very hungry caterpillar -new fun

This story re-telling can is inspired form this pin.  It's from the blog Strong Start, although I can't find the specific post on their blog.  Before I forget, here are a bunch of butterfly activities from last year.

The can is covered in tissue paper and water ed-downed glue.  The (removable with velcro) wings and the antennae are laminated tissue paper.  I just hot-glued the antenna to the inside of the rim.  I will be doing any lid removable, so I think it's sturdy for our purposes. 

I used some garage sale embroidery thread to make a raggedy stripe on the little guy.   Bee helped me sort of knot and loop and tie and cut, almost one of hose friendship bracelets where you are just slip knotting around all the other strands.  We hot glued that on.

I was picturing the pieces going in the mouth with a clang, so I used old canning jar lids and a hot chocolate can with a metal interior.

The lid already happened to be red.  That's because we like hot chocolate with marshmallows and that's the red lid at our store.  The clip art for the food items is from a google images search.  There were several choices for 'very hungry caterpillar food.'   Lou glued those on blue circle and I laminated them before hot gluing them to the old lids.   The kids will touch those, so hopefully they'll be sturdy enough.

Bee and Lou suggested a 'nice healthy green leaf' after I was done, so we laminated a tissue paper leaf. 

My co-teacher also planned some new hungry caterpillar activities, so we might spend a few days reading and reading this book.  Good thing it's always a kid favorite!

chicka chicka preschool math

There's tons of fun activities out there for the Chicka Chicka books, but here are two things I did at preschool.  We had read Chicka Chicka Boom Boom last year, but not the 123 book. 

So a week or so ago I had a teachers choice theme on a math day.  I showed the pages of chicka chicka boom boom to review the plot of the story.  Then I read chicka chicka 123.  The kids loved it.  It was familiar and new at the same time.  This story counts to 20 and then counts by 10s to 100.  We aren't quite there for counting by 10s, but we all needed the counting to 20.  A few of the more mathematically accelerated kids I'm sure appreciated the counting by 10s.  This year I really want to keep them in mind. 

I wrote the kids names out a large chart paper and we counted the letters in each persons name.  We counted each as we worked on their page for our class book.  The page reads, "Chicka, chicka, boom, boom!  Will there be enough room?  ______'s  has _____ letters in her name. 

One of the gals I teach with had the fun idea to use old metal canning lids to use in an activity where the kids plunk them into a metal coffee can.  She did parts of a story or something.  I printed the numbers from the story on the lids.  I laid all the 'coconuts' out in the middle of our circle and asked the kids one at a time to find a number and add it to the tree.

I'm trying to plan fewer activities this year so I don't feel rushed to get to them all.  The kids are a year older this year and they can sit through a bit longer activity like this one.  Also, the kids are doing 1 sheet of 'paperwork' this year and that has to account for 10 minutes or so.  I am really enjoying them being a year older.  For the record, the boys are just as squirrely!

Mixed Up Chameleon color day

One day at preschool recently was 'colors.'  My 4 and 5 years old are pretty good at colors, but did need a little review.  I love The Mixed Up Chameleon.  Its a fun story about a chameleon who is bored with who he is and wants to be like the other animals he sees.   When we read it, I added more color words. 

I made a felt set to use for retelling after we read the story. 

In the end, the chameleon is a little like all the animals he sees.   When you stack all the felt pieces up,  it's just like in the book. I had the kids help me remember all the animals. 

Then, after much explanation of how we were going to be using these pieces, I passed out these story sticks.  Each is a paint stick covered in the soft side of velcro.  All the story pieces are laminated and have the stractchy side of the velcro attached.  We retold the story again and added the pieces.  They fit on just right. 

I saw the idea for the story sticks on pinterest. The original idea is from Making Learning Fun.  They used them for Brown Bear, Brown Bear.   I plan to use them for other stories too, and could do shapes, numbers, letters to spell words.  The wheels are turning on this one.   After all the velcro I used on these, I'd better use them all year!

pool noodle caterpillars

I totally borrowed this idea from I can Teach My Child.  When I saw it, I knew it was not only something I wanted to make for my kids, but something I wanted to make for my preschool room and it was one of the ideas I wanted to share at our 'back to school teacher idea sharing meeting'.

Pool noodles are cut into 1 1/2 -2 inch segments and programmed with numbers (or letters, or whatever you want to) using a nice sharpie.  I used cheap clothesline from the dollar store for the stringing.  I will have the kiddos add the numbers 1-10 in order.  You could easily make it counting by 5s, 10s, etc.

