Past projects 13
Sparking Scientific Sensations in Pre-K
Funded Sep 21, 2024We are beyond grateful for your generous donations which has helped our project come to life in our classroom. Our students have been so excited to choose our discovery center every day so they can play, learn and explore with our new materials.
Our students have been most excited about the microscope and binoculars and use these these new materials almost every single time they are in the discovery center. They love using the binoculars to explore throughout our classroom love to look for new and exciting things to examine. They get so excited to share their findings with their teachers and peers.
We have just introduced the bread basket and the sensory play breads around the world for our new unit Bread. These materials have been so helpful with giving our students the opportunity to learn about foods from different cultures as well as usuing them for math to compare and contrast. These materials have been a huge success so far and we are extremely thankful for your support to our classroom!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Formica
This classroom project was brought to life by An Anonymous Supporter and 7 other donors.Little Listeners for Learning
Funded Dec 19, 2023Thank you so much for your generous donations and helping to get my project fully funded. The children have been super excited that we are now able to open a new center in our classroom, the listing center. Since we have opened it, children have been patiently waiting their turns to go into the new center. We had to set a timer for students so that we will have enough time for all the students to get a chance each day. They are so happy to be able to listen to their favorite stories on cd as they read along with the text. Thank you for building my students' interest in learning and putting such big smiles on their faces.”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Formica
This classroom project was brought to life by LOFT.Alexa, Can You Translate For Us!
Funded Aug 8, 2023Thank you for all your support to our classroom! Alexa has been such a great tool and has made such a significant impact to our classroom. The children were so excited to first receive it and have quickly learned how to use it. It helps us throughout the day while we request Alexa to play songs to help with our transitions in the classroom. The children love hearing the music and get so excited when they get a chance to tell Alexa to play a song. During rest time, our students love the relaxing music and sounds Alexa plays to help them calm their bodies.
Another great way Alexa has contributed to our daily routines is with her helpful timers. When we break out into gross motor stations or small groups, Alexa will set timers for us which helps greatly with smoother transitions.
The best feature so far has been her ability to translate to our English language learners. Throughout the day she is able to translate things we are learning, simple tasks that are needed to be completed or helping translate daily routines. One of our students who is just learning to speak English has now learned simple commands to tell Alexa. He is now able to say, "Alexa play clean up song"! We couldn't be more happier with our new donations!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Formica
This classroom project was brought to life by The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and 5 other donors.From Readers to Leaders
Funded Dec 30, 2022We are so very grateful and thankful for our generous donations. My students have been super excited about all the new books and characters we have introduced to our classroom library. We have been using these books during our morning meetings and the children have been so engaged in reading the new books during choice time. I have been using these books to help guide my instruction and challenge my students with higher order questioning. We have been working hard to prepare our students for kindergarten and these books are being used to help with this transition. The books are being used to teach them necessary reading skills such as basic print concepts, rhyming words, sequencing, retelling and word recognition. These books have also helped our ELL students tremendously with gaining new vocabulary. More and more students have been choosing library during center time in our classroom to further explore these books with their classmates. Our students are also having fun with role playing with their favorite storybook characters, helping them build their language skills.
You have opened the doors to building stronger creativity and imagination in these young, curious learners. We are looking forward to reading more of these books, building on student's knowledge and leading the way to creating life-long learners and readers. These books will help support me to reach one of my goals this year which is expanding language and vocabulary in my ELL students. Thank you once again for your thoughtfulness and generosity in helping to achieve my goals as an educator of young learners.”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Formica
The Best Way Is Through Dramatic Play!
Funded Sep 7, 2022We are so thankful for your generous donations to our dramatic play center in our classroom. The students were so excited when we introduced our new toys to them. We have used the grocery stand for every unit so far and the students enjoy it every time. We set it up as a farmers market during our harvest unit and the students used the grocery stand to sell their fruits and vegetables to their customers. During our five senses unit, we changed it into a pizzeria and students used the grocery stand to take pizza orders and have their customers pay at the stand. We are now in our buildings unit and the students love wearing their new construction worker costume and handyman tool belt. These new resources are giving our students the opportunity to fully step into different roles and open up a whole new world of learning for them. We appreciate all your support!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Formica
This classroom project was brought to life by Valhalla Foundation.Creating Calming Choices
Funded Sep 7, 2022Thank you so much for your generous donations. Thanks to you and your support for my classroom, my students have found comfort in our "safe" place we have created in our room. Our students now have the opportunity to go to our calming corner any time of the day when they need help managing their feelings. It has helped our students recognize their own feelings, understand their friends feelings and learn how to deal with their different emotions.
Many times we find our students coming to this area when they are feeling sad or miss their family. They take comfort in our little cozy area where they often use the sensory tubes or the elephant mediation doll. This elephant has become very popular with our students and they love following along with the elephant's commands to help them with various breathing exercises.
We couldn't be more thankful for your support in helping to meet the social emotional needs of all our students. We truly thank you once again for your donations!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Formica
This classroom project was brought to life by Valhalla Foundation.Open Books Open Minds!
