Fairy tales Part II

Here is some photos of our "Princess and the Pea" art that I promised to post. Students chose what (and how many) mattresses (leftover scrapbook paper!) to use.  A pom pom was glued on for the pea..snoozing princess or princes were drawn at the top..and then students wrote the number of mattresses used. My assistant drew the cute sign!

Click the link below to view more fairy tale fun from our classroom:
http://prektweets.blogspot.com/2013/02/3-bears-new-toys-and-fairytales.html

What would YOU do with Jack's beans?  We read a few different versions of "Jack and the Beanstalk." Students ounted jellybeans..sorted jellybeans...planted bean seeds..and students drew on paper leaves what they would buy with Jack's beans...we now have  a gigantic towering "beanstalk" in our science center!

During our feelings unit, within our Fairy tale theme, we read and acted out the nursery rhyme, "Humpty Dumpty."  Students had to state kind words or describe actions that could make a friend feel better. I wrote down students' thoughts on our  Humpty throughout the week and the students mended back the pieces with band-aids...who knew band-aids could be such a hit!? The original idea for this project came from: http://www.pre-kpages.com/humpty/

We read a few different versions of Princess and the Frog...one of our projects was this Pucker Up! graph... There were many giggles during this math activity! The original idea for this graph came from: http://perciousperks.blogspot.com/2011/10/if-i-had-fairy-godmother.html

Jack in the City!

I left the Jack and the Beanstalk vocab. up for one more week in our science center. We grew bean sprouts and read the story a few weeks ago as part of our fairy tales unit.  Since we are now learning about construction and building I decided to read another version of this story...In this version, "Jack and the Baked Beanstalk," Jack and his mother run a cafe in the middle of the city! This story allows us to tie in community, jobs (chef, cook), construction (tall buildings, cranes) ...and allows students to compare earlier read versions of Jack and the Beanstalk...love it!

Jack vocab from:
http://www.pre-kpages.com/jack/

Wait! No Paint!

As part of our construction/community theme we have been reading different versions of the three little pigs. During our unit the pig characters are viewed as "builders/construction workers."  Our objective last week for literacy group time was to identify the beginning, middle, and end of a story.  Students have learned the roles of author and illustrator previously. In this story, "Wait! No Paint!" the illustrator interrupts the story and the pigs protest at the end for paint. The story is left untold with no complete ending!  I expressed to my students how they could take on the role of the author and the illustrator and finish the story. Students took turns verbally sharing ideas of how they would end the story. Then students drew the ending of their story with their choice of details, colors, and pre-k inventive spelling.   I wish I had taken photos of their amazing work!

Students also created 3 pig houses out of our recycled milk cartons! This milk carton idea came from:
http://rainbowswithinreach.blogspot.com/2012/07/three-little-pig-projects.html

Recent Art Projects

During our nursery rhyme and fairy tales unit we read "Hey Diddle Diddle."  We used the felt board to sing and retell the rhyme and then students created their own dish and spoon! 
(My assistant made the cute little sign :)
We also read "Little Miss Muffet." The kids had a blast as they giggled, sitting on their "tuffets" (pillows), eating pretend curds and whey, and running away from my huge spider! (After Halloween sales have great stuff for insect units...and esp. costumes for fairy tales and acting out stories!)

Students created self portraits at the end of our feelings unit. I drew the body outline and they created the rest! I love how the portraits are all different and unique! We have been talking a lot about adding details to our journal entries and it shows through in their portraits.  

I was out sick last week and came back to find all these googly eyed cute little creatures! My assistant read "Glad Monster, Sad Monster" then the students drew their own feelings monsters. I wish I could post all of the drawings because they are all so adorable!

3 Bears, New Toys!, and Fairy tales

For our winter unit in January the theme was The Mitten which transitioned to The Three Bears..and then this week we are starting our Fairy Tales and Nursery Rhymes unit.  The Mitten was super fun (see prev. post) and tied it quite nicely to The Three Bears..where we focused on size ordering..small, medium, large, big, bigger, biggest, small, smaller, smallest, etc. This is a photo of a corner of our reading area. It has the 3 bears felt board with sm. med. large labels, puppets, The Mitten masks, and vocab from here http://www.pre-kpages.com/goldilocks-mini-word-wall/

Pretend Center: "Three Bears Cottage" ...small, med. large, cookies, bowls, spoons, stuffed animals, can of oats, winter dress up clothes, and The Three Bears storybook. To go along with The Three Bears story we taste tested "porridge" made in my crock pot and watched The Three Bears movie on Friday. Here's the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYP8p-10TGA

The Mitten and The Three Bears led us into winter weather, bears, and hibernations.  This is a photo of our science table  where we have winter vocabulary, weather books, hibernation stories, and a new weather puzzle!

After we did our mitten temperature experiment I left the therm. and mitten in science center as an activity.

