R Week

          When we moved into our house back in May, we discovered that several rabbits (or as Brooklyn likes to call them “hop hops”) lived in our front yard bushes.  They are pretty big rabbits and are rather brave.  They often stay very still and let us walk somewhat close to them to get a better look.  Brooklyn loves them and spends lots of time looking out of her window watching them during the warmer months.  As the weather has started to warm up after a snowy winter, we have just started to see our rabbit friends come out again.  Brooklyn was very excited about our song of the week, “Rabbits Here and Rabbits There,” as it reminded of her little furry friends.   

We had a typical Monday which consisted of learning a new song, poem, letter, and verse.  Brooklyn did her R dot picture and glued together her rabbit R.  She had raisins for snack - one of her favorites.  

On Tuesday we talked about rain and rainbows.  As soon as I told Brooklyn that was the theme for the day, she gave me her Bible and wanted to read about Noah.  So we started our day by talking about Noah and the very first rainbow (not in my lesson plans, but I’m so glad that Brooklyn thought of that!).  We said our rainbow poem and talked about the colors that are in a rainbow.  Next, I gave Brooklyn scrap pieces of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple paper.  I told her to tear the paper into small pieces.  Madelyn had fun helping with this part too!  We put all of the little pieces of paper into a bowl for the next part of the craft.  I had drawn six arches onto a piece of white paper to form a rainbow.  I wrote the names of each color (using that color marker) into each arch.  I then filled each arch with glue, one color at a time, and had Brooklyn fill that arch with the correct color paper.  In order to do this, she had to search through the bowl of colored paper to find the correct color.  When she was finished with each color, she had a beautiful rainbow.  Lastly, we did a little science experiment about rain.  I boiled a pot of water and then placed ice cubes into an empty round cake pan.  I held the cake pan, which represented our cloud, above the boiling water.  Droplets of water formed on the bottom of the pan.  Brooklyn watched as the droplets got bigger and finally began to rain.  What a fun way to learn about rain!

Madelyn helping Brooklyn tear up paper

Brooklyn tearing up paper for her rainbow

Adding color to her rainbow

On Wednesday we talked a little bit about rockets.  Somehow Brooklyn had no idea what a rocket was before today.  After explaining what a rocket is and what it does, Brooklyn made her craft.  I drew a rocket onto a piece of paper and let her color it with markers and decorate it with star stickers.  Meanwhile, I found two plastic disposable cups, cut four slits into the bottom of one, and attached rubber bands across the opening by slipping them through the slits.  I cut out the rocket and taped it onto the cup with the rubber bands. Brooklyn then enjoyed launching her rocket into the air.  You can find the full instructions for this fun craft here.

 

Thursday was a cold, rainy day.  Brooklyn was very sleepy and wanted to cuddle and read.  Instead of doing our rock and river activities, we decided to have a reading day.  So we snuggled up in a chair by the window with a blanket, listened to the rain, and read books for about an hour.  I did add one more R activity later in the day.  Brooklyn wanted to make pretend banana muffins in her play kitchen.  I quickly jotted down a pretend recipe and read it out for her to follow.  Brooklyn used her play food, spoons, and cups to follow the recipe perfectly.   We had so much fun baking those yummy pretend muffins together!  

On Friday we read the story of Ruth from the Bible.  We talked about how she was loyal and stayed with Naomi even when she didn’t have to. We talked about how Ruth took care of Naomi by collecting leftover wheat in the fields.  For our craft, we made a Ruth puppet.  First, Brooklyn colored a picture of Ruth that I printed out.  I then cut it out, and she glued the head on the bottom of a paper bag and the body on the side of the bag.  To complete the craft, she glued wheat into Ruth’s basket.

For details and instructions of these crafts and activities, please click to see my lesson plans. If you have more ideas for the letter R, please comment and share - I would love to hear them!!

Q Week

Q is one of those letters that isn’t used very often.  So this week, I had to get creative in order to come up with enough activities that somewhat related to Q words.  Both our song and poem for the week were about quilts, and we talked a lot about what a quilt is and how to make one.  We made up motions for the quilt poem which we did while pretending to sew one together each day.  Our verse was the longest verse we’ve had so far.  I didn’t really expect Brooklyn to memorize it this week, but she surprised me and learned it very quickly!  Sometimes when I asked her to say her verse, she recited it just as I taught it to her “Be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to anger (or slow to get mad).”  Other times, she just told me it’s meaning which I’m glad she understood!  Once again, we put it into practice throughout the week.  Several times when Brooklyn started to get mad about something (usually when Madelyn got one of her toys), I would remind her to be slow to anger.  This is easier said than done, but it did seem to help her a couple of times.  *This verse is also a good reminder for mommies!!  

