Pumpkins - Day 2

Phonics/Writing

Preparation:

Using letters from a Scrabble game, write the words "pumpkin," "stem," and "orange" on a piece of paper.  Trace around the letters.  Then write the words "pumpkin," "stem," and "orange" in the boxes.  I added lines next to the words for writing practice.

Materials

Paper

Scrabble letters

Pencil

Teaching:

Letter Learner (Learning letters and letter sounds):

1.       Every preschool session play one of the letter learning games from this site. 
2.       As child places letters on the paper sound out the phoneme (sound) of that letter. 

 Emergent Reader (Knows letters and letter sounds):

1.       Have child find and sound out each letter as they place it on the paper.

2.       Have child guess word, and if they are unable to figure out word, sound it out together slowly until they can figure out what the word says.

The child's paper should look like this:

3. Have the child, using correct penmanship, write the words.

Reading

Preparation:

Make a poster with poem “Pumpkin”

"Pumpkin, Pumpkin,

Round and fat

Turn into a jack-o-lantern

Just like that.

Boo!

Materials:

Poem

Orange crayon

Yellow crayon

Teaching:

Letter Learner:

1.        Read the poem together 2-3 times.  At the end of the poem make your best "jack-o-lantern face."

2.       Have your child find and color all the ‘P’s” orange.

3.       Say the word pumpkin together.  Listen to the two /p/ sounds.

4.       Read it through again.  Point to each word as you say it.

5.       Help child point to words with you. (This helps them recognize sounds and words).

Emergent Reader:

1.       Read poem together 2-3 times.

2.       Have child color the word “pumpkin” orange. 

3.        Have child point to and say any other words they know.  They can color those words, too.

5.       Say poem again pointing to words. 

6.       Hand child a pointer (wand, pen or pencil with a star attached to it, etc.) and as you say the poem together they point to each word as they say it.  (This is important in helping them connect written word with what they are saying).

Math

Preparation:

Seeds from Yesterday's pumpkin, washed, and dry

Materials

Seeds

Teaching:

1.        Count the pumpkin seeds together. Make piles of ten seeds as you count.  When child gets tired of counting, stop.  Don't torture them with continuing to count after they've lost interest.  Be positive and say, "Wow! We counted 46 seeds!  That's a lot of counting, and there are still more! There are a lot of seeds in pumpkins!"

Book of the Day:  Pumpkins by Gail Gibbons

1. Read the book to your child, talking about what you are learning as you read.

Science

Preparation:

Buy a pumpkin, and several other fruits

Materials

Fruits

Teaching:

1.    Have your child compare and contrast the pumpkin to the other fruits.  Talk about size, shape, color, texture, etc.

Art

Preparation

Cut orange construction paper into 2 inch strips
Blow up a balloon into a small ball, tie off.
Mix together on medium size plate approximately 1/4 cup glue and 1/4 cup water (just eyeball it, you don't need to be exact.)

Materials

paper
balloon
glue mixture

yarn

Teaching:

1.        Have your child dip the strips of paper into the glue/water mixture.  We put several strips in the mixture and let them soak until thoroughly wet. 
2.  Apply the strips, one at a time, to the balloon, layering pieces over one another. Like this:

3.  When the balloon is covered with the paper, tie a piece of yarn to the top, take the balloon outside, tie it so the balloon is hanging and let dry overnight.  You may want to put something under the balloon because it can drip. If you want to dry the pumpkin on your counter overnight realize it may flatten a little.

Pumpkins - Day 1

Phonics/Writing

Preparation:

Write the word pumpkin on a piece of paper, then cut into individual letters.

Materials

“Pumpkin” letters

Teaching:

Letter Learner (Learning letters and letter sounds):

1.       Sound out each letter.

2.       Have child hand you each letter as you sound it out (/p/ sound – they give you letter ‘p.’) Create word pumpkin with letters.

3.       Blend sounds together slowly to make word pumpkin; draw each sound out. Have child try to guess word.  If they can’t, you need to blend sounds closer and closer together until they guess word (this is a phonics skill that they will learn in time).

Emergent Reader (Knows letters and letter sounds):

1.       Tell child that there is a secret word that these letters spell. They will be forming little words and finally they will make the secret word.

