[Display letter E card.]

What is the name of this letter? What sound does the letter E make?

Letter E says /e/, just like in the word “exercise.” /e/, /e/, exercise. Let’s together say /e/, /e/, exercise.

Now let’s spend some time with our book.

[See Week 3, Day 5 of Language/Literacy for a description and examples of how to approach today’s book reading. Key aspects are summarized below:

• Display book cover. Explain that we have read our book two times this week. Each time we read the book we learn something new. Point to and say title of book. Engage children in describing what they remember about the book:
  • What is our book about?
  • Who were the main characters in our book?
  • What happened first? What happened next?
• Point to and say the names of author and illustrator. Point to where to begin reading.
• During the reading, pause on pages that include a word defined in the prior two readings of the book. Ask or remind children what the word means. Also pause during the reading to define the 2–3 words identified for today’s session, using the following approach:
  • Read the sentence with the novel word. Identify the novel word.
  • Repeat the sentence in which the word is used.
  • Define the novel word and connect the definition to the book.
• After the book reading, write the 2–3 words targeted for today on the chart and engage children in a discussion of each word, using one or more of the following strategies:
  • Ask children to describe a picture related to the word.
  • Define a word without naming it and ask children to identify the word.
  • Encourage children to think about a novel word or phrase in another context.
• Explain that different types of things happened in our book. Facilitate a discussion of children’s interpretations of events and/or characters in the book, especially events or characters related to one or more words defined this week. See Week 3, Day 5 for examples.]

We are learning what numbers 1–10 look like. We are also learning how to use a number list to find which number comes after another number. We know that after means something comes later than something else. If follows something else.

This week we practiced our numbers by making groups of cubes. Let’s try it again with our fingers. I will hold up a number card and then we can hold up the same number of fingers.

[Hold up large numeral cards 1–10 in random order and encourage children to hold up the same number of fingers.]

We can also use our number cards to help us know which number comes next. I will begin counting and then stop before I count to number 10. Please say what comes next when I stop counting.

[Line up large numeral cards in a row similar to a number list.]

• 5, 6, 7. . . . What comes next?
• 4, 5. . . . What comes next?
• What number comes after 9?

We learned that a number list has numbers 1–10. We used our number list to play The Great Race game. Let’s play The Great Race game again!

[Display a number list. Divide the class into two teams and play The Great Race game. Include the “count on” strategy introduced in the second turn of the game on Day 4. Play as long as time permits.]

We know what numbers 1–10 look like. We also know how to use a number list to find which number comes after another number. Numbers are so much fun!

We are learning about buildings in big cities. Remember, a city is a large community. Some big cities have skyscrapers. What is a skyscraper? (a very tall building)

[Display picture of skyscrapers taken at night.]

Let’s look at this picture of a big city taken at nighttime, when the sun was not shining.

What do we see in this picture? (skyscrapers, lights)

Today we are going to make some skyscrapers with different colors of paper. Each of us will make our own skyscrapers.

We will make our skyscrapers on black paper to make it look like it is nighttime in a big city.

[Display your cityscape.]

Here is a picture of some skyscrapers at nighttime made from different colors of paper.

What do we see in this picture? (skyscrapers, lights, stars, moon)

We can make our skyscrapers look however we’d like.

• What shape are the skyscrapers in the pictures? (rectangles)
  [Use your finger to show the outline of rectangles in your cityscape creation.]
• Do skyscrapers have windows? (yes! they have lots of windows)

The windows in the skyscrapers in this picture are squares.

[Use your finger to show the outline of several windows in your cityscape creation.

Give each child a black piece of 12 x 18 or 8 x 10 construction paper.]

We are going to cut our skyscrapers out of colored paper.

Each of us can cut out our skyscrapers and glue them to our black paper. Then we can use small square pieces of paper to add windows to our skyscrapers.

Skyscrapers can be very different. Let’s each make our skyscrapers unique! Remember, unique means that there is no other just like it.

Today we created skyscrapers. We will hang our skyscrapers on the wall and share them with each other next week.

Yesterday we practiced catching balls we threw up into the air. Today we will practice catching other types of things we can throw up into the air.

We will play a catching game called Who Can? The game will help us practice catching different kinds of things.

Here are the things we will practice throwing up into the air and then catching.

[Display and describe/name each item or invite children to name/describe each one.]

Please listen carefully to how our game works:

• Each of us will have a container of items to throw and then catch.
• I will say “Who can?” and then say the name of the item to throw and catch.
• Take the item I say from your container/basket, throw it up into the air, and try to catch it. Then put the item back in your container.
• We want to throw each item gently up into the air. We do not want anything we throw to hit the ceiling or someone in our room.

Let’s play our game!

Who can throw the scarf up into the air and catch it as it falls down?

[Continue with requests, one at a time, for remaining items. For the balls, say “one of the balls in your container” and “the other ball in your container.” Remind children to put the item in their container after they have caught it.

After each of the four items has been thrown once, invite children to try one or more of the following requests, one at a time. Omit the following requests if children need repeated experience in throwing and trying to catch the different items. Continue as long as time and children’s interest permit.]

• Who can sit on their bottom and throw the beanbag up into the air and try to catch it?
• Who can throw the scarf up into the air and try to catch it with one hand?
• Who can throw a ball up into the air, clap one time, and try to catch it?

Today we practiced throwing and catching different types of things. We played the game Who Can? What was the easiest thing to catch? Why?