We did our typical Monday activities including gluing together the Q Queen, doing the dot Q picture, learning the new poem, song, and verse, and talking about the sound the letter Q makes.  After gluing the queen’s crown on the letter Q, Brooklyn added some sparkles with glitter glue.  She also practiced writing Q’s on the chalkboard (and was very good at them!)

On Tuesday, we continued talking about queens.  Brooklyn decorated the bottom of a paper plate with markers, stamps, and stickers.  I then cut slits in the plate to make a crown that she could wear.  We also talked about quarters.  First, we played a quarter toss game.  I gave Brooklyn six quarters and made a line on the floor (with a folded baby blanket).  I then placed a tray (from her play kitchen) a couple of feet in front of her.  She tossed the quarters and tried to get them in the tray.  After a little practice, she was able to do this very well.  Next, we talked about how a quarter is worth 25 cents and how four quarters are the same as a dollar (a little over her head, but she listened anyway).  We used the six quarters to work on multiplying and dividing.  I told her to put the six quarters into groups of two and asked her how many groups she had - she was able to see that six quarters make three groups of two.  She also did groups of three and one the same way.  

 

Quarter Toss

We went to MOPS on Wednesday and did not do school time.

On Thursday we did lots of quilting.  We sang our song and said our poem a few times then made our own quilt.  I cut nine squares (3”x3”) out of different colored paper.  I gave Brooklyn stamps and markers and let her decorate each square.  I then let her arrange the squares into a big square in the pattern of her choice.  Next, we punched two holes on each side of the squares - just the sides that touched another square.  Just for fun, Brooklyn chose to use a star hole punch instead of a regular one.  I finished up the quilt by tying short pieces of yarn through the holes to attach the quilt together.  We also made another quilt by weaving strips of paper in and out of slits that I cut into another piece of paper. I used cardstock for this quilt so it would be a little sturdier than regular paper. With a little help, Brooklyn really enjoyed making this quilt.

Weaving her second quilt

Friday we read the story of how God provided quail and manna for His people from Exodus 16.  We talked about how God also gives us everything that we need.  For our craft, I drew a quail on a piece of brown paper and cut it out.  I then followed the instructions on this website to make the quail fly.  Brooklyn really enjoyed shooting the quail across the room and watching it fly.

  For details and instructions of these crafts and activities, please click to see my lesson plans. If you have more ideas for the letter Q, please comment and share - I would love to hear them!!

P Week

What a beautiful week we had for P week!  After all of the snow in the past few weeks, it was so nice to have a week of temperatures in the 60’s and 70’s.  We spent a lot of time outside this week and enjoyed my favorite time of year - the surprise warm days in winter where there are no bugs!  We added a few outside activities to our agenda for P week including a few walks to the park and a little lesson in pine trees and pine cones.  We now have quite the collection of pine cones that we will hopefully use for a craft  soon.  

On Monday I introduced the letter P, taught Brooklyn our song, poem, and verse, and she glued together her P pig.  Brooklyn had peas with her lunch, and then we enjoyed a walk to the park.  

Tuesday we worked on patterns and made a peacock.   I cut out a peacock body and six feathers.  Brooklyn decided she wanted pink and purple feathers - perfect for the letter P!  We then used the feathers to make patterns.  I would put down the feathers in this order: pink, purple, pink, purple, pink….and let Brooklyn tell me what should come next.  We then did the same thing starting with the color purple.  After some pattern practice, Brooklyn glued her peacock together.  I let her decide which pattern she wanted to use to glue down her feathers and she chose to start with pink.   Later in the day, we went for a walk and collected pine cones.  

We had a fun Wednesday learning all about penguins.  We started our day by singing “Have You Ever Seen A Penguin” and doing the motions that we made up earlier in the week.  We then watched a short video on penguins.  Next, I gave Brooklyn a worksheet with a picture of a penguin.  We talked about the different parts of a penguin and a little more about how they come from eggs (which was taught in the video).  I let Brooklyn color the picture, then I called out the different parts of the penguin and let Brooklyn identify each part and glue on the word to label the picture.  We finished our school time by making a penguin craft.  I painted Brooklyn’s foot white and black, stamped it onto a piece of paper, and added on some flippers, eyes, and a bill.  She didn’t want the penguin to be lonely, so we ended up making two.  

Thursday was such a gorgeous day outside!  We decided to spend most of the day playing outside and walking to the park.  We did spend a little time putting puzzles together but decided to wait until Friday to make our puzzle craft.  

