Our preschoolers are very excited about winter and snow. For many of them it’s the first time they have seen snow or been old enough to play in it. Classroom themes have ranged from winter and snow, to colors, letters, transportation and dinosaurs.

In the Chickadees, Montana Vazquez-Grinnell’s twos class, the children continue to grow and flourish. Each day we are seeing them discover a little more about each other and themselves. The children have really started to in-teract, create games, and play together. A favored game during Big Room is setting up all the chairs to make a train, bus, or theater and quickly the whole class becomes involved! They have been talking a lot about winter and snow, as well as Dinosaurs which is something completely driven by the group's interest.

The Robins class, Tomomi Iwamoto’s three class, is studying colors. They started with primary colors last week and are onto secondary colors. They have been playing a game where the children all have to search around the room to find one thing that is the color of the day and bring it to the rug. They then gather around the items and look at them and count them. After studying primary colors they moved on to secondary colors. The children did a special project where they dropped blue and yellow ice cubes in water to see what would happen. The Rob-ins were fascinated to see the colors mix gradually together.

The Sparrows, Natalie Roth’s threes class, are working hard on their letters and are spontaneously adding letters to their art work. They continue to read different versions of Chicka Chicka Boom Boom (both the letter and number versions) and to discuss how each is different. They will be starting a new unit “all about me". The kids are growing and developing a greater sense of self-awareness. They have been saying their full names at morn-ing meeting and talking a lot about birthdays. In the coming weeks they will be creating "all about me" books which will help the children to think about who they are in their family and what their interests are.

The Puffins, Catie Blake Vignona’s fours class, has been busy learning about dinosaurs and of course making lots of fun dinosaur art. They have been singing "Oh where oh where have the dinosaurs gone..." This is a unit that resonates with all of children. It has also given them an opportunity to explore a variety of art materials. They made "fossils" with shells and little dinosaurs that they pressed into model magic, dinosaur skeletons using pasta as the bones and sand as dirt, a big dinosaur collage as a class, and compared their footprints to one the size of a dinosaur's. The Puffins also worked together to make a huge dinosaur mural using oil pastels and different textured paper.

The Hummingbirds, Pam Apple’s fours class, has been working on a transportation unit. They have painted with car wheels using foam paint and regular paint, and they have made their own driver's licenses. They are currently working on creating their own original vehicle from cardboard boxes. Each child is making a different vehicle. Among the vehicles the Hummingbirds have thus far created are a police car, fire truck, ambulance, airplane, car and train. This is a very time consuming project. All of the children are trying to include lots of details on their vehicles.

Please contact us if you are interested in applying to our summer program which runs June 17th through August 2nd.

We are nearing the end of our admissions process for fall 2013. I am still offering some tours and accepting applications. If you are interested in applying to the preschool for the fall please call the preschool office at 718- 623-1322.

Registration for our summer program will begin in late March. The summer program will run June 17 through August 2. Call or email us (susan@utpreschool.org, or krista@utpreschool.org) for an application.

The Adult Education program is committed to the exploration of a wide range of issues and subjects that will broaden the knowledge and experience of our adult members and friends in the community. We make use of a multi-media approach, including lectures, films, study groups, and concerts, a regular Shabbat Morning study hevre, and an adult Bar/Bat Mitzvah class. We view all types of programs as learning opportunities, and join together with the various committees and auxiliaries of the temple to grow together as Jewish lifelong learners.