Yanuell had a VERY exciting day filled with holiday fun! He wanted to begin the morning re-reading both the Hanukkah and Christmas books that we have looked at this month. Following our reading, we joined Ethan for some group social studies/reading work. They continued working on yesterday's craft. They completed their reindeer by cutting legs and adding them as well as adding the handprint antlers and finishing touches. During the activity, they sang holiday songs and discussed the meaning of Hanukkah and the upcoming celebration. The boys then brainstormed what they knew about winter holidays and logged into raz-kids.com to read one of Ethan's level L books, titled World Holidays. Yanuell was extremely excited to be working on one of Ethan's book - it made him feel very advanced!! The boys outlined basic information on Chinese New Year, Christmas, Hanukkah, Holi, Kwanzaa, New Year, and Ramadan. During the reading, we stopped to summarize, clarify, and work to connect the holidays and find common traits among them. At the end of the story, we had a wonderful group discussion. Yanuell wanted to finish writing his T-Rex book before the Hanukkah celebration, so we went to the computer lab and added more photographs as illustrations, more text and several images copied from the internet. Yanuell looked over the book several times before printing to make sure that he was happy with his finished product. We did not get a chance to read the printed copy - so that is on tomorrow's agenda. The rest of Yanuell's day was filled with Hanukkah fun! He made crafts, ate Hanukkah snacks, played the dreidel game, sang songs, and made latkes. It was a fantastic afternoon filled with activities to help learn about Hanukkah!