Once Upon a Book ~ Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See?

 Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?

By Bill Martin Jr. and Eric Carle

Summary:  A cute children’s book, filled with predictable rhyming, bright colors, and precious animals.  Find out what each animal is looking at and prepare yourself for a surprise at the end!

Bible Verse

God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. (Genesis 1:25)

  

The unit we did for Eric Carle actually was an entire Granola School learning experience.  Eric Carle is by far one of my favorite authors/illustrators.  Therefore, our entire family joined in on the fun.



The way Eric Carle books are created is very unique. 

Crafts



We first learned how to paint like Eric Carle.  See this video to learn for yourself!  (Note:  Eric Carle uses tissue paper.  In light of how fragile this medium is, I opted for actual watercolor paper.)

Supplies:

• watercolor paper
  
• jumbo paint brushes
  
• washable tempra paint
  
• smock

Directions:

Read a few Eric Carle books.  Briefly talk about using color and long brush strokes.  Allow your child to fill their paper with paint, mixing the colors however they wish.  Allow to dry. 



If you want to further understand the process Eric Carle goes through to create his art work, then watch this video demonstrating how he created the Hungry Caterpillar. 

Lapbook Ideas
 
Sometimes there is no need to reinvent the wheel.  I simply headed on over to Carisa’s Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? Tot Book site and both downloaded and printed her entire Tot Book! 



Here are some ways that we used the Lapbook . . .

• I read the story to Mr. Smiley.

• After each animal, his job was to find the animal and velcro it back onto the correct shadow.  This printable is available from Making Learning Fun.

 

• Mr. Smiley also attempted to velcro the Brown Bears according to size.

• You can also have your child stack all of the Eric Carle books in your house!  Works for us!

• We used Do-A-Dots and painted all of the animals in Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?  These quick and easy pages can be found here.

• Learn colors with Carisa’s Coloring Animal Learning book . . . I said the color and then gave him the correct Do-A-Dot Marker and he pounded away!

• Counting Numbers

• Matching animals . . . you can also vary this activity by having your Tot put like colors together, all heads, all tails, etc.

Want to see what's coming next (and books we've done in the past)? Click here to see our Once Upon a Book webpage!

Crafty Corner ~ Eric Carle

The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Confessions of a Homeschooler

The Very lonely Firefly by Adventures of a SAHM

The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Confessions of a Homeschooler

The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Adventures of a SAHM

The Very Quiet Cricket by Adventures of a SAHM

10 Little Rubber Ducks by Adventures of a SAHM

Polar Bear, Polar Bear by Ramblings of a Crazy Woman

Brown Bear, Brown Bear by Ramblings of a Crazy Woman

Little Cloud Craft by Ramblings of a SAHM

More fun Eric Carle Inspired Craft Ideas:

• Art Lessons for Kids
• Deep Space Sparkle

Do you have a tot-friendly craft on your blog? Read here first and then email me (EricaAtTotallyTots@gmail (dot) com) so I can add it here! If you feature crafts on your blog often, be sure to let me know in the email so I can add you to the "search" list for future posts!

Once Upon a Book ~ The Mixed-up Chameleon

 

The Mixed-up Chameleon by Eric Carle

Summary: Your little one will giggle as the chameleon discovers he can change colors…and tries to look like the many animals in the zoo but all at the same time.

Bible Verse

Psalm 139:14

“I praise you because I am fearfully, wonderfully made.”

We talked about how God has a plan for us and He already knows what we are suppose to be.  He doesn’t want us to be like everyone else ~ we are perfect just the way God made us!

Craft

We put together this cute letter ‘c’ craft and made it look like a chameleon {of course!!}.

Math

First Aiden arranged Size Sort Chameleons on a stick, from biggest to smallest, and we worked on ordinal numbers {1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc..}.

Aiden practiced counting 0 to 10 by feeding The Hungry Chameleon flies.  We didn’t use the flies from the printout ~ we used flies made out of felt instead {we also used the flies later in the game below}. 

Science

We printed off colored chameleons and Aiden matched the colored chameleons to the correct color word cards.

Art

We printed off this pattern for a chameleon. Aiden colored the chameleon and then poured an entire load of glue onto the picture along with a lot of glitter.

Snack

For snack we had mixed-up frozen yogurt.  We used two flavors of yogurt and swirled them together. We put the yogurt into a paper cup, added a popsicle stick to freeze in the middle and then put them in the freezer until they were ready to pop out and eat!

Games

We talked about how chameleons use their sticky tongues to catch flies.  To demonstrate this I added Velcro to the end of a party blower so Aiden could catch and “eat” flies made out of felt.

Puzzles

Aiden needed some help with the Chameleon Puzzle, but enjoyed putting the last pieces together.

 

Song

Do You Have Green Skin?

{sung to tune: “Do Your Ears Hang Low”}

Do you have green skin?

Can you shed the skin you’re in?

Can you change the color, too?

Turn from green to red to blue?

Do you live among the trees?

Blending in with sticks and leaves?

Do you have green skin?

For more fun ideas and printables to go along with the The Mixed-up Chameleon, you can check out this post on my blog.

Want to see what's coming next (and books we've done in the past)? Click here to see our Once Upon a Book webpage!