Week Thirty: The Little Rabbit + LAST DAY OF SCHOOL

Week 30 we read The Little Rabbit written by Judy Dunn:

For this week, instead of focusing on rabbits, I focused on the photograph aspect of this story.  I brought in my camera and took out some toys and tried to spark their imaginations.  As they took the pictures, I had them narrate the story to me and I would write it down, numbered as to which picture it went to.  

Then, I used Snapfish to put together their books.  Here are some examples of one:

I didn't tell them I was making their stories into books.  Instead, I wrapped them and attached a note:

Tino-

I’m glad I was your teacher

I’ve come to love you so.

I can’t believe the end is here,

I hate to see you go.

You’re such a star

And I love you so dearly.

You light up my life

I mean that sincerely.

Remember all the fun we had

In all the things we did,

But, most of all remember…

You’re a very special kid!

Love,

Miss Theresa

I gave their books to them on the last day of school. They were thrilled.

Week Twenty-Six: The Empty Pot + EASTER

Week 26 is The Empty Pot by Demi:

For the Empty Pot sensory bin, I made brown colored rice, and added a garden hand shovel and some little pots.  

Next we set up our bean sprouting experiment: 

We taped them on the classroom window from Tuesday until Friday but then I sent them home because it was Easter Break.

Our last Empty Pot activity was this:

I brought in some flower shapes to trace and asked them to only draw flowers in one of the two pots. Here is the printout for this.

This was the last week of school before Easter break.

Of course we read and learned about Easter.  Then we made these Easter crafts:

For these crosses:

1. We used a little of our green playdoh from St. Patrick's Day and pressed it into a cup of an egg carton
2. Apply some glue onto the playdoh
3. Press in some green Easter grass
4. Make the crosses out of popsicle sticks; one big cross and two little ones
5. Stick all three crosses into the playdoh

Another idea: make a felt Easter egg and some felt decorations for it, like my felt Christmas tree.  

Week Twenty-Five: Prayer For A Child + ST. PATRICK'S DAY

Week 25 is Prayer For A Child by Rachel Field.

Our poem/ song was "Jesus Loves the Little Children."

We made minibooks using the words from the book (here) and drawing picture, making pictures out of construction paper, or using clipart.  Let them be creative, but here is my example:

Tuesday was St. Patrick's Day.  We learned about St. Patrick, the shamrock and the Trinity, and then made these:

I also made green-sparkly-lime-scented-St-Patrick's-Day play-doh using this recipe.  It turned out beautiful.

Week Fourteen: The Night of Las Posadas + CHRISTMAS

The Night of Las Posadas by Tomie dePaola is the story of a miracle that took place on the night of Las Posadas, a Spanish Christmas tradition.

While I wish I had started sooner, this was my one and only week to concentrate on Christmas.  

After reading the story, we made these.  The kids really loved sprinkling the glitter on:

These too were a hit,  they especially loved choosing the pom poms:

Their favorite thing, though, was the gingerbread man bakery I set up for them.  I used this recipe to make the play-doh.  It smelled and felt amazing-- just like the real thing.  I had to remind them not to eat it :)  Much fun (and secretly, fine motor skills and sensory and dramatic play) were had all around.  It was a delight.  

This picture is my favorite :) So much fun.

They made sure to fill up the pan:

They even baked them:

I brought in our Footsteps to Follow birth of Christ set which they had fun with.  The set includes a great book about the story of Christ's birth which I read to them. 

And I gave them the supplies to turn our baby doll crib into Baby Jesus' manger.

I stole this great idea from Jenae over at icanteachmychild.com.  A felt Christmas tree, who'd a thunk it?  Genius.

I just love the adorable Christmas decorations all around the room.

Merry Christmas!!

Week Twelve: Cranberry THANKSGIVING

This week we focused on Thanksgiving.

Our main book was Cranberry Thanksgiving by Wende and Harry Devlin:

Tuesday was such an easy day because there was no meticulous cutting and pasting and hardly any prep, but the kids LOVED what we did.

First, we used this observation sheet I made to record our notes on how we feel about cranberries using our five senses, a little experiment about whether or not cranberries float and why they float, and labeling the parts of a cranberry.

Next, we played a game they absolutely loved, inspired by theinspiredtreehouse.  I filled one cup with cranberries and put an empty cup on a table on the other end of the room.  I handed each kid a spoon.  They took turns scooping up some cranberries from the full cup and bringing them over to the other cup, once they started walking I would shout out a challenge for them.  I used theinspiredtreehouse's challenges.  They loved this game and it was such a great way to practice team work, cooperation, and both fine and large motor skills.

For our snack, I made mini cranberry muffins using "Grandma's Secret Recipe," but actually just Krusteaz.  We ate most of them, they were delicious :)

While they ate I showed them this super neat YouTube video about how cranberries are harvested and made into things like cranberry juice and craisins.  They were completely enthralled and one kid later asked to watch it again!

Next, I set up cranberry themed centers for them which they cycled through.

In this one they practiced measuring.  I drew "fill-to" lines on three cups and they simply had to fill to the line.

The next one was inspired by littlebinsforlittlehands.  I asked them to use each provided utensil to put one cranberry in each egg cup.

This one was a "cranberry bog." Super easy and this was probably the favorite.

After playing with this one for a while, I added onto it for them by giving them some funnels and cups.

And I asked them to pick out the bad ones like the factory workers did in the video.

Then they decided they wanted to fill the bin up to the top with water so they all grabbed a cup and walked back and forth from the bathroom sink to the bin to fill it up with water: 

For the last center I just put water in one cup and they had to transfer the water to an empty cup using a turkey baster.

 Fine motor play all around the room!

Finally, we did cranberry painting.  My idea was to just crush up some cranberries and paint with them, but they were way too hard and it was not working.

So, we had to problem solve.  We brought the bowl of them into the kitchen and put it in the microwave.  This worked like a charm.  The kids were pretty fascinated.

They turned out beautiful:

Since that Friday was the last day of class before Thanksgiving, I wanted to read a more educational book about Thanksgiving.  I chose The Pilgrims' First Thanksgiving by Ann McGovern which was long but they didn't seem to mind.

Then we made mini books (download here), which were all about the Pilgrims' first Thanksgiving.  They really loved putting themselves in the Pilgrims' shoes.

Our snack was pumpkin pie in a cup.  They loved this, though it made them a little crazy.

Then we made these adorable Turkey headbands from preparingforpeanut.

And we made these puppets which they played with all day.

Download template for the pieces here. Just print each page in the appropriate color of construction paper.

Happy Thanksgiving!