Bugs!!!

This week we are learning about bugs and insects! It's spring time in Texas which means the flowers are blooming and so are all the bugs! We are dicovering types of insects, the parts of insects, what they eat and their life cycles. We will be busy reading about bugs, observing them, sorting them (fake bugs of course) and creating them!
Today we made a beetle with homemade puffed paint. Here is the recipe if you would like to try at home, it was so easy!

1 tablespoon self-raising flour

a few little drops of food colouring

1 tablespoon salt

Then add some water to make a nice smooth paste.
Paint away on a nice thick sheet of cardboard (if you don’t have enough paint brushes use cotton buds – they work really well).
Microwave the design on high for 10 – 30 seconds until the paint puffs and it’s all nice and dry. We did ours for 30 seconds.

I hope you all have a blessed week!
Krista Langford

Grandparent's Day

This is a reminder that this Friday, April 12 is Grandparent’s Day at CCS. All the students will be participating in a performance for their grandparents at 10:00am on Friday in the Parish Hall. After the program we will be serving cookies and lemonade, and then the grandparents are invited back to the school to visit our class and pick up a special gift made from each student. I plan on having the children make 2 sets of gifts for their grandparents, but if they have more or less grandparents coming, please let me know ASAP. Parents, of course, are more than welcome to come as well. If you have any questions please email me back.

Blessings,

Krista Langford

Cowboy Day

We have been super busy the last few weeks! Last week and part of this week we have been talking about Dental Health and Healthy Teeth. This week we will be starting our Texas Study Unit. We will be learning about the state symbols, including state flower, star and flag. To celebrate the beginning of this unit we will be having cowboy day on Friday March 1, 2013. You may dress your child in cowboy gear including boots. However we are asking to bring an extra pair of school approved shoes for later in the day. We will be cooking hot dogs on that day so please bring towels or blankets to sit on as we picnic. If your child does not want hot dogs, please bring your own sack lunch. This is all of the information that I have about Cowboy Day. As I get more information such as times and events, I will let you know. Hope you are all having a blessed school year, I know I am!
Blessings,
Krista Langford

Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day is less than two days aways and we have been busy making heart inspired art projects! We learned how to make pink using red and white paint and purple by red and blue paint. We used the pink and purple paint to paint hearts with. 
Tomorrow is also Vihaan's birthday! He will be 3 years old and they will be bringing cupcakes for us to celebrate with him. Happy Birthday Vihaan!
This Monday, February 18, there will be no school and parent teacher conferences. Hope to see you all there. If you need child care that day, there will be Extended Care, ask the office for more details.
Hope you all have a blessed week and holiday!
Blessings,
Krista Langford

Lent: Growing Closer to God!

Here in the Episcopal church we are getting ready for the season of Lent. Today in my class we did a little preparation so the children are prepared for Ash Wednesday. During Lent, we do things to help us to know God better and the life of God's son, Jesus. Sometimes we spend extra time in prayer or in reading the Bible. Some people make the choice to give up something like television or chocolate. Years ago, people did not eat rich foods such as butter, eggs, or sugar during the Lent season. This brought about the tradition of Shrove Tuesday or Fat Tuesday as some call it, to eat all those things you wouldn't allow yourself to eat during this season.

The children and I also talked about the story of Jesus in the Wilderness from Matthew 4:1-11. See if your child remembers the 3 temptations of Christ.

All the children are coming home with a little pipe cleaner pretzel. If you would like to see the story and tradition they learned about, you can retell the story below to your child or have them tell it to you.

Angelo and the Pretzel

A long time ago, there was a monk in Italy named Angelo. Angelo worked in the monastery kitchen baking bread.

One morning, Angelo began to bake the day's bread. Since it was Lent, he didn't put any butter, eggs or sugar into the dough.

While the bread was in the oven, Angelo sat down to think and pray. The children in his parish didn't seem to be learning their prayers. He wished he could come up with a clever way to help them remember. As Angelo thought, he rolled a leftover piece of dough between his fingers.

In his day, the children were taught to fold their arms across their chest when they prayed. Angelo kept on thinking as he rolled that piece of leftover dough.

Suddenly, he had an idea! Angelo twisted the rolled piece of dough into the shape of praying arms.

He put the dough on a pan and baked it. Angelo got busy cleaning the kitchen and let the dough bake too long. But when he tasted it, he decided it was delicious.

"I will call this treat a 'pretiola' (preh-zi-o-la) which means 'little reward,'" he said. "My treat will be a reward for the children who learn their prayers."

