Play Ball and Ocean Animals

In preschool this morning we introduced the letter P with a "Play Ball!" theme.  We had tons of fun playing with different types of sports balls and talking about our favorite sport to play.  We used the foot print words under contact paper to play our reading ball game.  Everyone got a ball at the beginning, read the letter or word of each step they would step on and then shot a basket at the end.  They seemed to love it.  We talked about P the Pelican popping popcorn from the Amazing Action Alphabet and glued popcorn onto the activity page. 

 Each child got a couple baseball reading wheels today.  Check their binder for them.  We spin the wheel and say the letter name/sound or read the word.  The sight word "ball" was a new sight word today that needs to be memorized.  We continued our "Guess My Secret Rule" game in math.  Some of the kids were able to make their own sets without prompting and were allowed to go play the game as a group.  The rest of the group made sets with me following a step by step instruction.  "Take 3 blocks that are the same." (Interestingly difficult for them).  "Take 1 block that is different from the 3 you already had." (Relatively easy).  "Which block is different in your set?" (Difficult). "Why" (even more difficult).  PLEASE play this game at home to help us move forward in class!

This afternoon we had some fantastic reading lessons.  We practiced our nonsense words and sounds to warm up and then dove into some hard core reading.  We worked on the strategies readers should use when they get to a word they don't know.  There are 8 strategies in my February Dr. Seuss Preschool pack that we covered.  We'll continue referencing them as we're reading more difficult text.  We also talked about giving a 5 finger retell (1. Characters 2. Setting 3. Beginning 4. Middle 5. End). 

 We talked about ocean animals with the letter J this afternoon.  We read lots of books about ocean animals and found a great page in the encyclopedia that talks about the ocean.

 We continued our patterning in math by making patterns with giant beads.  We practiced making the patterns that were shown on the pattern cards today.  At the end of the day we enjoyed drawing with chalk in our notebooks.  The kids often talk about how their parents are going to be so proud of their art when they get the journal at the end of the school year.  It's so cute!

Play Ball!

We had a great day in school today. Our class was a little small due to illness but that just means that we got more one-on-one time than usual.  Our theme was "Play Ball" with the introduction of the letter P and sight word "ball". We read a number of books right away this morning all about baseball. One of my favorites is the Berenstain Bears Play T-Ball.  It describes how to play the game in a very simple story.  After reading all our books we got out the T-ball equipment and got to work playing!

 We had popcorn for snack to go along with the letter P.  After snack time we glued the extra popcorn into P shapes.  We did more baseball reading and enjoyed playing our math game with attribute blocks.  We're still playing "Guess My Secret Rule" where we have a set of 4 objects, 3 have the same attribute and 1 is different.  Kids are working on creating their own sets to try and trick Miss Amanda.  We had a lot of fun playing today!

November Preschool Packs

Find the Year Long Theme Calendar here and follow along with us!

The preschool curriculum that is all inclusive and provides hours of fun and engaging learning!  The "November Preschool Packs" contain 6 theme based lesson plans, a total of 179 pages of lesson plans and activity printables.  My preschooler has begged to do his "homework" because it's a wonderful time that we spend together learning age appropriate concepts!  These plans are intended to be taught in a 10 month sequence from Aug-May, though may be adapted to use individually. 

November
{Download all 6 November Preschool Packs}
21. Insects {Download}
The insects preschool pack contains 43 pages of lesson plans and activities for preschoolers all about insects.  We introduce the letter "I" and the sight word "my".  We spend November talking about comparing attributes of objects and rhythm in music.  We talk about ant pheromone trails and how that relates to following a path and standing in a line. There are mini books about insects and insect safety.  We match beginning sounds to pictures, follow instructions in art, find shapes in pictures, and talk about attributes of objects.

22. Indians and Pilgrims {Download}
NOTE: This pack is meant as an introduction to Native Americans and Pilgrims. I have intentionally used the word Indian to introduce the letter I. Indian, however, is not an accurate description of Native Americans. For more information please see this link. There are also many different tribes of Native Americans that have very different traditions. Though the Pilgrims were in contact with the Wampanoag, this pack introduces ideas from many different tribes.

The Indians and Pilgrims pack has 17 pages that will teach all about the group of pilgrims that settled on the east coast of America and celebrated the first Thanksgiving.  Activities include listening skills that will lead into phonics instruction and math skills that build upon each other week after week.  There is a long path phonics game, sorting the words into a sentence, science activities about corn, a letter I headband, matching words to pictures (from the initial sound), and an introduction of a Venn Diagram. 

23. Scarecrows {Download}
Scarecrows is a super fun day with oodles of scarecrow activities!  You can play "Old Scarecrow" just like "Old Maid" but fall themed, and even make your very own dancing scarecrow.  There is an alphabet dot-to-dot with the introduction of letter L.  There are scarecrow puzzles and mazes.  There is a scarecrow mini book as well as the anatomy of a scarecrow and looking at scarecrow characteristics.

24. Thanksgiving {Download}
The Thanksgiving Pack is jam packed with activities.  With 36 pages of lesson plans and activities there are plenty of review games and new games!  There is a large motor hopping and counting turkey game, a word game with animals to talk about how words can be long or short and are defined by a set meaning.  There are also 5 piece puzzles, a short path game and a grid game.  There are 8 different 3D shapes as well.  Kids need a lot of experience playing with 3D shapes.  You can cut out and glue together all 8 shapes in this pack.  I like to laminate mine and Velcro them so they can be put together and laid flat over and over again.  Did you know that being able to recognize what a flat outline will turn into in a 3D shape is a skill that is tested through the school years?

25. Play Ball {Download}
The Play Ball pack has 28 pages of lesson plans and activities all about baseball.  We introduce the letter P and the sight word "ball".  There are baseball letter and word wheels to play with, football picture and numeral matching, a ball game for practicing letters and the sight word 'ball'.  We also learn about words having meaning in context and out of context.  We take the sentence "Take me out to the ball game" and play with the word order to find out what makes sense.  There is an activity where preschoolers manipulate the baseball players around the field as they answer questions such as what color, quantity, shape, or word is on the card.  There is also a tracing page full of words that the preschoolers should already be reading, a long path bouncing ball game, a one to one correspondence game, matching upper and lower case letters, and a word wheel to practice their reading.

26. Animals in Winter {Download}

Animals in Winter has 30 pages of preschool lesson plans and activities all about what animals do in winter.  This is a fun pack that talks about the changing season and how that affects different animals.  We talk about adaptation, migration and hibernation.  We sort summer and winter clothing and play a short path game to help the squirrel get his acorn! We also match pictures to beginning sounds and words, follow mazes to get the animals that migrate to their new destination, play a winter snowball reading game and read a book "Goodnight Summer" written by my best friend based on the children's book Goodnight Moon.

We have so much fun playing with the November packs and learning oodles along the preschool path.  I hope you enjoy them as much as we do!