Preschool

Ladybug Theme

We continued our ladybug theme this week. We had started last week with a ladybug craft, which you can see more of HERE.

This week we talked a lot about ladybugs and I made some more pages for the science binder. I will share the pdf file here soon.

I also made a ladybug sensory box for the kids. I added our ladybug stones, aphids (from our ladybug game), petals (from Ikea, several years ago), and some foam shapes. The kids loved it. They are always big fans of sensory boxes :)

Fine Motor Activities...
We have been focusing a lot on fine motor activies lately. I made an additional sensory box for them, with many small beads. Smiley did lots and lots of pouring...

We strung cheerios on pipe cleaners (and then ate them)...

We put little magnets on cookie cutters...

We cut play dough...

We used scissors to cut the playdough. Cutting is still a bit difficult for Smiley, so we're working on building his grip strength :)

We drove our cars through the play dough...

Other Learning Activities...

We did quite a bit of arts and crafts this week. Here we made an underwater scene with lots of gluing...

We worked on puzzles...

Smiley is newly in love with his workbench. He's been working a lot with it lately....

Building towers...

Practical Life...
Smiley helped me make granola...

He cut strawberries and bananas for his breakfast...

He helped clean (we use vinegar mixed with water to clean)...

Outside FUN...
We typically spend at least an hour outside in the morning and another 1-2 hours in the afternoon. I thought I would share some pictures this week ;)

Smiley loves to ride his strider bike. He's doing such a great job with it. He is very fast and does a great job balancing...

Preschool ~ Sight words

~Smiley is currently 41 months old~

READING...

A lot of our week was focused on reading. We love the Ready2Read Program, which combines phonics families and sight word drills, as well as Carisa's You Can Read Program. We have been using both programs in addition to using ABC Reading Eggs and Hooked On Phonics. 

This week we focused on the following sight words: a, I, the, and, see.

Smiley used his car to help him read his sight words...

He colored them and then cut them out... (great fine motor practice for him!)

I love the cute sight word caterpillar. We colored the circles, laminated them and hung them in Smiley's room :)

We then worked on our phonics family by using this fun pasting activity. He really enjoyed this.

We then used Carisa's You Can Read Program to further work on these first sight words...

He used his car to drive from word to word...

(he did eventually use a pencil as well, but I didn't snatch a picture)

He loved this dot paint activity. We did "a" and "the" first. He then felt the need to completely cover the words in dot paint and it got a little crazy ;) but he really enjoyed it...

Ladybug THEME

We continue to learn about insects. We introduced ladybugs this week, and what better way then to start with a little craft. We had some flat stones and I thought it would be fun to make some ladybug stones :)

We covered them in red tempera paint...

and then added heads and dots with a black sharpie.

PLAY...

Megablocks were a big hit this week. Smiley built a castle for his cars ;)

Ladybug Craft

We are still learning all about insects. We finished our study on bees and are now learning all about Ladybugs. I though I would kick off our study by making ladybug stones. The kids had a blast!

We used relatively flat stones and colored them red with tempera paint. You could also use waterproof paint, particularly if you plan on putting them outside!

Even my 20 month old was able to color her stone independently :)

We let the stones dry while the kids napped...

We then used a sharpie to make a head, a black line down the middle and dots... Our little lovebug loved this and wouldn't want to give the sharpie back. I let her make two ladybugs, and big brother made one. This is still difficult for them, so I finished up the rest of our ladybugs ;)

We made this craft this past weekend and the kids have been carrying their ladybugs around with them. What a great hit! You could probably spray the finished stones, so they last longer! We may end up doing that (if I make it to the store again soon).

By the way, the picture below is not very good. It was very dark when I took it and it doesn't do our ladybugs justice. Just know that they are much cuter in real life ;)