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Preschool Corner: Letter R

This week I’ll be sharing about our preschool fun studying the letter “R” and the lapbook for Runaway Bunny that I created to go along with the book. At the end of the post you will find Mr. Linky so that you can participate too in the fun by sharing what you’ve been doing during your preschool time.


Rick had a business trip this week and I was able to tag along for a few days, so I spent some of my alone time during the day sketching out the lapbook pieces and putting them together for us to do. I based most of the minit books on the areas that Before Five in a Row covers. All of the pieces I made are now posted at Homeschool Share and Ami was great to make the cover (which I forgot) and also a few bonus games to go along with it.

We did do a few activities that weren’t related to the book, but it’s all listed below, so enjoy looking around. I’ve provided links to the various activities and sites that we used whenever possible. Of course now that I’m posting, I’m thinking of a bunch of other little minit books that I could have made too ~ sigh.

ABC Book:

The alphabet book page for the letter “R” was a rainbow using fingerprints for each of the bands of the rainbow. We glued some clouds (cotton balls) on at the ends of the rainbow…and made a general mess. {grins}

Alphabet Activities: Rice Tracing


Zachary had a lot of fun with this activity…and then Kaleb joined in and the REAL fun began. He practiced his uppercase and lowercase ‘R’s’ and also made rectangles.

Fun Activities: Shadow Matching and Patterning

Homeschool Share has a fun game that uses images of rabbits with long ears, short ears, etc…and then has a shadow image of it to match. We stored our game pieces in a pocket on the back of the lapbook. You can find the shadow match and patterning games here.

Lapbook: Runaway Bunny


The lapbook pieces that I created can be found at Homeschool Share. Here are the links for the lapbook cover and some other games to go along with the lapbook. I used a full size folder for this lapbook and glued some of the game pieces directly onto the folder so that we could open it up and play it. On the back of the lapbook I glued our math game (only three sides) so that the pieces to the game can slide down in between the game board and the lapbook cover. You can see it in one of the pictures below if you can’t visualize it.

Lapbook pieces closed:

Lapbook pieces open:

Here are the minit books that we worked on:

Types of Art ~ Runaway Bunny uses two different kinds of art for the pictures ~ pen and ink drawings and also coloring paintings

What is Round? We looked throughout the book for different things that are round (spheres, disks, circles).

Catching a Bunny ~ Zachary had to remember what the Mommy bunny used as bait for her ‘fish’ son

Scarecrow puppet ~ We made a popsicle stick puppet for Zachary to play with since there is a scarecrow in the garden

Animal identification and matching ~ There were several different animals in the story at some point: bird, rabbit, monkey, donkey, kangaroo, fish, dog and donkey. There are two sets of cards to use either as a matching game or as animal id cards.

If/Then ~ Throughout the book the little bunny says he will become different things and his mother then says she will be something to find him (if you are a rock then I will become a mountain climber). There are cards for each of the If/Then’s in the book.

Shapes throughout the book ~ This minit book has four different shapes: square, crescent, circle and triangle.

Letter Sheet/Collage

Math: Rectangles

I pulled out a bag of rice and poured it into a shallow baking pan so we could ‘trace’ letters and shapes in the rice. We also had fun with our geo boards making rectangle shapes with rubber bands.

We also had other things that would fit in the math category (rabbit patterns) but they are listed above. :)

Stories and Books

Runaway Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown
Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister
I’ve Been Working on the Railroad by Nadine Westcott

Verse: Exodus 20:8

“Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.”

Writing

We’re still using the Peterson’s Writing book for our handwriting. There are great prompts and reminders for him to visualize how the letters are formed. Here’s a look at his work from this week:

About the Preschool Corner:

The Preschool Corner is a place for us to share the ideas we are using during our “preschool time” with our kids. You can join in the fun and record what you are doing in your house. Please link your exact blog post to the Mr. Linky below (if you have questions feel free to ask). Be sure to link back to this blog post so that your readers can find some other great ideas too!

The guidelines can be found here if you need them.

Share what you’ve been doing in your house this week!

Tot School ::16::

~ Kaleb is 27 months ~

Sometimes I look back at the pictures that I’ve taken during the week and wonder if I ever change my children’s clothes…or dress them in different things. Apparently I prefer to dress them in certain shirts and pants. *grins*

This week Kaleb kept disappearing into my room (where a lot of his toys are stored) and bringing back toys for me to play with. The big favorites this week were Melissa & Doug Deluxe Wooden Lacing Beads and also his pegboard from Discovery Toys.

