Turtle Mobile

Materials: toilet paper roll, ribbon, white turtle cut outs (from construction paper or cardstock), paint, crayons or markers

Activity: Paint your toilet paper roll and allow it to dry. Next, color your turtle cut outs green and brown. Poke a hole in the center of each turtle and thread your ribbon through tying a knot on one side. Poke a line of holes in your tp roll and thread the other end of the ribbon into it and secure with a knot. Using some of the ribbon tied around the top to form a way to hang your mobile as shown in the photo.

Rainbow Fish

Materials: Fish cut out of construction paper, rainbow variety of paints, foil, wiggle eye (or marker to draw eye)

Activity: Have your child paint the rainbow fish many colors. Once dry glue on small squares of foil and draw eye or glue on wiggle eye.

Darling Ducks

Thumbprint Ducks

Materials: Yellow paint, orange and black marker or crayon, white paper

Activity: Use your thumbprint and your child's to make the body of the duck. Once dry use the orange and black markers to add details to your ducks as shown in the picture.











Paper Plate Duck

Materials: paper plate, yellow paint, orange and yellow construction paper, glue, wiggle eye

Activity: Paint the paper plate yellow. Once dry fold in half. Out of the yellow and orange construction paper make head, beak and feet of duck and glue to paper plate (which should be folded in half as shown). Glue wiggle eye on to complete.

Updating

I just wanted to say sorry for my terrible lack of updates this week. I will be back later today to finally update. The beautiful weather and house hunting have taken over my life this week! But it's a rainy day, so perfect day to finally get my blog caught up again. :)

March 15-27: Pond and Ducks

I'm going to be doing the pond/duck theme for 2 weeks because I have so many ideas to go with it that I can't fit it all into just 1 week. :)

Books: Little White Duck by Walt Whippo, Over In the Meadow by Ezra Jack Keats, Turtle Splash: Countdown at the Pond, Fish is Fish by Leo Lionni, 5 Little Ducks Little Scholastic and/or Raffi, Down By the Cool of the Pool by Tony Mitton, In the Small, Small Pond by Denise Flemming, The Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister

Songs:
5 Little Ducks (words with printable sheet)
5 Green and Speckled Frogs (words)

* both of these songs also make great activities for magnet, felt board or glove puppets

Vocabulary: duck, fish

Art activities:
*feather painting
*turtle mobile
*turtle bowl craft
*paper plate duck
*thumb print ducks
*rainbow fish
*frog puppet
*duck nests

Other activities and games:
*eggs and nest number game
*lily pad jump
*cardboard box turtle
*water table pond
*frog food
*flies on a log

Printables and other resources:
Who lives in the pond printable book by scholastic
Little White Duck Printables
Frog Themed Printables

****TUESDAY ST. PATTY'S DAY ACTIVITIES: (now that I actually have the right week!)

Art Project:
Handprint shamrocks

Other Activities/Printables:
M & M rainbow sorting activity
Printable book by Scholastic
Shamrock Alphabet Match
Shamrock/Gold Coin Hunt

Coffee Filter Shamrocks

Materials: Coffee filters, green markers, spray bottle, scissors

Activity: Have your child color the coffee filters using green markers. Once done coloring spray coffee filters with spray bottle (filled with water). I recommend putting a paper towel on a paper plate and putting the filter on the top. The markers will bleed and run, so you need to have something underneath to soak up the running marker. Cut into shamrock shapes.

I suspect foul play...

So just this morning I finally got around to finishing my son's body tracing. I had traced him a couple days ago on a roll of brown packing paper and this morning he painted it. It was so nice out that I put it out on his picnic table to dry and weighted it down with a book. It's not very windy at all, so I left it and it's been fine. I've seen it out the window several times. Well, I put my son down for his nap and was in my bedroom for about an hour when I decided to go check if the painting was dry. I went out... and the painting is GONE! I searched all around the yard and path behind our house. The only thing I could think of is that it blew to the path and someone picked it up trying to be a good citizen. I'm so bummed!! It was too cute. I'm gonna have to redo the project with him sometime soon.

The Color of Me!

Materials: White paper or colored construction paper that would match your childs eyes, hair and lips, magazines, scissors, glue, crayons or markers

Activity: Either cut 3 squares/rectangles out of white paper and have your child color them the same color as their hair, eyes and lips or cut the squares out of those colors of construction paper. For older children, you can have them look through the magazines for photos that match the colors of the papers or for younger children you can have pictures already cut out and they can sort them out and match them to the correct color. For older children you could also use bigger sheets of paper as they will more than likely enjoy the cutting/gluing process more than toddlers.