2.       Say, “Using these letters, make the word ‘pin.’” If needed, slowly sound out the word as they search for the letters and put them together to form word “pin.”

3.       Say, “Change one letter to make the word “pip.”

4.       Change a letter to make the word “kip.”

5.       Say, “Change a letter to make the word “sip.”

6.       Say, “Change a letter to make the word “sup.”

7.       Say, “Change a letter to make the word “sum.”

8.       Say, “Change a letter to make “pum,” add a letter to make the word “pump”

9.       Put the remaining three letters “kin” on the end, and ask “Can you tell me what the secret word is?”  Sound out the word with child, if needed.

Reading

Preparation:

Make a poster with poem “Five Little Pumpkins”

“Five Little Pumpkins sitting on a gate.

The first one said, “Oh my it’s getting late”

The second one said, “There are witches in the air.”

The third one said, “But we don’t care.”

The fourth one said, “Let’s run and run and run.”

The fifth one said, “I’m ready for some fun.”

“Ohhh,” went the wind.  Out went the light.

And five little pumpkins rolled out of sight.

Materials:

Poem

Orange crayon

Yellow crayon

Teaching:

Letter Learner:

1.        Read the poem together 2-3 times.  Do a finger play with it.

2.       Have your child find and color all the ‘P’s” orange.

3.       Say the word pumpkin together.  Listen to the two /p/ sounds.

4.       Read it through again.  Point to each word as you say it.

5.       Help child point to words with you. (This helps them recognize sounds and words).

Emergent Reader:

1.       Read poem together 2-3 times.

2.       Have child color the word “pumpkin” orange. 

3.       Have child color the word “the” yellow.

4.       Have child point to and say any other words they know.  They can color those words, too.

5.       Say poem again pointing to words. 

6.       Hand child a pointer (wand, pen or pencil with a star attached to it, etc.) and as you say the poem together they point to each word as they say it.  (This is important in helping them connect written word with what they are saying).

Math

Preparation:

Draw or print out four pictures of a fence/gate. Place pumpkin stickers (or glue pumpkin pictures) on the fences on one gate place one pumpkin, on second gate place 2 pumpkins, on third gate place three pumpkins, on fourth gate place four pumpkins.

Materials

4 gates with pumpkins

Pumpkin stickers (or pictures of pumpkins and a glue stick)

Teaching:

1.        Tell child, “Here are some pumpkins on gates, but there aren’t five pumpkins on any of the gates, and the poem says, ‘Five Little Pumpkins.’ Can you put the gates together to create longer gates with five pumpkins on it.”

2.       Have child put the gate with four pumpkins next to the gate with one pumpkin to create a gate with five pumpkins.  Put the two and three pumpkins together.

3.       Have child use pumpkin stickers to make five pumpkins on each of the gates, using the matching gate as a guide for number of pumpkins to place on fence.

Book of the Day:  Pumpkin Circle: The Story of a Garden by George Levenson

1. Read the book to your child, talking about what you are learning as you read.

Science

Preparation:

Buy a pumpkin, cut off the top

Materials

Pumpkin

Teaching:

1.        Using the five senses have your child explore the pumpkin.  Touch the skin, stem, seeds, and inside of pumpkin.

2.       Smell the pumpkin.

3.       Look at the pumpkin, what colors are there? What shapes do they see?

4.       Let them taste something with pumpkin in it (we like eating pumpkin pancakes so we talked about pumpkin pancakes).

** SAVE THE PUMPKIN SEEDS FOR LATER LESSONS**

Art

Preparation

Buy a pumpkin

Materials

Pumpkin

Paint

Paintbrushes

Teaching:

1.        Let your child paint the pumpkin. 

**I wouldn’t recommend using the same pumpkin as the one cut up in “Science” because it makes such a cute decoration, and it will last longer uncut.**

Bats - Day 3

Writing/Phonics
Preparation
Make lined paper for your child to form the letters in Bat.
the lined paper should look like this:
________________________________________
-  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -
________________________________________

You can make this in word, and save it. That's what I have done, so anytime I need it I can print anothre sheet. You can also buy paper printed like this already. 


Materials

• Lined Paper
• Pencil

Teaching

1. Say, "We are going to write 'Bat,' but we need to do it right!"
2. Teach your child how to form the letters.  Watch the video below to see how I do it. Make sure you always Start at the top.

