Letter Cc is for Cookie!!

   We are moving along with our SWEET unit, and after drooling over ice cream activities (and ice cream!), we have moved on to learn about the letter Cc.

   Last summer, we did an extensive Cupcake theme when we learned about letter Cc and had lots of fun with Laura Numeroff’s “If You Give a Cat a Cupcake.”

   Here are a few pics from that Cupcake Fun!

   So this time, we focused on a Cookie theme for our Letter Cc fun!

   To introduce a few items that begin with the Cc sound, she cut out a huge circle and looked at different pictures to determine which ones began with the “Cc” sound. She glued them onto a smaller brown circle and then made a large Chocolate chip cookie!

   And what better book to use than another of Laura Numeroff’s books: “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie”?

   We used my storytelling kit as we read the book and then used some printables that I came across from 123 Homeschool 4  Me, centered around the book. Best part: It's FREE!!

   I made each of the printables into more of a game, just to make it more fun and exciting.

   The packet has a few word tracing sheets and her and I took turns tracing the letters of each word and asking each other to name the letters. Can you tell which ones are her writing?

                         

  She also worked on her counting with a Cookie Jar Ten Frame game I created, which will be available soon in my TPT store.

                  

                     

   And then she had some spelling fun with these ABC Cookies for Learning Resources.  

                       

And I bet it was that much more fun because she was doing it in her new Tinkerbell tent that I snagged in the Clearance shelves at Walmart for a whooping $7! 

         

  Tomorrow I will be posting some Water Play fun as we join the Virtual Book Club Summer Camp once again! Stay tuned for tomorrow’s Water Play theme activity!

Cc is for Construction!

 YAY! I received great news today!! I got my test results! 

 RELAX!!! NOT those kinds of results!!!  

   I passed my 2^nd New York State Certification test! 

   Two down, one more to go and then I will officially be a certified teacher in TWO states! (Illinois and New York)

   Anyhow, it has been a short time since I have posted about what is going on in my classroom!! Well, my preschoolers have been "At Work and Under Construction"!

   After our Dr. Seuss unit, I was sensing that the kiddos needed a fun unit! Our curriculum called for a unit on City vs. Country. Last year when I tried a unit like this, it was a big flop. So I turned it up a notch and began the unit by first discussing the city and country and going through the differences between the two. And then I turned the focus to the different types of vehicles that can be seen in both areas.

   THAT’S how it started! And then it took a slight turn. And so I went with it.

   It took a big turn towards a mini Construction unit, once I threw some trucks and tractors into the sand table!
   Since I have a classroom of 14 boys, I knew this would be a hit!

   And it was...even though it was a fairly brief unit.

   I whipped up some Alphabet mats and made a Matching Uppercase to Lowercase game. Some children needed some extra help in matching, so I brought out our Letter cards for them to reference back to.

I also made some Alphabet matching puzzles.

Our art center activities were pretty fun and engaging too!

We created different types of trucks and vehicles using different shapes.

   And we threw some construction tools with our play-doh and they had a blast sawing and hammering their play-doh.

  After just 2 days of doing activities centered around trucks and construction, I wished I had time to do more with it! 

   On that note, I am still working out the details on My Blog Birthday Giveaway! I was hoping to go BIG with it but with my readership still being low (even after a whole year!!), I might hold off on a big giveaway until I hit the 100 Follower mark! Giveaway details will be posted by Friday!!

Cc is for Cupcakes !

Well the work week has begun again- after an awesome weekend with my little munchkin!

   She was fascinated with caterpillars a few weekends ago and then we spent last weekend just hanging out for Mother’s Day.  

This past weekend we were back to our learning fun!

 We picked up where we left off, with the letter Cc. We reviewed the letter and she practiced tracing the letter Cc (in her princess dress up clothes), using an Alphabet Flip Chart that I don’t utilize in my classroom.

   I wanted to move away from caterpillars---simply because I was getting a little tired of them, so I decided to focus on my little munchkin’s sweet spot= CUPCAKES!

 I knew we were going to be in for some FUN learning!  =)

   I really enjoy the books by Laura Numeroff and so we began our Cupcake Fun by reading the book, “If You Give A Cat A Cupcake”. I found some extension activities for the book that were appropriate for her to do at Totally Tots blog and I also used printables from Spell Out Loud.

She “fed” the cat different colored cupcakes. I gave her a random number and color and I encouraged her to count each cupcake aloud as she placed them in the can.                                                            (BTW, as you can probably see, the cat was made from a recycled can= I must warn that if you do this activity, please make sure to be careful with the inside of the can. My poor little munchkin got a pretty nasty cut as she tried to play with it after our Counting activity.)

