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Dear Oak,

There was a bin with googly eyes, feathers, sparkly things, oak balls, wood chips, twigs, dirt, leaves, and other treasures. You joined me as I hunted through this bin. You pulled out treasures and sparkly things to give your mom. You found a sparkly cat. You collected your treasures on the side of the sandbox. You thought your mom would feel happy looking at them.

A second person joined us and went on her own treasure hunt. She collected her finds in a little blue net. Hers were different then yours. You each had your own idea of what was a treasure. She hunted differently too. She swept everything to the side and looked at what remained. You used your hands to move the top layer away.

Both of you used your eyes and hands to search. She wanted to give the treasures to her mother and her father.

A third person joined us. She collected only the beans. She’d brought a coffee filter over in order to lay her treasures on top. The beans were mostly a creamy beige and lightly colored and blended in with the leaves, twigs, wood chips, and dirt. They didn’t stand out like the brightly colored and sparkly treasures.

I wonder how she spotted them.

Love,
Teacher Michelle

Dear Oak,

“I can see it.”

“I can look through here.” You each moved along the fence looking through cracks or knot holes into the neighbor’s yard. “Let’s pull these out.” I reminded that we take care of Rainbow School. Our music corner is for everyone to use, and they wouldn’t be available if you broke them.

“But we have to get over the fence.” We have a step ladder, so we went on a search for the step ladder. “We have to get over the fence. We need a long one.” We tried the step ladder. First one climbed up. They couldn’t see over. Then another climbed up. They couldn’t see over.

So we tried a triangle. Several people helped move it and get it up over the musical pipes. It worked. You could see over the fence. One was even able to stand on the hooks in the fence. “We have to smash the fence.”

I informed that we have to have a fence since we’re a school. “We need to get in the yard.” You explained that something had been thrown over the fence that you wanted to retrieve. I explained that now that thing was the neighbor’s because it was in their yard. We can’t go into people’s yards without asking them if it’s okay first.

Love,
Teacher Michelle

Dear Mulberry,

Chase! Chase! Chase us! One person dashed right into my outstretched arms, and I gobbled them up. They were so sweet and tasty. Everyone else dashed by. “Distract her! Someone yelled. I wasn’t going to be distracted.

“Which way are you going?” I was going to go whichever way you went. You ran up Rainbow Mountain. I ran towards the downside of Rainbow Mountain. You ran into the Sleeping Barn. I ran to the swing side.

You ran to the Hello Goodbye gate. I ran towards the Pine Forest. You ran onto the pirate ship. I ran to the sandbox. And I didn’t catch a single one.

Love,
Teacher Michelle

Dear Oak,

Penelope Rex is a character in a book we have at Rainbow School. Do you remember her? I was thinking about her today. In the Hello Goodbye Yard, all the children sat on one side of the Hello Goodbye Yard and every time poor Penelope Rex tried to sit next to someone, all the children moved away.

Penelope Rex tried to join the game of good guy bad guy, but none of the children would let Penelope be the good guy. She didn’t want to be the bad guy.

Some children decided to play with the unicorns and blocks. Penelope Rex loves unicorns. She especially loves rainbow unicorns. She especially loves one special rainbow unicorn. The children weren’t playing with the special rainbow unicorn. They had decided to keep the rainbow unicorn from Penelope.

Soon all the children were playing unicorns and blocks and keeping Penelope from getting to play with that one special rainbow unicorn that she loved. Penelope waited patiently for a turn, but they never gave her a turn. She wanted to play unicorns and blocks too and was using a lasso to catch unicorns.

The other children started throwing unicorns and blocks at Penelope. Penelope thought it was just part of her lasso game until BOOM! A unicorn hit her on the head. Ouch! Then one of the children used the toy they’d been using as a unicorn prod on Penelope. Ouch! Penelope started to cry. Poor Penelope!