He also found another hidden tub this week that has foam shapes that you match to make designs. This card he used was just matching different size shapes, but he is doing well naming several different shapes: circle, star, and heart. I love these shapes because they are so soft and squishy (I think from Discovery Toys). The shapes were great too because we talked about big and little and also about colors.

We pulled out our Tabletop Easel this week too and Kaleb loved sticking all the magnets on it. He is cracking me up though because not too long after he began putting them on, he started sorting them by color and lining them up (Mommy helped make them straight), but the picture that you see is just the beginning. By the end, the board was full of magnets sorted into four color groups. He is so particular about the sorting it is funny!

I have some great little bear puzzles that show different emotions and let you change the outfits they are wearing. I’ve had them for years and used them when I was teaching. Kaleb put pajamas on the bear and had a ‘ky-ing’ (crying) face on his bear and refused to let me change it. He kept imitating some of the other faces and naming the emotions: mad (grunting), crying (fake crying), smiling/happy (cheese!), and laughing (hahaha).

Later he put the ‘outside outfit’ on the bear and I mentioned that the bear must be happy since he could go outside now. Kaleb quickly got up, picked up the bear and the box and tried to take him out on the porch…and then started screaming when I wouldn’t let him go out. Sigh.

I found a ring toss at a yard sale and again with the color matching – he has to have the peg matched to the exact colored flower. He tried tossing them for a bit.

And then the ring toss turned into a mini-music session when the pegs became rhythm sticks instead.

Other favorites this week were the stacking pegboard and the geometric shape sorter that we have.

That’s all for this week! Don’t forget to visit Carissa at 1+1+1=1 for some more Tot School posts.

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Beginning Consonant Cards

Our printer has been on the fritz lately and I really wanted to try these out before posting them…but since I’m pretty sure they will be fun, I figured I’d share them even before I get to play along myself at home!

These are beginning consonant cards to use with your tot/preschooler and are designed to help identify the beginning consonant sound in words. There are 3 pictures provided for each consonant (with the exception of ‘x’ – go figure). I do have them printed off and am going to laminate them to make them a little more sturdy

Match the pictures to their beginning letter sound. You can also use the picture cards to practice identifying objects with your child.

You can download and print the pdf by clicking here for the printable. Be sure to download the long and short vowel cards that I posted as well!

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The Preschool Corner: Letter P

There are a plethora of activities to do with the letter P and unfortunately just not enough days in the week to do them all!

ABC Book: Penguin

Before you run in terror, screaming “What is that THING?”… rest assured, it is a penguin. It’s just an odd little penguin, who’s creator was a little lazy and decided that a blob of construction paper glued onto his head would be much better than cutting it out and making an actual beak…or something. More of a ‘hat and earmuffs’ kind of day apparently.


Art Activity: Painting Pigs

Pink pigs. And mud. That was the request, so two colors were given to paint with and the little man went to work painting.


Fun Activity: Playdough

Not much work was done in the sculpting department – but this was what he proudly showed me after working very hard for about 10 minutes with his lump of playdough. I wasn’t quite sure what to think until he let me know that it was a pattern on the playdough. And for that I have to give the boy credit. :)

Math & Money: Pennies, Pickle Counting, Patterns, and Pizza Fractions

Math was apparently on my brain this week. Because we did a lot of activities relating to math. First we counted out 100 pennies. Zachary made lines of 10 pennies and then stacked them into piles. When he had stacked 100 pennies, we counted by 10’s together.

I pulled out some of my old folder games this week too and we had one counting the dots on pickles, so we practiced 1:1 counting and number identification.

I can’t remember what in the world these little manipulatives are called (anyone, anyone??) but Zachary sat for quite awhile playing with them and created his own pattern for me: blue, yellow, yellow until he ran out of the stacking rings.

I made some ‘mini’ pizzas using small paper plates and cut them up into different fraction sizes (1/2, 1/3, 1/4, 1/6 and 1/8). Zachary had fun putting the little pizza puzzles together and we talked about fractions and how many pieces made up each puzzle.

Letter Sheet/Collage

Click on thumbnail to download worksheet

Stories and Books

Piggies by Audrey Wood
If You Give a Pig a Pancake by Laura Numeroff
The Popcorn Book by Tomie dePaola
The Pokey Little Puppy by Janette Lowrey

Verse: Psalm 147:1

“Praise the Lord! For it is good to sing praises to our God.”