 Each string is knotted into the head and the trailing string behind just needs to be left long enough for the pieces that will go on it.  I wrapped some packing tape around the end so it wouldn't fray.

I made one for Bee with addition and subtraction and equal signs in a different color so she can work on number sentences.  I am a little concerned about the pieces rolling everywhere when we get them out at school.  I'm going to have to really think through the management of the materials.  That can make or break an activity with 18 tiny people.

preschool - Butterfly day

This week we talk about butterflies. I was pretty happy that it was my turn to teach. How fun are butterflies?   You can't talk about butterflies without reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle.  I usually don't choose the books that the kids have probably heard a hundred times, but they did have a lot of fun with this one.

I love this big book.  It was a gift to Bee when she was just wee from my brother and his wife.  I think that it is from Barnes and Noble though, if you are interested.  The little puppet can even fit through the holes.   The kiddos all really liked it.

We did a little sorting and counting with this little felt set I made up to go with the fruits from the story.  I love having these fabric numbers to use with varying counting activities.

This is actually the first thing I showed my little three year old friends.  They are butterfly pictures that I took this past week when we went to The Butterfly Palace. 

This is the first book I read to the class.  It's From Egg to Butterfly by Shannon Zemucka.  This was a good book, I would have read any short non fiction with real pictures though. 

I picked up this life-cycle model set at Toys R Us recently.  I  know they will get used a lot.  I used this set while we sang the Butterfly Song by Dr. Jean.

We looked at some additional butterflies and caterpillars on these flashcards.  I bought them at Target in the dollar section a few summers ago.  I love punching a hole in the corners and ringing them up.  They get looked at and don't get lost.

Of course I showed the kids the butterfly in a jar.  Several wanted to show their parents at pick up time.  The teachers loved seeing it too. The kitty was happy that I got it out again.

With just learning a few signs, the kids easily signed along to the song Caterpillar Dream from Rachael Coleman of Signing Times.  It's on the Great Outdoors DVD and CD.   Then, we used little butterfly finger puppets to move and dance along to the following song:   (I'm apparently too lazy to type out what is in the picture tonight- actually hubby and I have a bet as to whether I can finish this post in the time I estimated.   If I loose I have to go make us both frozen hot chocolates.  I'm thinking I should loose on purpose.)

I planned for us to to this song/activity with the puppets, but we didn't get to it.

Here are the little finger puppets.

It's felt wings hot glued on to...

the finger tips of yellow rubber gloves.  I picked them up at the dollar store.

We also made this little book, which didn't turn out logistically as I had thought.  It turned out ok though.   

The first page is:  A little egg lay on a leaf.   (a finger print is the egg)  I actually typed lays.... I never got that one, lays, lay, lie... I don't know which is right.

 (I think you can see the text now...I'll stop reading it for you)  A full finger print is the caterpillar.

The kids upside down hand in a fist is traced for the chrysalis.

Traced hands are the wings and the fingerprint is the body of the butterfly.

The parent that brought snack brought these cute butterfly snacks.  

They are made with a clothes pin and a snack size zip lock.  They are like the ones we made last year. 

I set this out after snack.  It is the brochure from the butterfly place we went.  I google imaged several of the butterflies from the brochure and made cards.   It's just a little matching game.  If my kiddos were writers, I could have numbered the cards and had them write the names as they identified them.

We also had on hand a Melissa and Doug bug puzzle which had been a gift to Lou and a bug pattern/matching set which was a garage sale find.

Last year we hatched butterflies, but I'll probably get them again next year.  We get to talk about butterflies in the 4 year class too.

I am linking up to some of these fine kiddo related parties:

Wednesday's A story + art = A Great stART  @ A Mommy's adventures,   Wednesday's Kids Get Crafty @ Red Teg Art's Blog, Tuesday's Show and Tell blog hop ad ABC and 123,  Tot Tuesdays at Delicious Ambiguity,  For the Kids Fridays @ Sun Scholars

2 easy cut kid projects

These two projects were made in the same day at two different events. What a funny coincidence.

At library time, we made this 2 cut cat:
1. start with a folded piece of paper that is slightly narrower than a sheet of paper
2. Draw an oval at the open side and a smaller shape at the bottom (see pic)
3. cut on lines
4. Glue on head and tail
5. Draw on face
He could also be a fox, don't you think?

At preschool Ee week, Bee brought home this elephant:

1. start with a piece of construction paper.

2. Cut a strip off the long side about 1 1/2 inch- fold in half

3. Cut the same oval out of the open side

4. Cut long strip in half. curl up strip. Glue on for nose and tail

5. decorate face and toes