE him to be nice.  It was so difficult for me to live with what I thought was the selfish choice.  When I returned to the room, both boys were all smiles and Jackson told me he decided to give up the yellow toothbrush and make Danny happy.  And happy they were . . . and even happier I was!

Jackson is the type of kid that the more you push, the more he pushes back.  If I back off, sometimes he makes the right choice.  But backing off and letting go of control are very hard for me to do.  I guess he was sent to me for a reason.