Exotic Birds

Welcome back to Mrs. Kats Kids this is our last week in our birds and eggs unit with Experience Early Learning ( formerly Mother goose time)

This week we talked about the Ostrich, Penguin, blue crane, and peacock. These types of birds are not normally in your backyard. By including these types of animals into the preschool curriculum, children build a broader range of knowledge of birds.

Unless your David check out this Crane in his backyard!!

We have also had a great time doing our Facebook lives and craft time with our friends at home.

Take a look at a couple of our crafts!!!!

Ostrich head

Supplies: • inspiration Photo • Fork • background paper • orange paper

• eye stickers • paint • glue • crayons or markers • scissors

Set up

• set the Inspiration photo and Any additional materials

Prompts

• what do you notice about the ostrich’s eyes? What do you think the ostrich is looking at?

• How will you use the fork to draw it’s fluffy feathers?

Penguin puppet

Supplies: • Paper plate • paper • eye stickers • black paint • scissors • glue

Discuss

• what do you like best about penguins?

Make

• help children paint the back of the paper plates Black and let them dry.

• Help them fold the plates into penguin shapes.

• Invite children to add sticker eyes then cut out feet and beaks and glue them on.

Play

• encourage children to pretend they are penguins and waddle around the room.

• Invite them to use their puppets to waddle around and talk to each other.

As an Experience Early Learning Blog Ambassador, we receive the Experience Early Learning Preschool curriculum in exchange for our honest and authentic stories resulting from our personal experiences. As always, our opinions on amazing stuff for children are 100% our own. Keep in mind that all preschoolers do things in their own time and on their own terms. What one is ready for, another might not be. Please use your best judgement when planning activities for your children. #preschool #EELblogger Experience Early Learning | Facebook | Twitter | Pinterest | Instagram

Tree Birds

Welcome back Friends this week at Mrs.Kats kids we Learned all about tree birds with experience early learning (formally mother goose time.) Some of the birds that we talked about were bluebirds, woodpecker, eagle, hummingbird, and chickadee. We had a great time exploring this week…… take a peak at a few of our activities from our preschool curriculum.

Bluebird Collage

Supplies: inspiration Photo, paper shapes, paper, paper bird, crayons, glue, and nature items.

Set up

• set out the bird photo, shapes and paper. Gather nature items for children to also use as collage materials.

Prompts

• what designs do you see in the photo? What designs would you like to create?

• Will you arrange your shapes to look like a bird or something else?

• How many birds will you make with the shapes?

We also sang a Bluebird song with our preschool curriculum.

it goes like this…

• Sing to the tune of “The farmer in the Dell”

The bluebird’s in the nest.

The bluebirds’s in the nest.

Singing the day away,

The bluebird’s in the nest.

Woodpecker Oscillation Experiment

Supplies:

•paper woodpecker

•Rubber band

•straw

•tape

•scissors

Discuss

• why does a woodpecker peck at wood?

• Explain that woodpeckers do this to mark their territory, search for food and store food.

• Cut the rubber band and straw then thread it through the straw. “ tweezers help”

Play

• explore holding the rubber band in different ways to make it move up and down the “tree.”

We also made easier woodpeckers for the babies out of popsicle sticks.

Hummingbird

Supplies: • inspiration Photo • straw • cupcake liner • background paper • paint • scissors • paintbrush’s • glue

Set up

•set up the inspiration Photo and any additional materials.

Prompts

• What do you notice about the hummingbirds tongue? What is the Hummingbird doing?

• Will you pretend the straw is a hummingbird’s tongue by sticking it in the paint?

• How can you use the straw and paint to decorate the cupcake liners like a flower?

This project will help children learn how to control the small muscles in his/her hands to use the paintbrush and straw.

I hope you all had a great week and we will see you again next week. Thanks for stopping by.

Spring is in the air

Welcome back friends we have made it through another week of learning at home!! I made our learn at home bags again this week and went live on my Facebook Page.

This week with our experience early learning curriculum (formally mother goose time) we have been learning about Birds and Eggs. It has been such a perfect theme to do while we are introducing spring time and last week was Easter. This week we talked about Bird Parts and with our preschool curriculum we talked about head and beak, body, wing, feet and claws, and tails.

Baby Bird Pet!!

Supplies: •cardboard tube •feathers •wiggly eyes •markers •glue •scissors •nature items

Discuss: •would you like to have a baby bird for a pet? Why or why not?

Make: • encourage each child to decorate their tube like a baby chick.