(Just so you know this is a condensed version of what I do, but it gives an idea of what I do)

Reading

Preparation
Write 3-6 simple sentences on a piece of paper (It's a good idea to illustrate, too) Sample sentences:
Bat is on the hat.
Hat is on the cat.
Cat is on the mat.
Bat is off the hat.
The hat is off the cat.
The cat is off the mat.
Materials

• Illustrated sentences
• Crayons (Yellow, green, and red)

Teaching

1. Point to the first letter of the first word. Color is yellow.

2. Say, "This is the first letter of the first word we are going to read.  We always start here,on the left side of the page when we read or write.  This letter makes a sound.  We put it together with the otheer letters next to it and it tells us a word! 
3. Have your child tell you the sound of each letter. Put the sounds togther to form the word. Underline the word in green.  Say, "This is the word 'Bat.'"
4. Say, "This space next to the word tells us the word is done." Color the space red.
5. Repeat for each word on the page.
6. Say, "You read a sentence!" Underline the sentence in green.
7. For the word "the" tell them "This is the word 'the.'  We use this word often, but it doesn't look the way it sounds, so we just memorize t-h-e is the."
8. Repeat this for each sentence.

Modification
Let your child color letters,underline words and sentencees and color spaces red.
Always point Left to Right as you read.

Math

Preparation
No prep!
Materials

• NONE!

Teaching

1. Tell your child they get to fly around like a bat.
2. Say, "I will tell you a number and as you 'fly' around you need to flap your arms that many times."
3. Tell them "Flap one time, then come back to your cave home." "Flap two times, then come back to your cave home."

Book

Preparation

Materials

• Bat book
• Paper
• Pen
• Post-it notes

Teaching

1.  Say, "Today when we read the book I want you to tell me something you learnd on this page."
2. You might have to encourage them by pointing the first facts out yourself . Example: "Wow! Bats are awak at night.  That is cool.  Should we put a sticky note on it?"  

3. Read the book to your child placing post-it notes near facts your child liked.

4. Write the facts on paper.

Art

Preparation

Materials

• Fact sheet from Book read today and yesterday.
• Paper
• Crayons, markers, etc

Teaching
1.  Using the "favorite fact sheet" direct your child to draw a picture using the facts. Remind them of the facts you wrote together.  Have them draw big ideas first (Nighttime, the bat)Use only 3-5 facts in the picture, as a parent, review the sheet and see if any of the facts can be combined easily. I used post it notes in the picture below to show you what facts were in our art.

Bats - Day 2

Writing/Phonics
Preparation
None
Materials

• Jell-o (gelatin)
• Plate

Teaching

1. Have your child write the letters for "Bat" in the Jell-O one at a time, making (saying) the sound for as long as they are writing the letter

Reading
Preparation
Make a book (See Video from Spiders Day 2)
Write on Title Page: Black Bat
Write on first double page (pages 1-2): Black Bat
Write on second double page (pages 3-4) Black Bat bit.
Write on third double Page (Pages 5-6) Black bat bit bugs.

Materials

• Black Bat book
• Crayons

Teaching

1. Read "Black Bat" to your child.
2. Say, "There are no illustrations on the pages.  Can you draw the pictures for this book?"

 
3. Read each page and have them draw a picture to go with the words.
4. Have your child read you the book.
5. Have your child read the book to dad, mom, the family pet, aunt, etc.

Math

Preparation

Draw or print 10 green bugs and 10 black bugs, cut them out into individual bugs
Hide the bugs around the room


Materials

• Bugs
• Crayons
• Paper, divided into four sections
• Glue

Teaching

1. Tell your child he is a little brown bat and is going out at night to get some food.
2. He needs to catch 5 bugs and bring them back to you to "eat".
3. Have child find five bugs and bring them to you. (My son put a blanket around his shoulders so he would have "wings.")

4. Identify the bugs your child has brought to you ("You have one green bug and four black bugs.  Good.  You found five bugs.")

5. Have child glue bugs to the paper. Write the equation.
6. Repeat three more times.

Modification

• You can use any number you want for the bug catch. I find five or less works well. It's not an overwhelming number.  The point is to help your child have a GREAT number sense when they start kindergarten.  This gives numbers meaning rather than counting they see the number comprised of a group of things.
• You can have your child write the equations.