  A lightbulb went off in my head as I saw how well she was sorting the cupcake pieces by color and I quickly made a magnetic graph.  I grabbed a cookie sheet, some green strips of paper and some magnetic strips. I threw some strips on a few cupcakes, made a simple graph and asked her to put the cupcakes where they belonged on the graph. 

  And then when she finished it (without any help from me), I asked her to count each column and did some teaching on the concept of More or Less.  

( I did good thinking on my toes at 8:00 in the morning- on a Saturday, huh??) 

   
   Then I changed the pace a little bit, cuz it was 9 in the morning and I had been up since 6:45…. I pulled out her baking stuff, her cupcake play set by Melissa & Doug, and some cupcake shaped eggs leftover from Easter. She had a blast, making, decorating and even counting cupcakes.

    And when she was done with her baking & decorating, we had a little Cupcake & Coffee party… she must have served me at least 7 cups of coffee within 20 minutes…she must have seen how tired momma was!

   

  On Sunday, I kept with the Letter Cc and Cupcake theme (cuz we both love it so much) and so I put out just a few activities for her to work on her fine motor skills.

 I borrowed an idea I found here at The mOffat Girls Blog to allow my little munchkin to practice her cutting skills. I placed some cupcake stickers on a strip of paper and drew black lines where I asked her to cut. The scissors I used are some I purchased awhile back and I am wondering if she is ready to move up to bigger scissors. Seeing as we haven’t been doing too much with scissors lately, she did a really good job!

    She practiced writing the Letter Cc from Spell Out Loud and well, as you can see, we need to do a little more practice on coloring! =)

    I found some cupcake stickers left over from Valentine’s Day and created  a simple graph. Working with the stickers allowed her to practice those fine motor skills by trying to peel the stickers off the sheet. She did pretty darn good on the whole graphing part. I gave her a huge Smiley Face on her paper when she was done-which she loves!

  And what’s a Cupcake theme without a fun, yummy art project?

I made some Puffy Paint, using some combination of shaving cream and glue… I can’t tell you the exact combo because she was so eager to do the activity, I had to do it all so quick! But if you ever make it, a few swirls of glue should do the trick. I also let her choose which color she wanted her cupcake to be… and BAD idea on my part to use food coloring!! 

What was I thinking? I sure don’t have a clue…especially since I had paint sitting in her art supply crate!

    Anyhow, she swirled the shaving cream and glue together and then I added the food coloring. She painted a cupcake top shape, while I cut out a cupcake liner shape from a cupcake sheet from my scrapbooking stash.

 After putting the two pieces together, she added the main ingredient- SPRINKLES!

     She wanted to make a small blue one right after her pink one, so we did it all over again.

Now, don’t those look delicious enough to take a bite out of?!

    We ran out of fun learning time because we had to get out of the house and enjoy the weather… BUT I have a few more Cupcake activities in mind that I know she will love!

(The ideas involve doing some baking, creating a new sensory bin and some Alphabet Puzzles created by me… Can we say Freebie ??)

    And here is my little Cupcake Princess. in her Cupcake nightgown!

   Thanks for taking a peek into my little munchkin’s world of Learning Fun!

 Stay tuned….. =)

Cc is for Caterpillar !

   This morning after breakfast, my little munchkin and I logged onto the computer to check out Online Story Time by Barnes & Noble.

   We have been discussing caterpillars since last week and we were both excited to listen to Eric Carle read the story The Very Hungry Caterpillar!

   And we listened to the story…4 times!

   In order to try to lure her away from the computer, I brought out her copy of the book and my storytelling props that I have had in my teacher stash for quite a few years.

  

  

   As I read the story, she used the book and props to retell the story…and then she wanted to go back online to hear the story again! She shocked me when she went and grabbed each prop as Eric Carle was reading the story! Smart girl! And she proceeded to put the story back in order as the story went on. I loved it! =)

   We also did some more work with the letter Cc- AFTER I enjoyed some Teacher Appreciation blog hopping fun!

   I found an awesome Letter Land Alphabet Pack from Live Love Laugh Kindergarten on sale today at Teachers Pay Teachers and I had to have it!

    My little munchkin worked on the Letter Cc Search activity I pulled out of the pack for her (I can't wait to use this pack in my classroom)

   Since we were on the letter Cc, I remembered a Letter craft I had seen somewhere in Pinterest, so I cut out some circles and drew the letter C on a big green construction paper and had her glue the circles onto the letter C to make a caterpillar.

He looks like a Very Grumpy caterpillar, doesn’t he? LOL

    Another activity I pulled out (Caterpillar Sizing Game) came from The Very Hungry Caterpillar packet from 1+1+1=1.

   We had quite a busy morning, filled with Caterpillar and Letter Cc fun!

   

Now back to my preschool munchkins tomorrow to embark on some Insect Fun!  Stay tuned…!