Tot School - Planting Seeds

We had such a fantastic day in tot school yesterday.  We read some books and played with the playhouse inside as we got settled.  Then we went outside.  Our theme was "Planting Seeds" We played with a wildflower mix of seeds, potting soil, and watering cans in the sensory bin. 

 Snack included Oreo's (simply because they look like dirt) and bananas. 

 At the end of the day we planted flowers in our flower pots.  This is the toddler connection of seeds turn into flowers - just sped up for our class time together.  I love how they each planted their flowers completely true to their own personalities.  Also, I'm impressed with myself for being able to plant flowers with 5 small kids and get pictures of most of them as we did it :).  It was a great day!  I love that the weather is more consistently warm and I look forward to being outside more often.

Planting Seeds, Constructing Numbers and Enjoying Spring

I LOVE when the Planting Seeds theme falls on a warm spring day.  It makes it so much nicer for me to clean up.  We spent the morning cutting out pictures from seed catalogs and gluing them in our notebooks.  We also used liquid glue to make seed pictures and we practiced our letters on the big outdoor chalkboards.

 We got VERY muddy when we got to work planting our very own pea plants.  We had to squish the soil with the water and then fill our little pots with it.  Then we planted our peas and enjoyed playing in the yard.

 This afternoon we spent a chunk of time learning about our "Constructing Numbers" game.  It's a download from differentiatedkindergarten.blogspot.com and I LOVE using it with my 4 year old class.  There are cards with the numerals on it and hidden pictures of the blocks.  The kids make their representation of the numerals in the tens and ones boxes and then can self check to see if they made it correctly by lifting the flap.

 We then were able to go outside and do our group reading lesson of "Biscuit in the Garden".  We love reading Biscuit books and I'm so proud of these kids for being able to read the majority of the book by themselves.  We had a little time at the end and the kids created "Rainbow Power" where they got power by putting chalk on their skin.  I had stepped inside to put books in folders and came back to colorful children.  What fun!

Planting Seeds

We had so much fun in school today talking about planting seeds.  We made letter Y watches, played in a black bean plants sensory bin and read lots of books about planting seeds, gardening and bugs.  We had some fun art today: gluing seeds on paper and apple stamping.  We also planted pea seeds to take home and grow.  We had so much fun!

April Tot Packs

I create all of my lesson plans to share digitally with other homeschooling families and small classrooms.  If your child attends Little Adventures Preschool you can easily supplement their learning at home by downloading the lesson plans.  It will also give you a good idea about what we covered.  I always plan more than we will ever actually get to so there is often a great idea within the plans that you can share with your child to extend their learning.  You can find all of my toddler and preschool lesson plans here:http://www.teachersnotebook.com/shop/LittleAdventuresPreschool
Find the year long theme calendar {here} and follow along with us! This post gives details and pictures of all February Toddler Packs. Be sure to scroll down to see all of them. 

Tot Packs 33-37 Tot packs are about 20 pages in length. They each have 2 pages of activity ideas, book suggestions, and links to the materials I use. You can certainly use all or part of the lesson plans.  The printable pages include songs, matching games, drawing games and other activities. Tot packs are designed to be a first introduction to math concepts, letters, shapes and colors. They are not meant to obtain mastery in any subject. Let them be a guide for educational play between you and your child.


April

{Download all 5 April Tot Packs}

33. Planting Seeds {Download}
  --I failed to take pictures of this pack before I sent it home as homework on Thursday.  I'll try and grab pictures when it comes back to me. --

Printables in this pack:

Letter Y

Numeral 1

What is one?

Drawing 1 favorite toy

Number Clip Cards

Sequencing a Growing Seed

Color Matching Seed Packets

Planting Seeds Puzzles

The Carrot Seed

Planting Seeds Song

34. Fruits and Vegetables {Download}

Printables in this pack:

Letter V

Numeral 2

What is two?

 Drawing 2 Shoes

Number Clip Cards

Fruit and Vegetable Counting

 Vocabulary Matching Memory

Lacing Cards

Fruit and Vegetables Chant

35. Rain {Download}

Printables in this pack:

Letter Review - Rainbow Writing

Numeral 3

What is two?

Drawing 2 Shoes

Number Clip Cards

Rain Tracing

Color Matching

Worm weaving

Rain Songs

Non-Standard Measurement with Measuring Worms

36. Plants {Download}

Printables in this pack:

 Letter X

Numeral 4

The parts of a plant that we eat

Sorting plants and animals

Shadow Matching Garden Tools

Plant Needs

Parts of a Sunflower

37. Zoo Animals {Download}

Printables in this pack:

 Letter Z

Zoo Animal Bingo

Tops and Bottoms Matching

Tell Me About the Zoo, A Non-Fiction Reader

 Numeral 5

Size Sequencing Zoo Animals

Planting Seeds - Tot School Thursday

Tot school was so fun today!  We finally got to go outside for the whole day.  Yay for springtime!

 We played with the peg boards and got a chance to get reacquainted with the backyard activities.

 I just love how relaxing and how fun it was to enjoy the sunshine.  We were talking about planting seeds and had a lot of fun eating apples and exploring the seeds from the apples.

 Our sensory bin for the day was black beans (dirt) with play vegetables (to plant), gloves and shovels.

 I'm in love with this picture.  She was so proud of herself for getting her glove on.

 For art we explored liquid glue and beans/seeds.  It was the first time that toddlers have been given a bottle of glue to explore on their own.  Most of the time I put glue on things and have them move it around with a paintbrush.  We've moved on to learning how to actually squeeze it out of the bottle.

 We also planted peas today.  Just keep your tray of soil warm and moist and when the peas pop up in about a week plant them in the ground (or a pot). Putting them next to a piece of chain link fence (or something similar) will let them climb up the fence.

 Playing with the planting seeds tot pack.  Our focus was on the numeral 1 in math.  Be sure to point out numerals 1-5 in your daily activities this month.

Wednesday Preschool - Planting Seeds

Spring is in the air and we're planting seeds at Little Adventures Preschool! First, we started with ice cube trays and children's tweezers.  The goal was to sort all the beans into the tray according to type (color).

 We had a review of #1 and introduced #2.  These number packets will be coming home with kids next week.  Please use a wet erase marker or a dry erase crayon to complete the pages. This is the new homework and should be done a minimum of a few times a week, every day if possible.

 We did seed art today.  Each child got their own bottle of glue and was instructed to make a flower out of the seeds. They turned out very cute.

 We also planted our own seeds.  We started by poking holes in the bottom of egg cartons (so the water could drain).

 Then we filled up the holes with dirt.

 And added seeds. We planted 8 peas, 1 sunflower and 1 pumpkin.  Keep them warm and moist at home and plant them outside when they pop up.

 We're practicing writing the number 2 in the air.

 We've been learning Old MacDonald on the piano.  It's so fun to watch them pick up the patterns.

 Afternoon preschool started with sorting beans as well (who can pass on an awesome activity that is already out and ready to play with?).

We also practiced reading our level C DRA reading books.

 Since we've been working on fluency, we started recording our reading and listening to the recording.  They get a kick out of this, and if you have the availability to record at home please do.

 Our math challenge increased today.  I had the kids put the numbers in the calendar chart and they discovered that the calendar doesn't follow the same patterns as the 100 chart.

 Art today was a chalk exploration outside.  Yay for being able to be outside more often.