Funded Sep 7, 2022We are so very grateful and thankful for our generous donations. My students have been super excited about all the new books we have introduced to our classroom library. We have been using these books during our morning meeting every day and the children have been so engaged in reading the new books. I have been using these books to help guide my instruction and challenge my students with higher order questioning. We have been working hard to prepare our students for kindergarten and these books are being used to help with this transition. The books are being used to teach them necessary reading skills such as basic print concepts, rhyming words, sequencing, retelling and comparing and contrasting. These books have also helped our ELL students tremendously with gaining new vocabulary. More and more students have been choosing library during center time in our classroom to further explore these books with their classmates.
You have opened the doors to building stronger creativity and imagination in these young, curious learners. We are looking forward to reading more of these books, building on student's knowledge and leading the way to creating life-long learners and readers. These books will help support me to reach one of my goals this year which is expanding language and vocabulary in my ELL students. Thank you once again for your thoughtfulness and generosity in helping to achieve my goals as an educator of young learners.”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Formica
This classroom project was brought to life by Valhalla Foundation.Little Learners Loving Life Cycles
Funded Sep 17, 2021We would like to give a huge thank you to all the donors that have donated towards this project! The materials that were received are being utilized in our science/discovery center and our math center. My students were beyond excited when we introduced all the new materials to them, all so eager to learn through these new hands on manipulatives. Each day we have seen these materials being utilized by our students and they have been so engaged in what they are doing.
One of the most favorite units of our students is Life Cycles. These manipulatives are being used in our centers to promote curiosity and learning of life cycles while enhancing math skills and scientific inquiry. The Honeybee Tree Game has been a huge success so far, having students completely engaged in the game. This games is helping our students with social skills such as sharing and taking turns as well as strengthening their math skills as it helps with counting. My students gather around this game and engage in conversation as well which is promoting language development, especially for our English Language Learners. My students have also spent a lot of time with the specimen viewers and spiders magnetic activity. They love using the magnifying glasses to look closely at the different insects and spiders and talk about their observations with their friends. This has helped my students to act like real scientists by making observations and conclusions. They are expanding on skills such as comparing and contrasting and drawing conclusions. Many students have also enjoyed the Frog Counting and the Picnic Counting Boxes, helping them with counting and number recognition. Many of my students also enjoy working with classmates to complete the Scoop a Bug Sorting kit, helping them with their sorting skills as well as promoting team work and collaboration in the classroom.
These materials have opened up a window of curiosity in my little learners. They have not only helped with strengthening math, science and social skills but have also helped to promote curiosity, questioning and wonder on a whole new level for my students. Thank you again for your generous donation!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Formica
This classroom project was brought to life by A Generous Donor.Building Math & Literacy Skills in Pre-K
Funded Nov 16, 2018Math and Literacy are two of the most important areas students will learn in pre-k and these new materials will help facilitate that process. The students were overjoyed to receive all these new materials and couldn't wait for center time to try everything out.
Students have been rushing to the writing center every morning to explore the alphabet stamps and the trace and write letters. These have been helping my students with letter recognition, letter sounds and spelling as they can use these at their center to practice building sight words and their names. My students absolutely love the letter bots as they use them to form each letter and we use them in small groups to practice beginning sounds.
In the math center students have been using the peg number boards and the counting tubes with partners to practice counting and number recognition. It has also been great in promoting turn taking and collaboration as partners are working so nicely with each other. My students love the magnetic mazes especially the shapes one. This has been very helping in teaching sorting and recognizing different shapes. My students work in small groups with the number bots and work together to put numbers in order from least to greatest and greatest to least.
Once again we are truly grateful for your generous donation and the support you have given to my students and our classroom. We could not thank you enough!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Formica
This classroom project was brought to life by Staples.Printing Supplies for Pre-K Prints
Funded Nov 16, 2018We would like to thank you with much gratitude for your very generous donations and supporting us with the resources needed to complete this project. Your willingness to help our emergent readers and English Language Learners in our classroom makes all the difference for these children. Your generous gift has worked well beyond to make our classroom a print rich environment including pictures, labels and signs. A literacy rich environment will help emphasize the importance of speaking, reading, and writing in the learning of all students. These resources will be especially helpful this year in supporting my very eager and ready to read students as well as my students with very low language skills and/or students who do not come from English speaking backgrounds. We have a lot of students this year that are very curious and willing learners so providing print rich materials have been helping them to read and sound out familiar words around our classroom. Our new technology will make it possible to foster these children's developing language skills as they discover another way to communicate - through print!
The children have been so excited to see all the new bright and colorful labels which have been added to our classroom.
During our current unit of study, we are learning all about transportation. For this unit I was able to print out multiple pictures of different types of transportation to add to our block center. The children use these pictures as a guide to help them with building their vehicles out of blocks. We have also worked on improving our comparing and contrasting skills by using printed visuals of different modes of transportation. We have printed and laminated transportation words for children to practice in the writing center as well as colorful transportation play dough mats for children to use in the art center.
I am beyond excited for this opportunity and looking forward to having this technology create a successful year in our classroom. Most importantly, I am excited to provided a powerful print rich environment for all learners to benefit and succeed from. Thank you once again for your support and generosity.”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Formica
This classroom project was brought to life by Staples.