Friday we read the story of Jesus walking on the water.  We talked about Peter walking on the water and then sinking because he stopped trusting Jesus.  For our craft, I printed out a picture of Peter in a boat and Jesus walking on the water.  Brooklyn colored these pictures, and I cut them out.  I let Brooklyn practice cutting by drawing a large wavy line on a piece of blue paper for her to cut - this would make our waves in the water.  She then glued her water to a piece of black paper along with Jesus walking on the water and the boat with Peter.  After our Bible lesson and craft, we worked on the puzzle that was planned for Thursday.  Brooklyn decided she wanted to make a Minnie Mouse puzzle so we selected a picture from one of her coloring books.  First she colored the picture, then I cut it down to the right size.  I took eight large popsicle sticks, placed them side by side, and taped them together.  I placed my popsicle stick square over the picture as my guide to cut the picture down to the correct size.  I then flipped the popsicle sticks over and let Brooklyn paint on mod podge to the non-taped side.  Once the popsicle sticks were completely covered, she placed the picture on top and smoothed it out.  She then painted more mod podge over the top to seal it up.  We let it dry overnight.  The next day, I removed the tape and used a box cutter to cut the popsicle sticks apart.  Now she has a very fun puzzle that she made all by herself!  

I hope everyone is taking advantage of this beautiful weather!!  

For details and instructions of these crafts and activities, please click to see my lesson plans.  If you have more ideas for the letter P, please comment and share - I would love to hear them!!

O Week

We spent a lot of time this week talking about obedience.  Our verse was “Obey your mommy and daddy in all things” Colossians 3:20.  Brooklyn learned this verse quickly and even put it into practice many times this week.  I taught her the song “O-B-E-D-I-E-N-C-E,” and even our Bible lesson on Friday was about obedience.  We also had a big snow/ice storm this week and celebrated Valentine’s Day on Friday.  Because of this, we skipped a day of school time to make Valentine cards and play in the snow.  

On Monday we talked about the two different sounds that the letter O can make.  We did a little math activity with our Octopus O craft.  Before gluing it together, I gave Brooklyn eight strips of paper which had the numbers 1-8 on the back.  I asked Brooklyn to choose one, read the number on the back, then paint that amount of dots on the front.  She used a q-tip and blue paint to add the dots, and one by one painted dots on each of the octopus’s tentacles.  Once they dried, she glued the big O onto a piece of paper and then glued each tentacle onto the bottom of the O.  She did this in order - from the tentacle with the least amount of dots to the one with the most amount of dots. She then added eyes and a mouth to complete her Octopus O.  She also did her dot O picture and enjoyed cheerios for her snack.

 

On Tuesday, Brooklyn worked on her very cute owl craft.  I gave her a large owl, two cupcake liners, two tinfoil circles, and two googly eyes.  She glued them all together to make big owl eyes.  Next, she glued feathers (which I cut out of orange and yellow tissue paper) all over the owl’s stomach.  I had planned to do a big obstacle course for her movement activity, but because we started school time late, we ran out of time. We have a fun slide, tunnel, and pillows that we have used to make super fun obstacle courses in the past.  It is such a fun way to use random things you already have to make something new for kids to explore.  It is also a perfect way for them to get some energy out!

Wednesday was opposite day.  We started by saying the “Open Shut Them” poem.  We read a few books about Opposites and watched a video of an opposite song.  Next, we played a little game where I would say a word and act it out and Brooklyn would have to say and do the opposite.  We had lots of fun being loud and quiet, tall and short, awake and asleep, and going in and out, and over and under things.  After our game, Brooklyn colored a few pages full of opposite pictures and words.  She also worked on her cutting skills by cutting out the eight sets of opposite cards. After they were cut out, I divided the cards into two sets and let Brooklyn choose a card from one set and try to find it’s match/opposite from the other pile.  She would then glue that set to a piece of paper and choose another card to match.  

We skipped school on Thursday and had a snow day and made Valentines.  

On Friday, we talked a lot more about obedience.  We sang the obedience song many times before reading our Bible story.  I read the story about the fishermen fishing all night and not catching any fish from John 21.  I told her that even though they probably didn’t think it would work, the fishermen still obeyed Jesus and moved their net to the other side when He told them to.  We talked about ways that she can obey mommy and daddy and also ways she can obey God (by doing what the Bible says).  I printed out a page full of fish and another page with the fishermen in their boat.  I let Brooklyn use her do-a-dot markers to color the fish and the fisherman page.  Once everything was dry, I cut out the fish, and she glued them into the water.  Next, I cut strips of brown paper that we used to form the net over the fish.  Since the strips were narrow and hard to put glue on, I decided to make glue lines on the picture and let Brooklyn lay the strips of paper on the lines.  

For details and instructions of these crafts and activities, please click to see my lesson plans.  If you have more ideas for the letter O, please comment and share - I would love to hear them!!