Once Upon a Book ~ Baby Bird

Baby Bird by Joyce Dunbar

Summary: This is a cute little story about a determined baby bird who wants to learn to fly. Although he first climbed out of his nest and flop..flop…fell, Baby Bird doesn't let anything stop him from learning to flap..flap..and fly!

Bible Verse:  Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Galatians 6:9

Counting: Using our Baby Blue Bird insert cards for our Education Cubes, we played a fun little counting game. Start with a basket of plastic eggs and two empty egg trays (mine are from the Dollar Tree). Take turns rolling the cube. Count the number of birds shown. Count out the same number of eggs and begin to fill your egg tray. The first to fill their tray wins!

1 to 1 Correspondence: We practiced 1 to 1 correspondence by counting out the appropriate number of eggs to correspond with the number of eggs on the nest counting cards from Confessions of a Homeschooler.

Basic Addition: The boys did some counting and basic bird themed addition using their BambinoLuk.

Craft: Use a paper bag and some “supplies” from nature to make a brown bag bird nest. 

Pattern Blocks: As usual, the boys enjoyed using their pattern blocks. This time they used some bird patterns (from pattern cards and from Pre-Kinders).

Colors: The boys practiced matching colors using some feathers with colored tips and some puff balls.

Games:  The boys loved playing the Duck Duck Goose Game.

Snack: For a fun snack, make some yummy chocolate bird nests with blue m&m’s as eggs.

More Ideas: The boys had a blast using the Flap, Flap, & Fly game board. They rolled the Education Cube (containing the corresponding Flap, Flap, & Fly insert cards) and moved along the game board to help Baby Bird learn to fly.

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!

Hh is for Hands

 

One Hand, Two Hands by Max Lucado

 

Summary: A simple rhyming book with a good message---we can use our hands to show our love for God and to help others. The illustrations are so fun and beautifully done! The end of the book contains ideas of ways that we can use our hands to show kindness, show love, and help others.  
ABC Letter Introduction Activity
 

To introduce our Letter H unit, I came up with sensory bin. Since our theme was hands, I wanted to include items that my girls could touch and feel.


So along with various "Hh" items, I also included things such as scouring pads, microfiber cloth, smooth rocks, emery boards, sandpaper letters, and more. Everything  in the bin was something they could touch and feel with their hands. We sorted them by texture – smooth/rough, soft/hard.

ABC Letter Learning Activities
  
 

We had fun practicing letter Hh sounds/words with The Sticky Hand game.

Supplies:

Large lids (mine are orange juice lids)
Letter Hh word pictures (I used the cards from 1+1+1=1 and printed them at a reduced size)
1 Jumbo sticky hand (I found mine at the Dollar Tree)

The object was to try to hit one of the lids with the sticky hand. If the hand touched it at all, the girls would say the picture name. This was harder to do than you would think! They loved the challenge though and played this over and over---well until the hand broke :)

 
We went over our hand poem/coloring/handwriting page (click to dowload- under Letter H).

ABC Crafts
 

 
We turned this colorfully painted hand into….

 

 

a handprint flower! (The stem was made by dragging the pointer finger down, and the leaves were made by painting a fist and then stamping it onto the paper.)

My girls came home with this Bible craft project from Sunday School, and I thought it went perfectly with our Letter Hh week! The verse on the bottom is Deuteronomy 5: 32 (paraphrased) Do what God says.

I also cut letter H’s from sandpaper and we did crayon rubbings of them. There are so many things we can do with our hands!

Supplemental Books:

Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb
My Hands by Aliki
 
Downloads:


Tommy Nelson has a couple of free coloring pages that go along with One Hand, Two Hands.

For each letter I will be providing several downloadable resources plus a letter planner page. You can find these resources at Spell Outloud’s HSPrintables.

Other ABC Resources:
ABC Printables from Homeschool Creations
Letter of the Week Curriculum from COAH
ABC Flashcards and More from 1+1+1=1
ABC Letter Crafts
Songs for Saplings ABC Verses

Simply Made: Reading Rings

"Reading Rings" are a great way to let your tot practice reading and exploring their world. The possibilities for Reading Rings are endless and only limited by your imagination. Reading Rings can be as simple as a set of ABC flashcards or family names and pictures. Tots will enjoy flipping through them  over and over which fosters confidence through repeated readings. As your tot grows, use the reading rings to target skills they are working on--letter identification, beginning sounds, rhyming, etc.