Book
Preparation
On the top of a piece of paper write "BATS EAT"

Materials

• Paper
• Crayons
• Post it notes

Teaching

1. Read a bat book to your child (Gail Gibbons Bats is a great book for this).

2. Every time the book talks about food mark it with a post it note.
3. After reading the book write the things a bat eats on the paper. 
4. Have your child illustrate it.

Modifications
Your child can write the words instead of you.

Art
Preparation
Print or copy a black line picture of a bat

Materials

• Black paper
• Black line picture of bat
• Crayons
• Scissors
• Glue
• Star Glitter or glitter

Teaching

1. Have your child color the bat.
2. Have your cut out the bat.
3. Have your child glue the bat to the black paper.

4. Have your child glue some star glitter on the black paper.

Holiday Books - Halloween

I love books.  I may be obseessed with books.  I don't know. What I do know is that when it comes to books I say, the more the merrier!
Stashed away with my holiday decorations I have holiday books that only come out during the month we celebrate the holiday. So this month I have, next to my fireplace, Halloween books.  I have 30 Halloween books (including the five I bought yesterday).  My kids love this time of year when the holiday books come out. We read them over and over again, knowing that in a few short weeks they're packed up until next year.

To create a library of holiday books I buy from school book orders and the library (that's where the newest five books came from). 

Our favorite Halloween/Autumn Books are:

• The Stranger by Chris VanAllsburg (Jack frost loses his memory and a kind farmer helps him)

• The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything and Too Many Pumpkins by Linda White(So cute)

• The Spooky Smells of Halloween by Mary Man-Kong (scratch and sniff!)
• The 13 Days of Halloween by Carol Greene (Sing it to the 12 Days of Christmas)
 

• Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson (I think it's my kids' favorite)
• Five LittlePumpkins (I have a lesson I do with this book as well)

I have books for Thanksgiving and Christmas, too (I also have a few Hannakah books).
I'll write lists of our favorite Thanksgiving and Christmas books in the next few months.

Bats - Day 1

Writing/ Phonics

Preparation:

No Prep for this one

Materials

• Bubble Gum
• Paper
• Pen

Teaching

1. You and your child get to chew gum until it's soft and pliable.
2. Stretch the gum out of your mouth so it makes a long strand. Say the word "Bat" very slowly as you stretch the gum out of your mouth.
3. Have your child stretch out the gum (and the word) several times.
4. Ask your child, "What is the first sound?  Write the letter that makes that sound. What is the second sound. What is the letter that makes that sound?  Write it down.  What is the third sound? What letter makes that sound?  Write it down."

Modifications:

If your child doesn't know the letters tell them the letter and write it for them.

Reading

Preparation:

Create a small poster using this poem:
Little Brown Bat flies at night.
Eating bugs during his flight
Bat flies home it gets light
Sleeping upside down with his eyes shut tight.
You can embellish the poster with pictures, etc.

Materials

• Poster
• Marker or crayon in 2-3 colors
• Pointer (this could be your finger or a wand, etc)

Teaching

1. Read the poem to your child a few times, pointing to each word as you say it.
2. Have your child read it with you.
3. Point to the word bat and underline it, say, "You know this word.  It's the word bat.  How many times do we see the word 'bat?'  Help me find the word 'Bat.'"
4. Let the child point out the word "bat."
5. Point out rhyming words at the end of each line.  Circle the rhyming words. Have your child say the rhyming words with you.
6. Have your child color the word brown a light brown color the word still shows.
7. Say, "Look at all the words you know! You know Bat (point to the word bat).  You know brown (point to the word brown) and you know our rhyming word family (point to rhyming words and say them).
8. Say the poem again, letting child point to the words "brown," "bat," and rhyming words.  Put the poem somewhere low and encourage your child to read the poem whenever they want,pointing to the words as thy go.  Have your child read the poem to the family pet, dad, mom, grandma, grandpa, a stuffed animal, etc.

