Halloween Countdown

Last year I made a countdown to Halloween that we started on October 1st.  We had such fun doing it that I thought we should do it again this year and share here.  I used my Cricut Machine to cut everything out, but it could easily be done without one. 

The first thing you need to make square cards numbered 1-31 for each day of the month and find a place to hang them up.

Then you make enough die-cuts or pictures for each day.  Here is a picture of what I use.  I have an assortment of pumpkins, spiders, and other Halloween-type things.  (I used various Cricut Cartridges for this)

By the time Halloween hits your countdown will look something like  what is pictured below!

My pictures are not the best, I am sorry, but I hope this gives you an idea of what it looks like.  My sons looked forward to putting something new up every day last year.

Ears

I didn't get a lot of pictures today, but it was a fun day nonetheless.  My boys loved going on a walk and listening to the different sounds around them and they loved playing with the dog ears we made!

Gathering Time:

Play telephone

Listen to different types of music

Sing “Are You Listening” tune of Frere Jacques

“Are you listening?

Are you listening?

Yes I am.

Yes I am.

We can listen with our ears.

We can listen with our ears.

Yes we can.

Yes we can.”

Play follow the Leader (practice listening)

Focus Activities:

Make dog ear head band

Go for a walk outside and talk about the different sounds we hear

Magic School Bus listening game online

Start/Stop Game

Other Possible Activities:

Simon Says

RESOURCES:

http://www.twigglemagazine.com/

http://www.universalpreschool.com/

http://www.scholastic.com/

http://www.preschoolexpress.com/

Letter "E" for elephant

http://www.starfall.com/ letter E


Confessions of a Homeschooler

Ee lacing cards

E color by number

E cutting

E dot to dot

Ee sorting

E letter match

E number cards

E prewriting

E puzzle

E size sort

Dinosaur Week Continued

There are so many great dinosaur ideas out there!  I think I could spend months on a dinosaur theme and still not do everything I've found out there.  Here are a few of the things I chose to do with my boys.  They love dinosaurs so we had a lot of fun this week!

Gathering Time:


Dotty The Dinosaur story

Dinosaur Finger play

Dinosaurs movement activity

Focus Activities:

Dinosaur file folder game

Hand print Stegosaurus

Categorize types of dinosaurs- plant eaters vs. meat eaters
(using Luigi's new sets of Jumbo Dinosaurs  )

How Big are you? Online game

Other Possible Activities:

Dinosaur Shapes

Play with dinosaur finger puppets

Watch Dinosaur movie

Watch “Dinosaur Train” video clips

Field Guide

RESOURCES:

http://www.preschoolrainbow.org/

http://www.enchantedlearning.com/

http://www.preschoolexpress.com/

http://www.filefolderfun.com/

http://www.notimeforflashcards.com/

http://yellowmums.blogspot.com/

http://www.pbskids.org/



Dinosaur Week

We kicked off our Dinosaur theme with my son's third birthday party. 

Here are the decorations.

I made a dinosaur cake that was super easy and cute!  You can watch an instructional video here.

We also ate Dinosaur Chicken Nuggets for dinner.  It was a lot of fun.  My son receive some plastic dinosaurs for his birthday.  He and his older brother have had fun playing with them.

Actually, his younger brother loves them too! :)   The dinosaur quilt was made by my mother-in-law for Luigi (my 3 year old) when he was a baby.

Today we talked about the letter "D".  Here are some of the activities we did that are listed below.  Thanks to Erika at Confessions of a Homeschooler for her awesome alphabet printables!

http://www.starfall.com/ Letter D


Confessions of a Homeschooler

Dd lacing cards

Dd sorting

Dino clip cards

Dino color puzzles

Dino counting

Dino lacer

Dino patterning

Dino prewriting

Dino puzzle

Dino size sort

Stay tuned in for my dinosaur activities later this week!

Update

You may have noticed that all of our preschool activities were done early in the week.  We will be having visitors and also celebrating my son's 3rd birthday so I will not be posting  until later next week.  I have some fun Dinosaur things planned!

Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

Gathering Time Activities:

Read "Very Hungry Caterpillar" by Eric Carle

Use visuals- flannel board

Story Sequencing Cards

 

Pretend to be caterpillars, in a cocoon, then butterfly

Focus Activities:

Caterpillar Craft

 Fruit Tree Game

 Taste Test all the fruits the caterpillar ate (we actually only had oranges)

 Story Sequence activity- reread book

 

Other Possible Activities:

Size Sequencing

 Watch video of Eric Carle talking about book

Eric Carle reading book

Watch video of the story

RESOURCES:

http://www.dltk-teach.com

http://www.1plus1plus1equals1.com

http://www.toddlercraft.net

http://floridawic.org

http://www.eric-carle.com

http://www.perpetualpreschool.com

http://www.teachingheart.net

Number 1

Gathering Time Activities:

Hickory Dickory Dock nursery rhyme
Hockey Pokey- one version
Talk about first b-days, show pictures of what the children looked like when they were oneWriting Numeral 1 song
Play "Hot Potato" using one potato
Focus Activities:
One Giant Elephant

Circling Ones using a magazine

Make number 1 using beans

Get an assortment of buttons- pick out one blue button, one red, one green, and so forth

RESOURCES:
http://www.preschoolexpress.com/

Letter “C” as in caterpillar

http://www.starfall.com/ letter c

Confessions of a Homeschooler
Letter Cc lacing cards
Caterpillar bottle cap
Caterpillar Dice Game
Caterpillar dot-to-dot
Caterpillar lacing card
Caterpillar number order
Caterpillar puzzle
Caterpillar size sort
How many caterpillars

Blue

I didn't get too many pictures taken today.  My boys loved telling their own stories using blue objects.  We each took a turn and then switched objects and did it again so we each ended up telling three stories. 

Do you like the new way I am posting my activities?  It is an easy way for me to look at a glance at what is going on in our day.  I hope it is helpful to someone out there as well. :)

Gathering Time Activities:

Blue Story

Coloring sorting
We love Blue song
Little Boy Blue Nursery Rhyme
Focus Activities:
Blue Bubble Prints

This didn't work overly well for us and it was really messy. 

Hunt for blue things around the houseMake blue jell-o

Counting Blue

RESOURCES:
http://www.preschoolexpress.com/
http://www.first-school.ws/

Bakers

Gathering Time Activities:

Baker Poster

Put puzzle pieces together to find out theme of the day

Sing Patty Cake

Making Bread Video
Put items in a bag sort through decide which ones a baker would use and which they wouldn't
Include: Measuring spoons
    Measuring cups
    Spatula
    Wooden spoon
    Mixing bowls
    Apron

Read "Grandpa and Me" by Karen Kratz


Sing, "This is the way we measure the ingredients, measure ingredients, measuring ingredients. This is the way we measure ingredients to bake yummy food."
And


Focus Activities:

Knead dough to use to bake rolls

Memory game of what bakers use and what they bake

I took pictures of these items and printed them off to make this game.

Muffin Tin Game

Bake a cake

RESOURCES:

http://www.makinglearningfun.com

http://www.everythingpreschool.com

http://pbskids.org/lions/stories/food.html

http://www.first-school.ws