Book of the Week - Kindergarten

I had truly planned on working with some fall type books this week, like books about pumpkins but it just so happened that we are reading about Johnny Appleseed in our school week. I know everybody else did their Johnny Appleseed stuff in September when it was his birthday but I am following a different schedule and we are just now getting to learn about him. So I figured we might as well do some fun things with apples. The book I chose is Ten Apples On Top! by Theo. LeSieg The version I have is one that I found at a used book sale here in my country and it is probably the same version I read when I was a child. It is an old copy. It smells old, looks old, but it is good. The cover is worn and taped but we can still read it and love it. 

We started or apple study by filling out a KWL chart about apples and then worked on the life cycle of an apple by Wild About Teaching (link below). 

We talked about the parts of an apple and labeled them on this worksheet.

We practiced our number words by creating this mini book about apples by Musings of Me (link below).

We practiced a new prayer called Johnny Appleseed, we used to sing this one when my other kids were little. J had requested we start singing this one as well. She made fingerprint apples on the tree. This printout was from Guildcraft but I couldn't find a link for it.

We taste tested one apple for snack time and she added it to her comparison sheet. The sheet asked that J make comparisons such as color, size and taste. The first apple we tried was a Gala apple and she said it was sweet. The printable is by Kinderpond.

J then painted and stamped with apples. These apples will be cut out to make an apple wreath for our front door for fall. She chose the color green to stamp with.

Turned out cute but I think it might need a bow of sorts.

She balanced an apple on her head but I couldn't get her to try more than one.

I made apple bean bags from some fleece and she balanced these on her head, then...

on her foot.

After snack time, we left an apple out on the table to see what happens. This was the first part of our science experiment by Snippets by Sarah (link below).

The experiment was to determine the best liquid that would keep an apple from turning brown. J poured milk, soda, and water into tea glasses. Then she added an apple slice to each one. 

We waited overnight to see what changed and which liquid preventing the browning.

It truly surprised us to find the apple slice that sat in the milk was the least brown. The one that was placed in the water was the darkest, even compared to the apple that sat out in the air overnight.

We played a word game. I wrote words that J has been practicing on red and green apples. Then I found a clip art version of Johnny Appleseed which I hid behind one of the words in the pocket chart. She read each word, taking it off the chart, trying to find which one Johnny was hiding behind. Kaleb is helping, can you tell? We played this for awhile, practicing all of her current word families and sight words.

Hope you enjoyed our activities and found some inspiration as well. I am hoping to add more fall books, possibly pumpkins, and activities next week. 

Links

Wild About Teaching has the life cycle of an apple.

Pixy Stix and Teacher Tricks has the apple KWL chart that we used.

Snippets by Sarah has the free printable for the Science experiment plus some other freebies.

Kinder Pond has the printable for the comparison of apples, sorry couldn't find the exact link but it is there somewhere.

Musings of Me I See Apples printable book can be found here.

Making Learning Fun has tons of ideas for apples and Ten Apples on Top.

Tot Tuesday

Kaleb just loves books. He is always bringing me books to read. I just had to grab a camera when I saw this...

Kaleb quietly reading, of course with his faithful friend - Mouse.

He is concentrating hard on the book - so cute. I hope he always loves books like this.

Sonlight Week 6

Sonlight Week 6 brought us lessons about St.Patrick, the rainforest and savanna, skip counting by tens, a lesson of bullying. We began our new chapter book, The Hundred Dresses by Eleanor Estes. Here are some of the learning we did this week.

Obey was the key word this week. We read about how Abraham obeyed God, how children should obey their parents. 

Monday was Columbus Day so J created a book about Christopher Columbus. I found the mini book in a Scholastic teacher digital resource called Literacy Building Booklets.

J is still practicing her teen numbers. One game we played was to see which number would she roll more. I placed her numbers in the die and she rolled it. Every time she would roll, she would write the number.

We practiced telling time by the hour. I found a clock worksheet which she would draw the hands for the time stated. First, I had her create the time on her clock then draw what she did.

J practiced counting by tens. She had to cut out the numbers from 10 to 100 and glue them int he correct order with Kaleb supervising. I found this cut and paste activity from here.

Mystery letter of the week was A. Here she is working on her A page, gluing all of the pictures she found in magazines.

She learned how to draw a simple ant for the letter A. I found these cute write-n-draw sheets Inspired by Kindergarten.

J practiced her words using the Word Whammer from Leap Frog. She practiced the word families that she had already been learning.

She practiced writing the -at word family. I made this worksheet using the worksheet creator found here. I love this thing - type in what you want them to practice writing and print it out. Simple and easy.

She read some of her little readers.

We read about St. Patrick and made a shamrock explaining the Trinity.

J colored a Celtic cross for our studies as well. If you are looking for more ideas for Sonlight Core A, please check my pinterest account. I hope your week went well. 

Book of the Week - tot

Our book of the week is If You Give A Mouse A Cookie by Laura Numeroff. Here are some of the activities that we did based on our book. Some of these are included in my tot bag as well. You may read about my tot bag here.

I set up our feed the mouse game using sticky tack onto our door. I placed a dish underneath the tube and showed Kaleb what to do. The beads would fall into the dish underneath. Of course, J wanted in on the action as well.

Magnets, magnets, magnets...he loves these. He is totally fascinated how some of them stick together and some don't.

Kaleb is playing with the magnets and the cookie.

Kaleb loved taking the cookie apart but putting them back together was too hard. He just handed me the pieces and waited for me to do it.

Who is stealing the cookies from the jar? Kaleb....that's who (and I think he has crack - ha ha). Kaleb didn't want to throw the cookies into the containers, he would steal the cookies and run after J threw them. He has been busy this week but I couldn't interest him in any more activities for our book. We will bring this tot bag out once again at a later date and see how he does. We are off to our new book - I am playing with some ideas. Hope to see you soon.

Book of the Week - Kindergarten

Our book of the week is If You Give A Mouse A Cookie by Laura Numeroff. This is one of our many favorite books. If you give a mouse a cookie, he will want some milk....

I made some word cookies that J flipped with a spatula. If she could read the word, she got to keep the cookie. She liked this game. This may reappear as we practice our reading.

We sequenced the story using the milk caps that I made with clipart.

J practiced counting by two's using the worksheet I found at Making Learning Fun (link below).

J and I played Catch the Cookies game that I found (link below). She is competitive like her father, always wanting to win.

I happened to have Inchimals and in the set there is a mouse which measures 3 inches long. We used the mouse to measure things.

For the Science part of the book, we did a milk/color experiment. This was really cool. I gave J a shallow dish of milk and she added food coloring where she wanted.

Then, she added a drop or two of dish detergent. Wow, look what happens! The colors swirl and mix, moving all ways. She was really surprised.

We also played toss the cookies. I set up three bins from IKEA and J had to toss the cookies in each bin. We were going to tally the results but Kaleb kept running after the cookies and taking them. We also made cookies, sorry no pics. This book is definitely a favorite. Hope you enjoyed the kindergarten version of our activities, stay tuned for the tot version (if I have an agreeable tot, ha ha). There are a lot of links if you want to explore the book on your own. Enjoy.

Links

Mom to 2 Posh Divas the idea for the sight word cookie flip came from here.

The Preschool Experiment the idea for feed the mouse the cookie came from here.

Flutter Flutter milk experiment idea here, her pictures of the experiment are so much better.

Izzy Mac and Me tons of ideas here for the book.

The Art Annex I didn't do this but I wanted to, directions for a clay mouse. Looks cute.

The Domestic Notebook ideas here for a mouse sock puppet, super cute.

Erica Bohrer first grade teacher with some ideas, I love her mouse and cookie graphing.

Blog She Wrote has an idea for cookie bean bags and a mouse puppet, cute gift.

Made for First Grade has some free writing worksheets for the book plus is selling some units as well.

Sylvan Hollow mouse puppet idea for a brown lunch bag.

First Grade Wow has a circle map idea for the story, have child draw each item.

Mouse Cookie Books has some online games for the books and the Cookie Chase game we played.

Make Learning Fun has the skip counting worksheet as well as other activities for the books.

Live, Love, Laugh Everyday in Kindergarten has a free sequencing activity using printable cards instead of milk tops. Super cute.

Tot Tuesday - Bucket Head

For some reason, this particular morning Kaleb was playing so well by himself that we got school done in record time. We couldn't help but laugh at what he was doing though...

He was playing bucket head. He would place these buckets and bins on his head and dance around. Totally funny!

Busy, busy, busy. We had to laugh. It was a nice having him occupied while we worked on school. The things that make us happy;)