Paper Plate Face

Materials: Paper plate, flesh tone crayon, marker or paint, construction paper for your child's hair (or white paper they can color the correct color), wiggle eyes, markers, glue

Activity: First, color (or paint) your paper plate. Next, cut out the inner circle of the plate and cut 2 ears from the rim which you are cutting away. Have your child glue the ears. Next, add your details of your face using markers, wiggle eyes and construction paper.

Make it yourself literacy resources

Here are 2 great websites where you can make your own word cards and your own handwriting sheets. These are great for preschoolers (especially those pre kindergartners!) What makes these sites awesome is that you can input your own text and it will generate writing sheets and word cards. So if you are doing letter A you can make a handwriting sheet just for letter A or word cards with letter A words. Enjoy.

Free Printable Word Cards
Free Printable Handwriting Sheets

Edited to add a sample of some word cards I made.

Shamrocks and Rainbows

So apparently I'm trying to skip an entire week, since St. Patrick's day isn't until next week. Haha. Oh well, we still have some activities to do then.

Paper Plate Shamrock

materials: paper plate, green paint

activity: Cut the paper plate to look like a shamrock as shown in the photo. You can use one of the cut out pieces to form a stem. Have your child paint it green. We used this cool paint dabby thing that I got at Michael's recently. They came in a 4 pack for $9.99. Very fun.






















Rainbow

materials: rainbow cut out of white paper, rainbow color of crayons or markers, cotton balls (optional)

activity: Have your child color their rainbow with all the rainbow colors. For older children, try to encourage them to make the arc of the rainbow. On the clouds you can add cotton balls if desired.







Shamrock


materials: shamorck cut out of white paper, green crayons and markes, green glitter (optional)

activity: Have your child color their shamrock green. Use glitter around the edge to decorate, if desired. Give to a special friend for luck!

Foot Paiting and The Shape of Me!!

The Shape Of Me!

materials: brown bag or construction paper, markers or crayons, photo of your child, magazines to cut out things your child likes

activity: Cut out a "person" shape from your brown bag or construction paper (sorry, I do not have a pattern for this one because I just drew it, but you could probably do a google search for one). Have your child color the cut out. Once they are done have them go through the magazines to find things they like (of course for younger children you will need to help with this step). Have them glue the things they like onto their body shape.









Foot painting

materials: brown bag or large piece of paper (you could use the back of wrapping paper also- the white side), paint

activity: What I did was cut the paper bag so it was like one long strip (so basically i cut off the bottom and cut it down the side). Then I put it in the bottom of our bathtub. I put a paper plate with 2 colors of paint on each into the tub. I had my son step one foot in each color and then walk on the paper. As you can see from the photo I ended up cutting off about 1 side of the bag, because my son was not too thrilled with this activity. I just think he wasn't in the mood for it and wanted to take a bath more than anything. Afterwards I just ran the bath and he was clean. It's the easiest way to do this! :)

March 9-13: My Body

We will be learning about bodies and their parts this week!! We will start on Monday, but take a break on Tuesday for St. Patrick's Day activities.

My Body Theme
Songs: Head and Shoulders, Knees and Toes; Hokey Pokey
Books: Books: Where is Baby's Belly Button by Karen Katz; Toes, Ears and Nose! by Karen Katz; Horns to Toes and In Between by Sandra Boynton; Parts by Tedd Arnold (Also there is More Parts and Even More Parts); From Head to Toe by Eric Carle; I Like Me! By Nancy Carlson
Vocabulary: Parts of the body (eyes, nose, mouth, hair, etc)

Art Projects:
body tracing
painting with feet
paper plate face
marble painting veins
the shape of me
color of me

Other activities:
Mr. Potato Head Activity
measuring me!

Truffula Trees

Here are our Truffula trees. We made them yesterday, but I had to wait for them to dry to "assemble" them. Right now (in the pic) they are just laying on my counter because I can't decide what color of paper to glue them to. I want to put them on paper, so I can hang them up. But I can't make a decision right now. Haha.

Materials: Yellow construction paper, coffee filters, markers, spray bottle, glue
Activity: Give your child a coffee filter and marker and have them color it. Once they are done, place the coffee filter on a paper plate with a paper towel underneath it (under the coffee filter). Have your child spray the coffee filter with water until the color starts to bleed. Allow to dry. (Usually after about 20 minutes or so I take the paper towel out and just put the filter on the plate. I think it dries faster this way.) Use the yellow paper to make trunks of the trees. Glue pieces together when top of tree is dry.

If you aren't familiar with the story the Lorax, it is basically about the Lorax trying to save these truffula trees. It's a great book to go along with an earth day theme or to talk to your kids about recycling or being "green". Another thing we use to do in my classroom is to make a recycle collage. We'd use as many things as possible out of our recycle bin to make collages and pictures. It's a great way to teach that things can be reused, and if they can't recycling them is best.

This activity was inspired by The Lorax.

Getting Creative with Paint!

I recently bought my son some of those sponges that are on a stick (I think they're intended to be used for stenciling on your walls?) . I thought they looked like fun to paint with and they cost less than 50 cents a piece. I thought I'd give some ideas of different things I have used in the past instead of a paint brush.

sponges
veggies/fruits
hands
feet
q tips
cotton balls
cookie cutters
straws
cardboard tubes
spoons
forks
spools
bubble wrap
eye droppers
spray bottles
cars
marbles
golf balls
toothbrushes
cooked spaghetti
yarn or string
different bottles/cups
bubbles
feathers
fly swatters
dishwashing brushes
toothpicks
loofa/body puff

Also, you can do different types of paint: tempra, watercolors, poster paints. You can add glitter, sand, dirt to add texture. You can add flour or starch to thicken the paint. You can add corn syrup to make it shiny. You can add a little water to make it more liquid.

There are so many options for painting!! Get creative and enjoy!

Starlight Starbright

Our library hands out little maker bags with different activities each week that you can take home and do with your kids. To the left is my take on the maker they had for this week. The makers are usually traditional story or rhyme things (for example: last week was the little kittens who'd lost their mittens). I want to do more of the classic rhymes with my son, so I've been doing these activities with him. This week was the "Starlight, Starbright" rhyme. There was a die cut star (the inner cut out had been removed and they left the outer portion), clear yellow contact paper, and a piece of string. I covered the die cut with the paper so it was like a window effect. Then I cut around the edge of the star. I puched a hole and put the string through the hole. I then wrote the rhyme all around the edge and hung this in my son's room. I was pretty pleased with how this turned out and it will remind me to say the rhyme to him, so he can learn it for himself.

More Dr. Seuss Ideas

Ok, you just have to check out the green egg cookies Bobbi made over at her blog Casa Camacho. She has some SUPER cute ideas that look like so much fun. But you really need to check out her cookies. Very creative. :)

Cat in the Hat

I basically just cut and let my son color the parts of this. I had intended on him painting them, but they printed up much smaller than I thought they would. This would actually make a really good stick puppet. I was going to try and enlarge this pattern, but didn't have time. But I hope you guys enjoy and think of something creative to do with it. :)

Patterns:
Head
Hat

Winter Tree

I thought I'd get in one more winter craft/project before the time for "winter" themed things was over (even though this doesn't go with my theme this week).

Materials: blue construction paper (or you could use black), bare tree shape cut out of a paper bag, white paint, q-tip, cotton balls, glue

Activity: Glue your tree to your blue paper. Dip the q-tip into white paint and use to make "snow" on the tree and surrounding paper by dotting on the paint. Use cotton balls to make snow at the bottom of the tree.

Dr. Seuss Shape Book

Cat in the Hat Shape Book You can find the pages to this book here. If you have an older child have them color the book themself. If you have a younger child, you can make this book yourself for your child to look at and learn their shapes. I love the Making Learning Fun website, so browse it for other learning ideas for your child! :)

10 Apples Up on Top

Materials: construction paper; green, red, and yellow crayon, marker or paint; photo of your child or a self portrait drawn by them; 10 apples either cut outs or drawn by your child

Activity: Have your child color or paint the apples. If your child is able have them number the apples 1-10 (otherwise you can do this step for them). Cut your construction paper in half lengthwise and glue together the two pieces to make a strip. Glue your child's photo or self-portrait at the bottom of the strip. Have your child glue the apples on top of their head (or if you have a younger child you can help with this step). Display at their level and count the apples as you point to the numbers!

This activity is inspired by Ten Apples Up On Top! by Dr. Seuss

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish

Materials: 4 fish shapes cut out of white construction paper, paint, sharpie, blue construction paper, glue stick

Activity: Write 1, 2, red, blue on each fish as showed above. Have your child paint each fish, 1 and 2 whatever colors you would like and then red and blue appropriate colors. Use your blue construction paper to make a strip (cut in half lengthwise) and you can make it look like waves/water across the top. Glue the fish on (or have your child do so).

Inspired by:

Goodnight Book

I'm not quite done with this, but wanted to snap a few photos so I could share the idea. I came up with this while reading Goodnight Moon. I thought it would be fun if the goodnight story was
personalized. So I made it Goodnight Elliot. Basically, I'm adding a lot of photos of family. The last page will be a photo of Elliot and it will say "Goodnight, Elliot." Some other ideas for pages are photos of favorite toys, places you visit a lot, friends, your home, or a favorite stuffed animal.