Merry Christmas!
 
It’s hard to believe that it is already the end of another calendar year! It has definitely been a crazy year, but among the negative things have come some truly wonderful acts of kindness and generosity. Our little group has learned a lot about giving where we can: our time, our kind words, our care, our understanding, our help, our positivity. Through-out the month we have been focused on these daily acts of kindness that help make our community a better place to be. 
 
The Kindness Elves (Ted and Fred) joined in on our acts of kindness and offered kindness ideas for us to do or take part in. They were extremely fun for the kids to find each morning and we were always excited to see what notes they had left for us to read. They even answered the kids’ questions! We even wondered if Ted and Fred knew Oliver and Dot (an elf and reindeer from one of our stories) and it turns out that Oliver, Ted and Fred are cousins!
 
Some fun things we did this week:
-The kids got to play with freshly made gingerbread play dough. Mmm, it smelled wonderful! 
-The kids practiced their numbers by identifying, tracing and finger counting gingerbread numbers. They also added the correct number of buttons to a gingerbread man, practiced the motions of reading the number word and counting out the corresponding number of cubes. 
-The kids drew tiny pictures on tags that we tied to candy canes for the people in the neighbourhood. It was pretty exciting to hang them on the neighbours door handles! 
-Read Christmas stories to each other. What a kind thing to do for another. J
-Decorated plastic Christmas ornaments with glitter on the inside and painted pictures on the outside.
-The elves brought the kids some Magic Reindeer Food to sprinkle on their lawn so that Santa can easily spot their houses from the sky. And the reindeer can get a little extra magic to help them through the night. How exciting!
 
Some of the books we read this week were;
-Tough Cookie: A Christmas Story by Edward Hemingway
-A Very Merry Christmas by Maudie Powell-Tuck
-Snowmen at Christmas by Caralyn Buehner
-A Porcupine In A Pine Tree by Helaine Becker and Werner Zimmermann
-Franklin’s Christmas Gift by Paulette Bourgeosis and Brenda Clark

The Kindness Elves, Ted and Fred, have arrived from the North Pole! The kids who remember from last year were so excited to see them! The job of the Kindness Elves is here to spread kindness and joy. Yes, they go back to visit Santa at the North Pole each night, but they do tell Santa if the children have been naughty or nice, instead tell him all the kind actions they have taken for themselves and others. The elves encourage good behaviour without the added stress of not receiving a present from Santa on Christmas. Kids like to be noticed for the good that they do, however small.
 
The positivity that comes from these Elves include encouraging many positive behaviours, encouraging kids to carry out daily acts of kindness for themselves and others, modeling thoughtfulness and empathy towards others, community and Christmas spirit, encouraging feelings of gratitude and reflective thinking, and inspiring teamwork.
 
This week the elves left Kindness suggestions for the kids, as well as did a couple of kind things for them (cleaned up their toys they left out and brought them new markers after discovering they were mostly running out). The kids made a Christmas card for the mail carrier, decorated felt ornaments for themselves and someone special, made a list of polite words and tried to use them more often and made Christmas cards for the elderly at the Sage Hill Retirement Residence.
 
Some of the kind things Ted and Fred have seen more of this week include;
-helping others more frequently when they need it
-giving compliments to friends
-turning off the light in the bathroom even though they were not the ones in their last
-an increase in the use of manners
-I even saw some positive problem-solving attempts in the youngest
 
Books we read this week:
The Littlest Elf by Brandi Dougherty
The Littlest Christmas Elf by Nicki Shannon Smith
The Happy Elf by Harry Connick Jr
The Kindness Book by Todd Parr
Memoirs of an Elf by Devin Scillian
 
We watched the Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch and did a baking soda and vinegar Grinch heart balloon experiment. The kids funnelling baking soda into balloons and poured vinegar into the bottles, then I attached the two. And Voila! When the balloon filled with the baking soda that was dropped into the vinegar bottle, the Grinch's heart grew 3 sizes!
 
The kids a reindeer dice roll and number colour activity to practice number identification, played a Christmas memory match game, sorted and patterned tiny wood Christmas pieces, drew Christmas scenes in their journals, made twisted pipe cleaner candy canes, and helped put up the Christmas tree lights.
 
Our letters this week were M and N. The kids built these letters with a variety of toys.
 
The Christmas Crazies, as I like to call them, started to show a bunch this week. ‘Tis the season for all the excitement and tiredness!

Happy Hanukkah!
 
Hanukkah begins this coming week. We decided we would celebrate and learn about Hanukkah a bit early this year. We have been happy to learn about more than one holiday that celebrates the light over darkness. Such positivity in the holidays!
 
We had such a wonderful time playing the Dreidel game multiple times. A few of the children have even remembered what each of the symbols on the Dreidel mean! The wonderful thing about playing this game is that not only do we get to experience a game that children from another culture enjoy but we also got to work our finger muscles, count coins and practice positive game players. The kids made cute tissue paper Dreidels by gluing a collage of tissue paper together on the paper Dreidel.
 
We learned about what the Hanukkah Menorah candles represent, what the middle candle is called, and we will continue to ‘light’ the candles on the Menorah on our white board each day until all eight candles have been lit. The kids made handprint Menorahs and made colour patterns with paper candles. 
 
Ours letters this week were K and A. We practiced drawing diagonal lines, built letter K with wood pieces and searched for As in a pile of magnet letters. We are working really hard on making our diagonal lines straight instead of curvy. 
 
Some other things we did this past week included painting on a shiny surface, continuing to build and play up on NoseHill where our branch ‘tent’ is, and went bum sliding multiple times on the side of the Ravine.