B4FIAR - Katy No Pocket

We have returned to the Before Five in a Row books with our newest selection - Katy No-Pocket. It is a cute story about a kangaroo without a pocket to hold her baby. We took this time to learn about Australia and kangaroos.

We learned about the country that kangaroos come from - Australia. He colored a simple map and I made it into a puzzle. The map came from Education (link below).

After reading about kangaroos, Kaleb worked on a large paper kangaroo. He painted each section with water colors.

Then, I wrote facts about the kangaroo onto the cute project.

This book has a ton of animals on each page. We loved finding them all. I found a simple printable of all of the animals in the book and we found each one while we read the story.

After finding the animals on each page, Kaleb decided he wanted to make an ABC book. So, we stapled some pages together and we discussed each animal and what letter it began with.

And this story just lends to the idea that one needs some pockets. So, I made Kaleb a new apron from material that I already had on hand. He promptly found some animals that he could tote around just like Katy. I love that smile:)

Links

Julie Lee - has a cute free kangaroo craft idea.

Around the World Learning - has a cute idea for kangaroo math game.

Little Learning Lane - has a free printable kangaroo booklet as well as en even/odd number sort for the book.

Homeschool Share - Katy No-Pocket lap book printable.

Education - has a free printable map of Australia.

A Place of Abundance - has an apron pattern to use.

Homeschool Creations - has a free Australia mini pack.

Mother Natured - has the free printable movement dice.

Skip to my Lou - has a tutorial for an apron.

Ducks in a Row - has a cute kangaroo pocket game to go along with the book, use for reading or math etc...

Simply Home Blog - has a cute pocket project if you don't feel like sewing.

B4FIAR - The Red Carpet

Recently, Kaleb and I rowed The Red Carpet by Rex Parkin. I just knew that he would love the story of the runaway red carpet that had police chasing it all over town!

Because of the police chase, we learned about our community helpers. Kaleb painted a police car for a simple art project,

We talked about stop lights and what each color represents. He made a mini book about stop lights.

He painted a police cap to add to his dress up bin.

He made his own map where the red carpet rolled through town. I put it in a protective sheet so he could erase and run the carpet through town again.

I found printable traffic signs and made a matching game. We talked about the signs as we played and then he noticed more of them as we traveled around our town.

He found some of the words from the story. Kaleb isn't reading yet but he can still find words in our story.

Kaleb sporting his police cap.

We made pretzels the easy way - from pizza dough. Besides being somewhat smoky in our house, they were pretty good. He decided he wanted cinnamon and sugar pretzels. (link below)

He made his own town and ran the red carpet through it. I gave him a roll of red streamers and he made the town. In the background, you can see the Batman dresser that my DH painted - Kaleb loves it. Have an awesome day.

Links

Homeschool Share - has a free printable pack for The Red Carpet.

Domestic Serenity - has a few ideas for the row of this book.

Delightful Learning - has a few more ideas for this book.

Homeschool Creations - has some free printables as well as some ideas.

Life a Little Brighter - has a super easy pretzel recipe using pizza dough.

Talice Harper - has a free fingerprint investigation sheet if you are working a unit on police officers.

Cooking Classy - has a recipe for cinnamon pretzels.

B4FIAR - We're Going on a Bear Hunt

Our next Before Five in a Row book was We're Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen. I recently gave Kaleb a choice of books and this was the book he decided to work with for the week. This is a cute book of a father who takes his children on a bear hunt....only to actually find one!

After we read the story, we talked about maps and we followed a map of the story. He added some of the elements of the story to this simple map. This printable came from Pink Striped Socks (link below).

We played Where's the Bear? game. I hid the bear behind a number and he had to guess what cave it was hidden behind. This was to practice teen numbers. He had to say the number before he could pick the cave. This game came from Homeschool Creations (link below).

He wrote his own page for the story. He decided he would hunt for a dog. He wrote the word "dog" and drew a picture.

We both played a game of cover the bear. We rolled dice and covered the number with a counting bear.

He made some puppets to go along with the story.

 

We made a 3-D map - play box for the story. We used some figures from Playmobil and a bear as well as some items found around the house. He played with this box all week.

Kaleb's favorite activity was making a map of the story. We used paper scraps for each of the elements and made a paper map of the story. He loved this.

Here is his finished map. I love the eyes in the cave. This idea came from Buggy and Buddy (link below).

This was an opening for him to create more maps with scraps of paper. He completed several different maps that we just had to hang up.

Not too shabby of a week. Now my walls are covered with maps - thanks Kaleb! Next, we are on to some Christmas book studies for the month of December and then back to finish B4FIAR.  See you soon.


Links

Homeschool Creations - has links to 25 different activities for this story plus free printable pack.