Math

Preparation:
Create a flip book with 5 sections. (see Spiders Day 2 for instructions)
Materials
Flip book
15 Bat stickers, or 15 small bat pictures and a glue stick (I just used clip art and sized it small)

Teaching

1. Have your child label the flaps 1-5 with your help forming the numbers
2. Have them stick or glue the corresponding number of bats under the flap to the number on the flap.  (One bat under flap marked 1, etc)
3. Tell them to find the 3 bats, the 2 bats, etc.

4. Like every poem, or book, or flip book you make, put this in a special bucket and tell your child that he wrote these cool books and he can read them any time he wants to.

Book
Preparation:
Plan a visit to your bookstore or Library (I prefer library) and get three books on bats for the week.
You want to find books with no more than a few sentences on each page, and large illustrations or photographs.
I like:
Bats by Gail Gibbons
Materials
Book
Paper
Pen
Teaching
1. Fold Paper into three sections labeling first section with a "K", second with a "W", third with an "L".
2.  Ask your child, "What do you know about bats?"
3.  Write what they know under "K" section (K=Know)
4.  Ask your child what they want to know about bats (W=Want to know)
5.  Write questions in column under "W". 
6.  Read Book, talking as you read about the things you are learning
7.  Write under "L" the things learned (L=Learned).
** Don't expect a long list in any of the categories, 2-3 things is good!
Art
Preparation:
Cut a black or brown piece of paper into a medium circle (bat head), large oval  (bat body), two small triangles (ears) and two rectangles (bat wings)
Materials
Black or brown paper, cut
Glue

Teaching

1. Accordion fold rectangles for wings.

2. Glue pieces together to form bat.

Spiders - That's a Wrap!

So now you have three days with  lesson plans about spiders that are easy, and don't take a lot of time.  If you want you can also rent movies at the library about spiders.  We really enjoyed Bill Nye: Spiders, and Magic School Bus: Creepy Crawly Fun which has a video on spiders and bats (which is the next unit).

If you want to add a field trip day here are some suggestions:
1.  Go on a spider walk.  Look for webs and spiders in your neighborhood, remind your child not to touch the web or spider.
2.  Go to the zoo and look at spiders.
3.  Go to the pet shop and look at their tarantulas.

I hope you had as much fun with this unit as we did!

Spiders - Day 3

Writing/ Phonics

Preparation:

Get materials together

Materials

• Plate
• Jell-o/Gelatin

Teaching

1. Sprinkle a thin layer of Jell-o on the plate.
2. Have your child write the letter "S" in the Jell-o saying the /s/ sound as they form the letter.
3. You can have your child write a few of the other letters of "Spider," having the child say the sound of the letter as they form the letter. 
4. The fun of this is that your child gets to taste the yummy jell-o each time he licks his finger.  The tactile feeling helps memory of letter and sound.

Reading

Preparation:

None

Materials

• BOB Book
• Spider Book

Teaching

1. Have your child read the books with you.

Math

Preparation:
Make3 sets of 4 spiders on 3x5 cards. One set red, one set yellow, and  one set black.
Materials
Spider cards

Teaching

1. Place cards face down on table. 
2. Play "memory" game, but flip over four spiders at a time.  Name the spiders flipped over. For example, if you flipped over one black spider, one red spider, and two yellow spiders you would say, "I have four spiders, one black, one red, and two yellow, but they don't match."
3. Have your child name the cards they flip over, too.
4. When a person has 4 cards of the same color, they get to keep them.

Book
Preparation:
Plan a visit to your bookstore or Library (I prefer library) and get three books on spiders for the week.
You want to find books with no more than a dew sentences on each page, and large illustrations or photographs.
I like:
Spiders by Gail Gibbons
Spiders Biggest! Littlest! by Sandra Markle
On a large piece of paper draw a spider with extra long legs (you'll be writing facts on these later)
Materials
Book
Spider Picture
Pen
Sticky notes (like Post-Its)
Teaching
1. Read book to child.
2.  When you read an interesting fact place a sticky note on the page, and write one word to describe the cast, or draw a simple line picture.
3. After reading, go to each sticky note, and, if needed, remind your child of the fact you read. Have child tell you fact, then write it on a spider leg.

Art
Preparation:
Cut a piece of black paper into a small 6x6 square
Materials
Black Paper
Glue
Glitter

Teaching
1. Let your child create a sticky web by squirting glue on the black paper in any shape web they would like. Let them add some sparkle with glitter.