Oceans

This was a short theme, but I think one of the kids' favorites so far! We had 1 day spent on our field trip to Seaquest (thanks to a great preschool mom for getting us passes!), and then another short week because of Thanksgiving. Here's the fun things we did:

Dramatic Play

An ocean! And beach!




It changed a bit each day. The first day, we had the blue blanket for the ocean with lots of big and small ocean animal toys. There were beach towels, floaties and goggles for kids on the beach. The highlight is the sensory table with kinetic sand and seashells.


The next day, I added a few more dress-ups.


The last day, my son had requested pirates, since pirates sail on the ocean, so I added pirate costumes and a treasure chest. They had a lot of fun with it! Also, the small ocean animals were now in the water on the art table, but we happened to find another awesome bag of ocean animals at the store this weekend, that had a few animals we didn't have yet. So, more ocean animal fun!






I think my favorite part of their play at this center this week was wanting to learn all about the animals they were playing with. They wanted to know their names, what they ate, etc. So we spent a lot of time checking out the reading center to find books about their favorite ocean animals, so they could learn more about them.

Blocks

The sensory table was in the block area, but we had all these fun ocean-themed puzzles and games too! They're really starting to like puzzles and get them out often.

Art

I forgot a picture, but I have seashell rubbing plates they used the first day, before we left on the field trip.

Ocean animal sponge painting


Tub of water with toy fish


Small manipulatives

Folder game and book


Ocean animal lacing cards

Flat marble animal pictures from totschooling


Magnet board



Writing table

Ocean stickers


Ocean stamps
I made these with foam stickers and milk lids and they've held up great for 6 years now!


Snack

We had Jello from ocean animal molds, with some blue "ocean" Jello

Of course, Goldfish crackers!

Large Group

Our song was 5 Little Crabs from Dr. Jean. We focused on the counting and numeral recognition.

Our word was ocean and we talked about the difference between oceans and lakes on our big world map.

Day 1 was our field trip to Seaquest aquarium.

Day 2 we chose ocean animals from dramatic play and sorted them by their beginning sound. This is new to them, so I was really focusing on them isolating that first sound and hearing what their animal started with. Then I'd tell them which letter card it went by that makes that sound.


Day 3 we read Rainbow Fish and made our own Rainbow Fish by gluing sequins on a fish picture.

Small Group

Week 1, my group played an ocean treasures counting game. The other group played ocean dominoes.

Week 2, my group worked on counting and putting our ocean 1-10 puzzles together, while the other group drew their favorite ocean animal in their journals.

Farm Animals

Fall is the perfect time for farms, as we had just learned about fall being harvest time. Here's what we did these past 2 weeks:

Dramatic Play

A farm of course! There's a small garden and a variety of farm animals (stuffed, puppets, and hats), plus a few costumes, so the kids have many different opportunities for playing farmer or animal. They had a lot of fun and were surprised to find non-typical animals like mice and an owl.
Thank you, Target, for all the cute felt veggies and costumes from the after-Halloween sales! I'd been waiting a whole year to get out this tractor costume, and it was a huge hit!
 



 

 



Blocks

Barns, animals, tractors






And a variety of puzzles (which they are really liking and getting into this week)


Art

Feather painting


Finger painting

We used the art table to make butter to have for snack, then played play dough

Glue and collage materials


Small Manipulatives

Farm counting puzzle
(I loved that once it was finished, I did the search and counting with the group who did it, then many others came over to search for and count the animals too)




Farm animal magnets

Farm animal dry erase cards from Totschooling 


P is for Pig dot page and flat marbles, lacing cards


Farm words and pictures for silly sentences on the magnet board. They could match the words to pictures since the pieces fit, but they'd have me read the words so they could make silly sentences. I also watched some move the words around and just make up what they said, which is great because they're making a connection of spoken word to written word.




Writing

Farm stickers (requested out more than 1 day)

Farm stencil

twistable crayons

Sensory Table

Cornmeal and farm animals. They ended up adding cups from the playhouse for scooping fun.


Large Group

Our word was domestic and each day we talked about the difference between domestic and wild animals. We learned the song Down on Grandpa's Farm.

Day 1, we read At the Farm and matched puzzles of what products come from farms (ex. milk from cow, wool sweater from sheep, honey from bees, etc.) We also sang Old McDonald had a farm.

Day 2, we read Barnyard Hullabaloo and played animal sound bingo. I had the bingo cards out the next week and they played over and over the next 2 days! I was surprised at how much they enjoyed the game!


Day 3, we read From Egg to Chicken and learned the names of baby animals on the farm. We played a game where the kids had a picture of the baby animal, and they had to find its matching parent picture that I'd hid in the room.

Day 4, we read Cock-a-doodle-Hooooo. We had a big pile of toy animals and sorted them by wild and domestic.

Small Group

Week 1, my group played a harvest counting game from Kelly's Kindergarten. We worked on counting and matching the numeral.
The other group colored a barn animal page.


Week 2, my group counted and graphed farm animals on a page by Totschooling. We used dry erase markers and they marked off each animal they counted to help keep track. Then more counting as they graphed. Then they worked together on 1-10 farm puzzles.
The other group drew their favorite farm animals in their journals. I wrote their words as the other group did their puzzles.

Shapes

Dramatic Play

Pizza Restaurant







I have play doh to make the pizza crust, or also felt pizzas. I have shredded paper cheese, plus topping shapes cut out of foamies. They can make the pizza, work the register, or be a customer. They were awesome! Such great play went on here all 2 weeks! They loved the order forms and making and delivering pizzas, plus scanning the credit cards. They were even great at cleaning up, and sorting the toppings to where they go. I was so impressed.

Blocks

Bowling, see above pic

Magnatiles for 2 days


Shape puzzles




Art

Shape stickers

Shapes and glue


Shape stamping with paint


Play doh with shape cookie cutters and blocks to stamp shapes. We also mixed the colors of the play doh, which was a great review of last week.

Small Manipulatives

Gears


Shape lacing cards


Shape puzzles




Shape dry erase boards


Shape magnets


Writing

Big shape stencils


Shape stamps

Texture markers

Small shape stencils


Snack

Each day we ate a different shape, depending on which shape we'd be learning at large group.

Circle muffins with circle chocolate chips (thanks to one of our friends!)
Square cheese crackers
Rectangle graham crackers
Triangle pita crackers

Outside

The sensory table had red beans and scoops and bowls


Large Group

We learned new songs; Jake the Snake, Shape-a-Loo, and I Spy a Shape

Our word changed each day, depending on which shape we learned; circle, square, rectangle, triangle

Day 1, we read Shapes, added circles to our wall, found circles around the room, and matched shapes to our shape train on the wall.


Day 2, we read What is Square? and found squares around the room, and added squares to our wall. We sorted buttons by shape.


Day 3, we read Bear in a Square, added rectangles to the wall, and found rectangles around the room. We used pointers and played I Spy a Shape by searching for and tracing shapes around the room.

Day 4, We read Wing on a Flea, found triangles around the room and added triangles to the wall. Then we played shape and color bingo.

Small Group

Week 1, My group made shapes out of wikki stix.
The other group used tweezers to place pom poms on these shape mats.


Week 2, My group played shape dominoes.

The other group practiced sorting buttons by color and then shapes.