That afternoon, Angelo baked an entire batch of pretiolas. When the children came to the bakery to visit him, he gave the pretiolas to those who knew their prayers.

Before long, all the children began to remember their prayers, and they ate batch after batch of pretiolas.

And that's the story of a monk named Angelo and the very first pretzel.

February

February is here and that means so is Valentine's Day! We will be having a class party on Thursday February 14 at 11am. I have a sign up sheet in the class for food to bring. Our class will be learning about Valentine's Day traditions, symbols, and stories. We will have a card exchange the day of the party and there are 8 students in the class, so please bring enough for everyone.
Monday, February 18 is President's Day which means there is no school. We will be having Parent/teacher conferences that day and extended care only. I have a sign up sheet in my room for conferences, so please sign up or email me a time that works best.
I hope you are all enjoying this wonderful February weather!
Blessings,
Krista Langford

2 Weeks Until Christmas Break

Hello Parents!
Only two weeks until Christmas break, I hope y'all are ready, I know I am! Just a reminder our Christmas program is tomorrow night at 5:30 but please meet at 5:15 in the music room. Remember to dress your child in a star costume. Also, next Friday is our Christmas Party. Our class is going to have a Pajama Party that day and make hot cocoa and decorate cookies. I will also provide a sign up sheet for food you would like to bring for lunch.
One more thing, the school's Gala is coming up in February and each class is expected to make and donate something for the auction. If anyone has any ideas of what to make, let me know, I have a few ideas but would love some extra input, especially from all you crafty parents! Hope you have a blessed week!
Krista Langford

St. Nicolas Day, Pizza Party and Christmas Pagaent

Happy St. Nicolas Day! Today Father Mark dressed up as St. Nicolas and visited our class and told us the story of St. Nicolas and even left candy in our shoes! The children were very excited about our special visitor.
Tomorrow our class will be having a pizza party for donating the most food during the food drive. We will most likely eat around 11 or so, parents are welcome to come and celebrate with us.
A reminder about the Christmas Pageant on December 11 at 5:30 pm in the Church. Our class will be the Christmas stars, so please create a costume that has a star or stars on it.
Any questions or concerns please email or come see me.
Blessings,
Krista Langford

Welcome Back!

Hello Parents and Friends! I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving break! I know I did. It is now time to celebrate my favorite time of the year, Christmas!!!! Over the next three weeks we will be busy learning about The  Gingerbread Man, Reindeer, Santa and of course the birth of our Lord and Savior. This week we our theme is Gingerbread Man and we will doing a variety of art, math, reading, and social activities.
Our Christmas pageant is on December 11 and our class will be Christmas Stars. Ms. Boyd has asked the parents to make their children's costumes for the pageant. If you need any ideas or supplies feel free to talk to me about it and we can work something out.
I am excited for the next few weeks, we are going to busy having so much fun!
Blessings,
Krista Langford

Sharing Feast

Hello Parents!
This week we have been learning all about Turkeys and Thanksgiving. Children will be dressed up like Native Americans for the Sharing Feast Friday. The children have also been discovering about different foods that are eaten at Thanksgiving and what the first Thanksgiving was like with the Pilgrims and Native Americans.
I want to remind everyone about our sharing feast tomorrow and that parents and siblings are invited to have lunch with us for $5 a person. Our class will be making Green Bean Casserole in the morning to serve at lunch. Hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday and see you back Monday, November 26.
Many Blessings!
Krista Langford

 

Thanksgiving and Book Fair

Welcome November! Our class is learning all about the month of November and preparing for Thanksgiving, discovering what happened on the first Thanksgiving and what we do at our homes for Thanksgiving. This week we started off by taking a nature walk around the school, picking flowers and leaves, watching butterflies flutter by, and talking about the life cycle of plants. In class last week we took some pumpkin seeds and sprouted them in plastic bags, so today we transferred our seeds to soil cups to help them grow. Food is an important part of why we celebrate Thanksgiving and it is important to know how our food is grown. We also created beautiful nature collages with our findings from our nature walk.
 Currently our school is having a book fair, so please stop by and support our school and buy some books!

Canterbury Fair Week

Greetings Parents!
 First, I would welcome you to the Young Learners Blog! It is my goal to add weekly updates on here about what is happening in a class and at school. This Friday, Christ church School is celebrating our annual Canterbury Fair. We have lots of games, prizes, food and fun! Parents and siblings are invited to join us on this day.
Our theme in class this week is Medieval Times: Kings, Queens and Dragons. We will review the letters P, K, D, and Q and also Squares. It should be a fun week!
Hope to see you on Friday!
Blessings,
Krista Langford

Green Eggs and Ham!