Love,
Teacher Michelle

Dear Mulberry,

Zombies! Egad! There were drawn out moans of brains, brains. I was very glad I was in the safe area, and then, I wasn’t. You had turned me into a Zombie, not in the safe area. I made the mistake of leaving the safe area.

I was very hungry, and I could smell lots of sweet, tasty children’s brains. Zombies aren’t very fast. Actually, they are quiet slow. I was very slow. I couldn’t catch any children, and I was so hungry. Zombies never give up. So I might have been slow, but I was determined. Your brains are so yummy!

Love,
Teacher Michelle

Dear Oak,

I was pushing the swing. You were swinging on the swing. You sang “E will. E will rock you.” You asked me to sing the turtle song about the bubbles. You were the only one left on the swing. You told me, “There are no monsters here.”

I asked, “Not even the ones with 60 90 claws and 60 eyes?” You said something about only two eyes, I think. I thought that must mean no monsters. People have two eyes. Birds have two eyes. Squirrels have two eyes. Most spiders have eight eyes.

Then we heard a ROAR! There was a monster in the yard, and it was chasing everyone. Well, not us. I was glad we were swinging.

Love,
Teacher Michelle

Dear Oak,

One person was digging a slide. They had some tiny dinosaurs. Maybe it was a dinosaur slide. They dug until they hit the hard. They invited me to help. I was digging a hole with someone else.

Another person came along, they wanted to fill our hole with water, but that wasn’t our plan. Our plan was to dig a sitting hole. We wanted a dry hole for sitting. I thought maybe they could dig their own water hole.

They wanted to fill in the hole with dirt. That was okay as long as we still had room for sitting. Then my digging partner decided they wanted to sit on the edge of the hole with their feet in the hole. It became a foot hole.

Our hole filler decided to bury their feet, and it became a foot mountain. In the meantime, I’d built a mountain of sand from my own hole digging. They broke up their foot mountain, climbed mine, and rolled and slid down it.

I like playing in the sand.

Love,
Teacher Michelle

Dear Mulberry,

I dug a hole at the bottom of the slide. Someone yelled, “Teacher Michelle’s digging a hole!” Suddenly everyone surrounded the hole. I got up and out of the sandbox. Two people began to dig a bigger hole and to make it smooth. Another person grabbed the hose to fill it with water.

The two diggers said to the person with the hose, “Wooaaahh! It’s not ready yet. Every so often the one with the hose checked in, “Can I fill it now?” The diggers dug and dug. The one with the hose waited and waited. And then the hole was ready. Amanda turned on the water.

Suddenly clothes were flying. Another child waded into the hole with their clothes on not noticing the water still pouring from the hose. They were looking down. “Hey!” they exclaimed as their dress got soaked. I pointed out that they’d walked into the pouring water.  They got out and stripped down to underwear too.

Love,
Teacher Michelle

Dear Oak,

Two were singing and swinging. Three were picture writing. Two were painting. One was washing the animals in the barn. Before that they had been washing the paint window as the two painters painted. Then they moved on from animals and back to washing the paint the two painters were painting. This time it was on the fence.

There was a problem. 

You guessed it. The painters didn’t want the paint washed off. They wanted the paint on. The washer was taking care of Rainbow School and wanted more things to wash. This was a problem.

Then, Scott spotted the dirty bike. I noticed more dirty bikes. Soon, there were four more helpers taking care of Rainbow School and lots of clean bikes. I wonder how many.

Love,
Teacher Michelle

Dear Mulberry,

There were two at the mark making table. Both were picture writing stories. One story had so many characters in it. Characters are the people or other beings in a story. Then a portal appeared in the story. The writer asked the other writer – both writers were also in the portal story – if they wanted to go in the portal.

I wondered where the portal went. The writer declined to go in the portal. They were writing a story that took place in deep water and lines jutted out in all directions. A third joined the picture writing. They had a single character in their story, a cockroach. The cockroach jumped off the page and chased the other two writers up Rainbow Mountain.

Later one of the writers wrote a story as a birthday present. Someone turned 3 today.

Love,
Teacher Michelle