The Reading Ring we are making today is going to be made out of recycled environmental print using the front flap of cereal boxes, snack boxes, etc. I literally raided my recycling bin for this one!

Materials:

• Gather the front flap of cereal boxes, snack boxes, etc.
• Single Hole Punch
• Book Rings

Directions:

1. Cut the front flap off of cereal boxes, snack boxes, etc. (Almost anything goes here!)

2.  Punch a hole in the top left corner.

3.  Thread a book ring through all of the holes and close.

4.  Place in your book basket for your tot to explore.

Suggested Activities:

• Search for target letters.
• Search for target sounds.
• Count the number of target letters you find.
• Search for numbers.
• Add the numbers you find.
• Count the words.
• Read the labels.

Other Reading Rings I've Made:

• ABC Flashcards on a ring
• Number Flashcards on a ring
• Vocabulary Words & Pictures for Units (Print an extra copy of the vocabulary words from Preschool Packs, laminate, and place them on a ring)
• Family Names & Pictures
• Friends from Church

"Big Picture" Reading Concepts Reading Rings Target:

• Turning pages of a book
• Left to right & Top to bottom direction of print
• Identifying Environmental Print
• Confidence through Repeated Readings

Touch, Feel, Learn ~ Bug Safari

It’s time to explore the world around us and head outside for a bug safari {and a lesson on ~ ask before you pick up any insects}. 

 You’ll Need:

• a sense of adventure ~ after all you are picking up rocks and never know what you will find
• magnifying glass ~ so you can get a good look at those beautiful bugs
• container ~ to put your new friends in (for a short time) to observe them

Aiden LOVES bugs, he has absolutely no fear about picking up any bug, so before we headed out on our bug safari we had a discussion about the importance of not picking up bugs unless mommy said it was ok.  We didn’t want to hurt any of our bug friends and I wanted Aiden to learn that some insects might pinch or bite him if they are scared.

We grabbed our magnifying glass and container and headed outside to look under rocks, old pieces of wood, and containers.

We discovered centipedes and millipedes

 

slugs,

 

nasty looking grubs in my garden ~ yuck!

A slug and some sort of cocoon

 

a red spider, which we learned is slightly venomous (so glad we talked about not picking up the insects)

 

They were screams of joy when we found a salamander.

We found two different salamanders and I let Aiden hold them, then we put them back.

 

Aiden is currently observing some worms and roly poly bugs, which are proudly housed in a jar on our kitchen counter.

Touch, Feel, Learn is a fun feature that focuses on science and nature activities for little ones.  Click here to see past Touch, Feel, Learn ideas.

Treats 4 Your Tot

Here are some more cool giveaways for tots/moms of tots, check them out below and let us know if you win something we told you about!!!!

• Alphabet Memory Match …ends 4/12/11
• Alphabet Magnet Set…ends 4/13/11
• Things that Go ABC Poster…ends 4/13/11
• Education Cubes Membership…ends 4/15/11
• Rusted Chain Necklace…ends 4/15/11
• Sandpaper Letters…ends 4/15/11
• The Trip Clip…ends 4/15/11
• Happy Nappers…ends 4/18/11
• Melissa and Doug Play Food Sets…ends 4/22/11

Bolded are items we personally own and love!  If you are hosting a TOT friendly giveaway you are free to leave a link in the comments section!

Uniting the Team for a BIRTHDAY BASH!

Maureen from Spell Outloud is currently in the middle of her blog’s 2nd Birthday Bash celebration!  She has done an amazing job of uniting other bloggers to help her celebrate.

Many of our team members have either offered a giveaway {Erica, Jenn}, or created a birthday themed printable as a party favor {me, Jolanthe, Jenn, Valerie}.  There are also awesome giveaways and even more printables created by other wonderful bloggers you probably know!

You can see her main Birthday Bash webpage here where all of the information is hosted and organized.  A special thanks to Maureen for uniting us all together to celebrate.