Whatever floats your boat

We start most days with a short preschool time.  Mostly for Tyler, Brooklyn usually participates, Alan loves it, and Dale takes care of Daniel if he's awake.  If Daniel's awake, not Dale. Dale's always awake. :)

I like to do a weekly theme for preschool, and some gel better than others.

This week is 'Boats' inspired by, and semi related to, Alan's Five-In-a-Row book, The Little Red Lighthouse.

Today we read Bear Island

sang Row, Row, Row, Your Boat,

and read a picturebook of Noah and the Ark.

We talked about the fact that 40 days (how long it rained) is more than a month, after which we sang our months of the year song (to the tune and motions of The Macarena ,thank you Dr. Jean).

Then, tomorrow being the first day of February, we threw in a little ground hog rhyme, just for fun.

I cut out a construction paper square, circle, and triangle for each kid for a boat craft, but first we did a shapes song. Alan and Tyler loved it and asked to do it over and over.

The shapes song, to the tune of "Twinkle, Twinkle,Little Star":

Put your circle in the air,
Hold it high and keep it there,
Put your square behind your back,
Now please hold it in your lap.
Put your triangle on your toes,
Now please hold it on your nose.

Hold your circle in your hand,
Now it's time for you to stand,
Wave your triangle at the door,
Now please put it on the floor,
Hold your square and jump, jump, jump,
Now throw your square up, up, up!

When we finally finished singing the song, I cut the circles in half and the other shapes down to size and we glued them together to make boats.

When life gives you koolaid...

Before going to a church event recently I laid out a packet of koolaid powder I intended to mix and bring to ensure our boys would have a caffeine-free drink option.

Well, we got in a hurry and the koolaid didn't get made, but the envelope sat on the corner of the counter for a couple of days.

Until somebody who's not even supposed to reach up on the counter discovered it and cut the top off!

Then the rolled-down and folded up packet sat there for a day or two more.

Finally, mama gave up on drinking koolaid (full of bad stuff anyway, right? ;) ) but felt funny wasting even a 10 cent packet.

What perfect timing to run across a blog post on koolaid playdough!  I've seen it around several times, but never made it, until now. (I halved the recipe since I only had 1 opened packet and it made plenty for all 3 boys.)

Tyler and Alan joined me in measuring, mixing, stirring and kneading and we've enjoyed our bright pink, cherry scented playdough several times now.

 I'm thinking after naptime today may be time to enjoy it again!

Preschool Unit - Cars & Trucks

Shapes Bus - No Time for Flashcards

R road, inspired by - No Time for Flashcards

Stop Sign - No Time for Flashcards

Traffic light

 Cut a rectangle shape for body of traffic light.  Cut 3 holes down center of rectangle.

Cut 3 squares of wax paper.  Cover with bits of green, yellow, and red tissue paper.

Glue tissue covered wax paper to back of light body. 

Trim any overhanging wax paper/tissue.

Road map Town

Lay out big piece of paper. Draw. Drive. :)

Simplified version of this paper tube race car from Family Fun.

Tire track painting - No Time for Flashcards (again!)

Transportation puzzle

Plus a handful of car, truck, and transportation books from our library.

Linking up with:

Under the Sea - Preschool

Tyler's second unit of the school year was beach and ocean. Such an easy and fun unit! Here are some of our activities:

Music:

From the blog: Because Babies Grow Up.

Books

A few of our favorites from the library this unit:

Crafts and Stuff

Seashell sorting and other printed activities from Under the Sea, on hand from last year's extensive ocean unit.  (Check it out for lots more links and activities!)

 Remember our finger painting a week or so ago?  After the pages were dry we folded them in half, drew a fish shape on the back, cut out both pieces, and glued them together with a string in the middle for hanging.  Or flying around the house.  

'F' is for 'fish'!  And 'fingerprints'. ;)  Thumbprints all over our cut-out letter, embellished with magic marker faces, tails, and fins.  I like to teach letter sounds before letter names, so Tyler and I both went around talking about his 'fffff' a lot. 

Paper plate fish: color or paint the backside of two paper plates.  Cut a triangle out of each for a mouth/tail.  Staple the plates together, with the tail opposite the mouth.  We did this project the same day Alan read about Jonah, so we made a paper Jonah to go inside the fish.

Water play with fish figurines.  And a rubber ducky.  And a toy tire.  Because you just never know what you might find in the ocean, right? 

Linking up with: