Mucky Ducks Printable Pack

Another of my tot's favorite books is Ducks in Muck by Lori Haskins. We have both the board book and the easy reader versions. Both books have been well worn due to multiple readings. What is better for a boy - mud, trucks and ducks! This book has been on my tot bag creation list for awhile. I have researched and worked hard on this title (some are easier than others). But I have finally finished my tot bag for Ducks in Muck and I even made a printable tot pack that I named Mucky Ducks. I hope you enjoy the activities that I created.

Mucky Ducks tot pack contains:

play dough mats

seek-n-finds

letter tracing cards

strip puzzles

2 part puzzles

size sequencing

roll and graph

find the ducky game

math mats

just to give you a few examples.

Download the Tot Pack HERE.

And since I have a kindergartener, I also created a kindergarten printable pack to go along with the book. 

Mucky Ducks Kindergarten pack includes:

addition math mat with ducky counters

skip counting puzzles for 2's, 5's, and 10's

seek-n-finds

roll and graph activity

word tracing cards

word family -uck mat

where's the duck game focusing on blends and -uck words

Download the Kindergarten Pack HERE.

This is truly my first printable pack that I created. I have been wanting to do something like this for awhile and I was finally able to figure things out. I am still new to this so if you see some mistakes, please e-mail me and I will correct them. Stay tuned for my Ducks in Muck tot bag which includes some of my printables as well as a visual planner for my Mucky Ducks week packed with fun things to do.

The clipart used in this pack were provided by:

The Enlightened Elephant and Graphics by Ruth and Chantelle.

Thanks so much!

Sonlight Week 25

 This week, we read about jobs around the world. different types of motion, and worked on finishing The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. We finished our Nursery Rhyme book, somewhat early. Once I started reading, she begged me to continue. We also finished our bible program. We had several visitors which kept us busy. Here are a few things that we accomplished.

J finished her bible program early. We will continue our bible time using some pages left over from a bible activity book as well as reading a devotional daily.

J finished her word family pages. I like to practice words families and sight words every chance we get.

J is working on the book 1 1/2 of Explode the Code.

I brought out some shape puzzles for her to work on. These would have been easier if they were magnetic. The pieces kept sliding around, especially with a little brother looking over her shoulder.

I caught J looking through the Oz book. She really liked this book.

I just happened to have some green cling wrap and we made Emerald City glasses. I found the idea and pattern from Birthday in a Box. I am hoping to have time to create an Oz play mat, but we will see. Sorry for the lack of pictures this week. We had so many visitors, we were just trying to stay on top of school. See you next week.

ABC Review Pack

I have been investigating all aspects of preschool learning for my tot for the new school year. I know, I know - this year is not finished but I am a teacher/planner at heart. First, I had decided to create my own "boy" centered preschool activities, full of messy experiences and "boy loves" such as bugs, dinosaurs, and cars. I planned on avoiding the alphabet (since he is not quite 3 years old yet) and just focusing on fun themed activities. But Kaleb has changed my mind.

He has recently fallen in love with letters and numbers and is able to distinguish the difference between the two. So I decided to add learning letters into my school plans. I still wanted to keep with the "boy theme" but wasn't sure where to start. Then, I stumbled across Royal Baloo's Zoomin Movin Alphabet series. Her letter printables are awesome and they are free! The Zoomin Movin Alphabet series is all about vehicles - cars, trucks, which is right up Kaleb's alley. He loves anything with wheels. Royal Baloo has posted free printable packs for the first five letters of the alphabet, each with a new vehicle and she plans to create a pack for each letter of the alphabet.

I have been wanting to try my hand at developing printable packs for my tot as well. Since there are only 26 letters in the alphabet, I thought it would be good if I created several review packs to go along with Royal Baloo's series. These, in no way, are to detract from her series. They are to be used in addition to her packs as a form of review.

So...(trumpet fanfare)....here is my first ABC review printable pack!

I have tried to add a variety of activities that would aid in the review of each letter, number, and sight word. This is my first printable review pack. My plan is to add a new review pack for every three letters. This will give you an additional nine weeks to your preschool schedule. Since I will also be homeschooling a first grader, I was trying to include Kaleb into our 36 regular school weeks.

I have included....
letter/sight word play dough mats
roll and graph the sight words and letters
search the letters magnifying pages
letter/picture match game
milk jug labels
missing letters
clothespin number cards
letter/sight word tracer cards
number/letter strip puzzles
number cards and more. 36 pages of review centered around the transportation theme.

I hope this pack is helpful to your preschool plans. And if you haven't already, visit Royal Baloo to download all of her printable packs.

Download ABC Review Pack HERE.

We will most likely not use all of the activities included in my free pack. I like to have a variety of activities to pick and choose from to keep things new. There are a span of different abilities in this printable pack. Some things may be easy for your child and others may be challenging. You know your child best, do only the activities that interests him/her. Every child is different. I am in no way endorsing school for all tots. My tot has watched his sister only to be disappointed when he can't do school as well. That is why I have begun planning learning activities for him.

All Graphics were purchased from

Tot Tuesday

Kaleb has loved the sensory bin full of the nuts and he asks to play with it daily. But I finally got tired of always cleaning the nuts up as well as finding them downstairs, in pockets, and under every piece of furniture I own. So, I decided to change the sensory bin. He does not like the fur-fru of my speciality bins, even though I still try to entice him with my color bins and such. I went with something more simple - beans. I gave Kaleb a large bin filled with different beans that had served J well in the past few years.

He was very busy pouring and scooping. I had to remind him several times to stay on the blanket. No matter how many times I do that, beans still end up everywhere.

I'd say that the bean sensory is a success! It is easier to clean, no. It makes no difference - beans, rice, nuts - Kaleb is going to make a mess. But he loves this activity and who am I to take it away from him?

I want to make a small note that some beans are harmful if ingested without being cooked. Please watch your child when playing with small items.

A Free Moment

For the last week or so, I have been working my way through the toys, books, and craft supplies to weed out the items not worth saving while we are gone. This has been a monumental task but it seems, the desire to spring clean comes with the warm weather. (I think I learned this from my mother :) It has been somewhat difficult to do this with children afoot, especially if they see something they "love" go into the bag.

Kaleb surprised me the other day while I was working.  He spread out on the floor and contentedly read through his books. Thus giving me some free time to actually pack a whole box and it was a big one as well!

He looks so sweet "reading" his books. It was nice being able to work for some time. Hope your day has unexpected surprises.

Sonlight Week 24

This week has awarded us with some warm weather, warm enough to open the windows in the house. Warm enough to think that it might be Spring. And with Spring, comes Summer, and with Summer, comes our trip to 'Merica. It was encouraging to see the message in the Sonlight manual about only 12 more weeks to go...wow!

We learned about different types of energy. We continued to read The Wonderful Wizard of Oz which J absolutely loves. I could without the graphic descriptions of the animals dying but she doesn't seemed phased by it. She asks to read this book all the time which has put us way ahead of our schedule. Here are a few activities we did this week.

We learned about different building blocks we needed to make our "life" house strong.

J practiced "take away" using the ten frame and some counters. 

J practiced her blends with this free printable reader that I found from...sorry, I seemed to have lost the link.

J is still practicing her sight words could, should and would. She is having difficulty with these so we have been practicing them all week.

I added an alpha handwriting sheet this week. But instead of asking her to write her letters, I asked her to write words that started with each letter. She could use her word wall or dictionary to find words for each letter, if needed. We did this all week. (Kaleb is in the background....playing with letters.)

The included activity sheets are so easy for J to do that I do not even copy them. I do briefly have her go over them.

J finished her word sorts for different e-word families.

Since St. Patrick's Day is around the corner, Art Friday revolved around green crafts. J colored a scene on a paper coffee filter and then sprayed the filter with water. These were then cut out in the shapes of shamrocks.

They also made tissue paper rainbows to hang in our windows. I drew a basic outline of a rainbow on parchment paper.

Then they spread glue over the outline and added small pieces of torn tissue paper. Hope your week was sunny and warm. See you next week;)

A Tisket, A Tasket..A Toy Basket

Kaleb has taken a shining to an IKEA collapsible toy bucket that we own. I use it to hold the monstrous amount of stuffed animals that we own which seem to keep multiplying. Every day, he has to drag his bucket out of his room, down the hall to our living room. Then, he proceeds to dump out the toys onto the floor....

and get into the bucket.

J will then add as many toys as possible. Kaleb will sit there until I drag him out. He thinks it is fun, not sue why though.

I wonder what he will find next to entertain himself!