This week our class has been learning all about eggs!! So far we have painted with eggs and had a Ressurection Egg hunt in the classroom. We have also tried out some science experiments; the floating egg, the rubber egg, and the translucent egg! We have had lots of fun! Today is the last day of our egg unit and to celebrate we made Green Eggs and Ham, from the Dr. Suess' classic story book. The children had so much fun and so did I! Hopefully I can uplaod some photos from the day onto here or onto the school's facebook page!
Have a great weekend!

Mrs. Langford

WInter has arrived!

Dear Parents,
I hope everyone had a great Christmas break! We are pleased to welcome two new student to our class, Owen and Barrett! We are so glad to have new friends in our class! Sadly we also lost a student over break, Aishik aka "Nick" and his family moved back to India. :-( We will miss him a lot! This past week and this week our class is learnig all about winter. We have been talking about what happens to the weather, what types of clothing we wear, and what types of activities do we do. We started off this week by doing a special science experiment where we put snowflakes, made out of pipe cleaners, in a borax-water solution to soak and hopefully over the next few days we will have crystalized snowflakes to hang in our classroom. Pictures have been posted on the school's Facebook page if you would like to see the experiment. Report cards went out last week, most have been turned back in but if you haven't already please sign them and return them. Thank you! And if you have any questions or concerns don't hesitate to give me a call or stop by my room!
Many Blessings!
Krista Langford

Goodbye Thanksgiving, Hello Christmas!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving break! Our class had lots of fun at this year's sharing feast and ate lots of good food! Thank you to everyone who donated money for the rolls!
Christmas time is amongst us and we are hard at work in our class! This week our theme is "Gingerbread People". The children have been working on their own gingerbread family and house for our class' bulletin board. This Friday we will be decorating our very own gingerbread boy/girl for snack! This should be lots of fun!

Fall Harvest!!

This week our class is learning about the Fall Harvest, Seeds and Nuts. Yesterday we painted a picture of a pecan tree, but before we started painting we first went outside to look at the pecan tree on our playground. We studied the trees' trunk, branches, leaves, and the pecan nuts. The children collected the fallen pecans and we brought them back in the classroom to use in our project. Once we were back in class, each child had opportunity to paint their own pecan tree. We used brown paint for the tree trunk and branches, and green paint for the leaves. Then we glued on the pecans we gathered from the playground. The trees look so cute and each one unique to each child!

Getting Ready for Thanksgiving!

Hello Friends!

We have been super busy the last month, and we are currently finishing up our "Nocturnal Animals" theme, where we focused mostly on owls and bats. Our next themes are going to be Fall Harvest, Native Americans, and Thanksgiving. Our sharing feast will be on November 18 and our is responsible for bringing rolls for the entire school, approximately 75 rolls. I will have a sign up sheet by my door for those of you who want to contribute. If you have any questions about anything, please feel free to email me or just stop by my room!

Blessings,
Krista Langford

CCS Parents Plus Spirit Night!

Papa Murphy's Pizza Fall FUNdraiser!

$2 donated to CCS Parents Plus for EVERY PIZZA SOLD

Return order forms & payment by Monday Sept. 26
Best Part: DELIVERY at School on Wed. Sept. 28
. . . in the drive through, on the foyer or at extended care!!!!

Take them home for an easy week night meal AND stock your freezer for fall parties, birthdays and family nights!

Classroom Jobs

Starting today, there are five new jobs that the children will be assigned at the beginning of each day. Each child will take turns doing a job throughout the week, never repating the same job that week. The jobs are; Calender Helper, Weather Helper, Door Holder, Line Leader, and Room Monitor, which is actually going to be given to two children each day. So that means 6 job positions a day, with 12 children in our class that means half the class will be have something to do every day.

We are also finishing up our "All About Me" theme! We have about 75% of our family albums finished and they came out so cute! I am still missing a pictures from a few children, so please turn them in ASAP so all the children can share their families with the class!

Fire Safety

Today we had a special vistor, Mrs. Jones, the fire safety lady came in today and taught us all about how to walk across the street safely. She taught us to look both ways before we cross the street, never cross the street with out a parent or another adult, and that we need to use our eyes and ears to make sure it is safe to cross. Here are a few photos from today's special visit.