Thank you to my wonderful asst. who drank all the water bottles and made our new color sensory bottles! She put in things like pom poms, colored pencils, erasers, beads, tissue paper, etc.  This is a photo from our science center that holds discovery and nature baskets, science tools, and two new games from Lakeshore.

This is a seasons Lakeshore game.  Underneath the winter mat is the spring mat. Students are learning the order and characteristics of the seasons during calendar and weather circle time. I love this game and they have been very occupied by it. It comes with little items that they match and sort to the pictures. I thought I would add in the spring mat and then when it's spring, I'll take out the winter mat and put in the summer mat. 

This new game is also in science, we have been talking about animals that live in snow and then forest animals. The game comes will all the animals needed for different habitats. The mat underneath is forest animals.  

Have I mentioned how awesome my storage shelves are?! The brown totes hold pretend center thing..the totes are from Target.  The teal baskets and other plastic tubs are from the dollar store.  The zebra bins are from Hobby Lobby. I  received my order for new manipulatives and supplies this week.. In the center book shelves we have new Lakeshore counting boxes and 4 tubs of manipulatives!

These are awesome!!!! I have two of these boards that just arrived...one for writing letters in ABC center and one for writing numbers in Math center... they are very popular right now with the students.  The heat from your fingers/hand activates the board and creates a rainbow effect.

New counting boxes/games and manipulatives for morning tubs and math center. 

Current ABC center:  book basket (baskets on sale now at Hobby Lobby! lime green, pink, teal), abc puzzles, letter punches and twist up crayons, wiki sticks and letter cards, ABC lower case and upper case foam letter match

Here is an example of two of the counting boxes I ordered. I set up Friday afternoon for our Fairy Tale unit.  I have the frog game in math center for Princess and the Frog... and the treasure chest/coins I will put in the math center for the following week.  Excited about Fairy Tale and Nursery Rhyme unit...so many options of stories and activities! 

Check out my pocket chart in books center!  Is it strange to be excited about pocket charts? I ordered five and they just came in. I've been using removable stick on hooks to hang them in centers. Actually, the vocab pocket chart in reading is held onto the door with clip magnets.  The frogs and crocodile are for blocks center..the prince frog is at Target currently in the toy section for around $4.

Here are some other little fairy tale friends to join blocks center! 

Getting ready for Valentine's day with some vday vocab!

Little Red Hen

I just found the photos from our Little Red Hen on one of my many camera cards... We did this unit after Fall/Pumpkins/Apples.. leading up to Thanksgiving..and right before our Gingerbread Man unit.  Our student "I Can" statements were about answering questions/asking questions about the story, counting sets, and identifying shapes. 

We had many cooking/baking projects including mixing homemade bread! The kids measured and mixed and I took the bread home and baked it.  I found a really easy recipe from Steamy Kitchen http://steamykitchen.com/168-no-knead-bread-revisited.html  The post says "so easy a 4 year old can do it!"and  it was THAT easy! It is no fail, really tasty bread that I have made several times now for family since our unit. 

For counting sets, students counted baked snacks like crackers and even mini chocolate cookies (cookie crisp cereal!).  We read many different versions of the little red hen, including "Little Red Hen Makes a Pizza." Students created paper plate pizzas with paper shapes..they turned out really cute..have to find the photo I took..it's somewhere on one of those camera cards : )

Sign for our pretend bakery that I made last year.  I used images of real life bakers, breads, and pastries. I found these great stickers at Michaels. 

My mother in law made this really cool pie.. she has been making all kinds of "amigurumi" foods and characters for our classroom! 

Small, medium and large amigurumi cookies, fortune cookies, felt cinn. rolls, and cookies... varied textures and sizes!

I picked up some baking tins and trays from the dollar store for our pretend bakery : )

Here are some of our read aloud stories.. I highly recommend "Cook-a-Doodle-Doo!"  For next year I plan to have the class make mini strawberry shortcakes.. wouldn't that be fun?! I put some of our stories in our pretend center along with some cookbooks/recipe cards I took from my kitchen.

We read "The Best Mouse Cookie" before we counted sets with cookie crisp cereal...it's so much fun to incorporate literacy with other subjects!

For the sensory tub, students sifted, poured, measured, and drew letters in flour.

We opened up our play dough center for molding and baking cupcakes and cookies.  I also added in some fall cookie cutters. I found the plastic table cloth for cheap at Big Lots. They had a ton of cute table cloths, including yellow and teal with white polka dots! (Which I also just had to pick up) : )

Cherry pie was the theme for our math center.. After the read aloud I kept the book in the center..students played hi ho cherrio (which I found at a garage sale for a buck over the summer!). I had some mini pie tins and created a little play dough counting game. 

And TADAAAA!!! my new blocks center curtains!  The fabric is from Hobby Lobby. LOVE!