About the Preschool Corner:

The Preschool Corner is a place for us to share the ideas we are using during our “preschool time” with our kids. You can join in the fun and record what you are doing in your house. Please link your exact blog post to the Mr. Linky below (if you have questions feel free to ask). Be sure to link back to this blog post so that your readers can find some other great ideas too!

The guidelines can be found here if you need them.

Share what you’ve been doing in your house this week!

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The Preschool Corner: Letter O

I’ve been continuing on with Zachary’s alphabet theme, but in the next few weeks I’ll also be ‘testing’ and reviewing some other curriculum, so the alphabet theme might be put on hold for a week or two while I post about the new curriculum that we are using.

‘O’ ended up being mainly for ‘octopus’ this week, so the ocean theme was plentiful in our house.

ABC Book: Octopus

I cut an octupus shape (of sorts *grins*) out of blue foam and we added ribbons and white paper reinforcers on as the ‘tentacles’ and legs of the octupus. The main page was colored like water and we added on some other ocean themed stickers so that the octopus had a little company in the water.


Alphabet Activities: Ocean in a Bottle

What isn’t there to love about water, strange sea creatures that expand when they are put into water, rocks meant for a fish tank and fake seaweed?

Just remember to hot glue the top of the water bottle shut – or you might just have a big, fat watery mess on your hands.

Not that I speak from experience or anything. Not me.

Fun Activities: Making Orange

Paint mixing and color mixing can be especially fun when attempted with a four year old who refuses to sit still.

We all know that red + yellow = orange.

Red + orange + Zachary = a big mess and paint everywhere.

Math: Estimating O’s & Octagons

We set out some small bowls of Cheerios this week and had Zachary try to guess how many were in each dish (his answers were hysterical). We then counted out 1:1 to see how many were actually in the dishes.

We pulled out our pattern blocks too and had fun making octagon patterns together.

Music: Opposites

We have a great cd called Sounds Like Fun {you can now download mp3 files!} that we sang along with our "O" theme called ‘Opposites’:

Opposites are tricky
Opposites are fun.
One day we will know them,
We’ll learn them one by one.

Happy faces smile.
Sad ones make a frown.
To use a slide go up, up, up
And then slide down, down, down.

(There’s more to the song, but I’m sure you get the idea…)

Letter Sheet/Collage

Click on the thumbnail to download worksheets

Stories and Books

Owl Babies by Martin Waddell
The Owl and the Pussycat by Edward Lear
Animals, Animals by Eric Carle

Verse: Psalm 118:1

"Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good!"

About the Preschool Corner:

The Preschool Corner is a place for us to share the ideas we are using during our "preschool time" with our kids. You can join in the fun and record what you are doing in your house. Please link your exact blog post to the Mr. Linky below (if you have questions feel free to ask). Be sure to link back to this blog post so that your readers can find some other great ideas too!

The guidelines can be found here if you need them.

Share what you’ve been doing in your house this week!

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Tot School ::15::

~ Kaleb is 26 months ~

This last week we had a FUN stomach bug going through our house and Kaleb took the brunt of it. He was so happy to actually get out of the house (ok, maybe Mommy was more thrilled) and spend the morning at the children’s museum. So before you think we have the coolest toys in our house, know that they aren’t ours!

There is a huge magnetic wall and some great marbleworks toys that stick to the wall so you can create fun marble mazes. Kaleb just loves hearing the little ‘clink’ of the marbles and trying to catch them as they fall out.

We tried naming the shapes and colors while stacking blocks, but really they just make better hats, no?

Next we moved onto the critter station and {shiver} took great fun in looking at the hairy, hairy spider and trying to get the frog to pay attention the rubber frog that was banging on the top of his habitat.

There is a great barn area for the little kids that has the cutest horse. You can brush his tail…which Kaleb did again and again.

We quickly moved on to play doctor and ambulance together. That pesky stethoscope can be difficult to get working right.

One of Kaleb’s favorite places to visit (every.single.time) is the face painting area. He won’t let anyone else help him so he usually looks like … well, a mess, but he’s a happy mess and proud of it!

That’s it for this week! Hope you all had a fun (and less-sick) week! Don’t forget to visit Carissa at 1+1+1=1 for some more Tot School posts.

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