Shark Week 2020

 We hope everyone had a very happy Shark week!!! 

Our preschool classroom certainly had lots of fun learning all about the sharks of Massachusetts!

A few fun facts about sharks!

Hammerhead Shark - This shark's unusual name comes from the unusual shape of its head, an amazing piece of anatomy built to maximize the fish's ability to find its favorite meal: stingrays.

Great White Shark - When a great white shark is born, along with up to a dozen siblings, it immediately swims away from its mother. Born on the east and west coasts of North America, the south of Africa and southwest Australia, baby sharks are on their own right from the start. Their mother may see them only as prey.

Sand Tiger Shark - Sand tiger sharks are also known as sand tigers and gray nurse sharks. Like all sharks, they breathe underwater, through their gills. But sand tigers have one unique habit. They are the only sharks that come to the surface to gulp air, but not to breathe. The air ends up in its stomach. The air makes the shark more buoyant, so it can float motionless in the water as it watches for prey.

Basking Shark - Although it has hundreds of small teeth, the basking shark does not use them when feeding; instead, it usually swims with its mouth open and catches whatever plankton is filtered through.

Short Fin Mako Shark - The short fin mako shark is a large, predatory shark that lives in the open ocean and reaches lengths of 12 feet (3.8 m) and weights of at least 1200 pounds (545 kg). With top speeds of 45 miles per hour (74 kilometers per hour), the short fin mako is the fastest shark and is one of the fastest fishes on the planet.

Thresher Shark - When hunting schooling fish, thresher sharks are known to "whip" the water,using its tail like a whip herding and stunning prey. The elongated tail is used to swat smaller fish, stunning them before feeding. Sometimes the thresher shark will slice the fish in half before eating.

Blue Shark - Blue sharks are curious, open-ocean predators that live throughout the global ocean, from the tropics to cold temperate waters. They spend most of their lives far from the coast and are truly a pelagic species. The common name comes from the blue color of the skin, unique among the sharks.

Fun facts were found on National Geographic for kids!

The children loved finger painting the ocean and worked their fine motor muscles by tracing, cutting, tearing,and gluing the paper for the sharks!

The children did a fun match the shark activity! 

By identifying patterns and comparing similarities and differences in the sharks the children are learning problem solving and representation of different species. Since the teachers have it on a wall chart the children are also using their fine/gross motor skills and having to cross the midline** to put the sharks into their correct spots!

**Crossing the midline means that a body part (eg hand or foot) is able to 

spontaneously move over to the other side of the body to work there. The ability to cross the midline is important on the physical level as well as on the brain level. On the brain level, a lack of midline crossing may indicate that the left and right sides of the brain are not communicating well together. On a physical level, when your child spontaneously crosses the midline with the dominant hand, then the dominant hand is going to get the practice that it needs to develop good fine motor skills.

They painted shark hats with water colors

complete with fin and tails!!!

Each child had a bag with fish, each fish with a letter of their name. They were then encouraged to identify the letter and feed the hungry shark!!! They also worked on putting the letters of their name into the correct order! 

We are big advocates for hands on learning and this was a fun way to work on name and letter recognition. 

They learned a fun ocean song too...to the tune of Old MacDonald. 

Old MacDonald had an ocean, e i e i o. 

And in that ocean he had a shark, e i e i o.

With a chomp, chomp here,

chomp, chomp there, 

here a chomp, there a chomp, 

everywhere a chomp, chomp!

Old MacDonald had an ocean, e i e i o. 

We changed it up with a few other ocean friends too!

Crab - pinch pinch 

Fish - swish swish

Whale - spout spout

These were just a few of the fun activities that were going on throughout the week! The kids and teachers both had a ball learning all about sharks!

Hogwarts...no HDC!

Magical things are happening in our school age room this summer!

The children were sorted into their houses via a random drawing on the first day at HDC this summer. 

Just like at Hogwarts the children are able to earn points for their school triumphs. In our case at HDC we are focusing on the kind deeds that the children are doing in the classroom. After the lock down, we know that it is more important than ever to give special attention to the children's social emotional health. So by focusing on the kind deeds that they are doing for their peers and teachers we are hoping to build positive social relationships among the students. The teachers have decided to only spotlight the positive and not take away points for any negatives at this time, their hope is to build up each students self confidence and self worth. 

Here are a few of the things the kids know the teachers will be looking for. The kids also can give a shout out and let the teachers know when a peer helps or does something nice for them. 

They also brainstormed as a class how they might feel if another house has more points at the end of the summer than another. They also talked about what they can do to cope if they do get upset. It is important for children of all ages to learn that it is ok to not always win and that having fun throughout the summer is the most important thing. We also believe it is important to learn coping and self regulation strategies at a young age to be able to regulate their emotions more effectively and become successful adults. 

Here are the students house point logs, recent things they have done to earn points and their house maps they made!

You might belong in Gryffindor, where dwell the brave at heart.

 Their daring, nerve and chivalry set Gryffindors apart. 

You might belong in Hufflepuff, where they are just and loyal.

Those patient Hufflepuffs are true and unafraid of toil. 

Or perhaps in Slytherin you'll make your real friends, 

those cunning folks use any means to achieve their ends.

Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw, if you've a ready mind.

Where those of wit and learning, will always find their kind.

The kids have had so much fun with the Harry Potter theme so far this summer and we love how excited they are to do kind deeds for one another!