Momma Pappa Bubba - has the idea for the sensory tray.

Childhood 101 - has another idea for a sensory tray.

Buggy and Buddy - has the idea for the map with scrap paper.

Pink Stripes Socks - has the simple story map plus 2 more ideas for the story.

B4FIAR - Ask Mr. Bear

To increase Kaleb's interest in school, I recently asked him what he wanted to learn about. I wrote down everything he had to say and, if I can make it happen, I will. This week, as per his list, we learned about bears. Since he wanted to learn about bears, I paired our learning with a Before Five in a Row title that we hadn't had the time to row - Ask Mr. Bear by Marjorie Flack.

We started with B for bear craft, easy to do but he enjoys them.

His finished B for bear craft.

He made a beginning sounds pocket for the letter B. He sewed the sides with yarn and added b cards in the pocket. This was found from Making Learning Fun (link below).

Since we are reviewing the alphabet (until he is ready to read), he worked on a beginning sounds page for the letters A and B. He used the counting chips to cover each word that began with the correct sounds. These were found from The Measured Mom (link below).

Each letter I like to make a chart that we leave hanging all week in case we find more words that we want to add. Here Kaleb is working on our B chart. He really took an interest in this. He looked through the picture dictionary pages and added pictures to our B words.

As a part of the book, the boy Danny gives his mother a bear hug. We measured Kaleb's hug and added some string to his hands for his own bear hug.

He matched the gift ideas from each animal to the animal who suggested it. He even colored them. We added these cards to some pockets in the Bear book we made. These came from Homeschool Share (link below).

We just had his birthday so he learned to write his birthdate.

I had him choose a bear and he worked on a math page. He measured the bear, compared the bear to other animals. This was a free printable I found Julie Lee (link below).

Even though Kaleb is not ready to read right now, I still want him to work with letters. I printed out several word cards from the story and had him make the word using magnetic letters. Then, we discussed each letter sound and I showed him how to blend the words (just in case he changes his mind about the reading part:).

Here is our finished bear book. I added the items from the Homeschool Share books as well as our bear projects for the week. I copied the cover of the book to add to the front. Now he has a memory book for his bear learning. We are off learning about bats next. See you soon.


Links

Grade Onederful - has a few bear activities and ideas that may work for a bear study.

A Little Pinch of Perfect - has a hibernating bear craft idea that looks super cute and easy.

Growing Book by Book - has a free printable for the book The Bear Ate Your Sandwich.

A Special Place Called Kindergarten - has a free printable for comparing fictional and non-fictional books.

Glued to My Crafts - has a sleeping bear paper plate craft that is cute and easy.

Making Learning Fun - beginning sound lacing project came from here.

The Measured Mom - beginning sound worksheets free printable.

Homeschool Share - Ask Mr. Bear free printable lap book items.

Julie Lee - teddy bear exploration page freebie.


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B4FIAR - Blueberries for Sal

This post was actually supposed to happen a few month ago. I decided to finally post it. Using Before Five in a Row, we rowed Blueberries for Sal. It is a cute book about a mom and her daughter going blueberry picking where they meet another mom and daughter group blueberry picking as well.

I made a cute bear for Kaleb to feed blueberries to using the tongs for fine motor practice. He rolled some dice and had to feed the bear the number of blueberries he rolled.

He put the numbered blueberries in order from 1 through 20.

He found the b's in the blueberry bushes and stamped them blue.

He went alphabet blueberry picking around the house. I hid a blueberry for each letter which he found around the house. He then put the letters in order.

He measured his hand print against that of an actual bear. Do you see how big that paw is?

We discussed real and fake bears and sorted the facts between the two.

He made blueberry pictures using a cork. He stamped blueberries with blue paint and made a picture.

He counted out each number using glass marble blueberries. He used this ten frame worksheet to practice counting his numbers.

He compared numbers using the glass marbles and dice.

I found some magnets at a thrift store and I placed them on the magnet board. He placed the beginning sounds under each one. We definitely had fun rowing this book and I hope to continue rowing since our situation has changed. We still have a few Before Five in a Row books left before we can move on to Five in a Row. We may just get to them this year:) Sorry for the late post but I though you would enjoy seeing it. Have a great day.

Links

National Wildlife Foundation - has the recipe for bear paw cookies.

M is for Monster - blueberry pancake counting printable.

Artsy Momma - has the painting with blueberries idea.

Annie's Adventures - has a free unit on bears to download.

123 Homeschool 4 Me - has the blueberry math printable game.

Preschool Alphabet - has the great idea of an outside alphabet game, match the blueberries to the correct letters.

Growing Book by Book - has the free printable abc berry sort that would work well with this book.