Play: • use sticks, rocks or other nature items to build a nest or birdhouse.

• what else might the bird need? Invite children to brainstorm ways to feed and care for their pet check.

Wing

Supplies: • inspiration photo • feathers • paper •glue •paint •scissors • paint brush

Prompts:

• what do you notice about the wing in the photo? How do you think a real feather wing feels to the touch?

• Will you cut the paper into a wing shape?

• Will you use the feather or a brush to paint? What’s different about painting with a feather instead of a brush?

• Will you glue feathers on your wings?

I hope you all had a great week and we will see you again next week. Thanks for stopping by.

Learning from home

Well well well! This is a crazy time and boy I never thought I would be blogging about how I am teaching my daycare children from an I-pad.

We started learn at home bags this week and I am also going live on my Facebook page for circle time and craft time. Each day in our preschool curriculum Experience early learning has a craft called “creative corner” and they supply us with the main materials and then I added paints, markers, glue, and scissors to each child’s bags. It was so fun getting out of the house and making deliveries.

During circle time, I have been doing calendar, weather, shapes, numbers, letters and then Giving a brief example of our preschool curriculum study for the day. Some days we have songs and others days we have books to read. I will then explain our craft and then jump back on about 10 minutes later to explain how to make it. The kids have been posting pictures of their crafts in my comments via Facebook post.

Baby Bird Pet!!

Supplies: •cardboard tube •feathers •wiggly eyes •markers •glue •scissors •nature items

Discuss: •would you like to have a baby bird for a pet? Why or why not?

Make: • encourage each child to decorate their tube like a baby chick.

Play: • use sticks, rocks or other nature items to build a nest or birdhouse.

• what else might the bird need? Invite children to brainstorm ways to feed and care for their pet check.

I hope you all had a great week and we will see you again next week. Thanks for stopping by.

As an Experience Early Learning Blog Ambassador, we receive the Experience Early Learning Preschool curriculum in exchange for our honest and authentic stories resulting from our personal experiences. As always, our opinions on amazing stuff for children are 100% our own. Keep in mind that all preschoolers do things in their own time and on their own terms. What one is ready for, another might not be. Please use your best judgement when planning activities for your children. #preschool #EELblogger Experience Early Learning | Facebook | Twitter | Pinterest | Instagram

Life is a little different

Welcome back to Mrs. Kat’s Kid’s, as we all know everyones life is a little different these days. As a owner of a In home Daycare, my day has not changed too much. I am used to being at home and entertaining children all day but, on the other hand it has changed so much. My heart is so sad because I did not get to say goodbye to some of the children I see everyday. Its like a part of my heart got ripped out because I was not expecting it. I miss my daycare kids that are not with us durning this time. It makes me sad when we Open our preschool curriculum and I have three extra sets of materials because those children are not here. I saw someone else post about learn at home bags, I thought this would be a great way to interact with the children from home.

I also have my school age children home now and one of my daycare children sisters joining us. It’s been interesting balancing daycare life and homeschool life, but I also think of all the Memories we are making and this extra time that I am getting with my girls. We have had daily walks and our neighborhood has also participated in a bear hunt. Our Neighbors are putting bears in their window and this has been so much fun!!

Going on a bear hunt in the neighborhood

Our unit this month with Experience early learning (formally Mother Goose time) has been Pond life and my school age kids have really enjoyed doing the preschool lessons. I originally had them doing separate work during our work/craft time and they quickly decided they wanted to join us too, so of course I changed their schedule around. One thing I have had my school age children do every morning is scholastic Learn at home and on day 6 the girls got so excited because there was a lesson on pond life. https://classroommagazines.scholastic.com/support/learnathome/grades-1-2-week-2.html .

This week week with Experience Early Learning we talked about Life in the pond and we talked about snails, crawfish, lizards, alligators, and fish.

Let’s take a look at a few activities we did this week.

Snail Trail

Supplies: •Paper •sand •glue •cotton swab

• The children poured glue onto their paper next they poured sand onto their paper we used the cotton swab and pretended to be a snail making a trail in the dirt.

Crawfish Clappers

Supplies ( include in your preschool curriculum ) • cardboard rectangles (2) • Bingo chips (4) Your supplies • glue • markers

Discuss • what do you think a crawfish does with its claws? Explain that crawfish use their claws to fight enemies and to catch food. Make • encourage each child to decorate then fold the cardboard rectangles in half. Next glue the bingo chips to the inside of the clappers so they can produce a clicking noise. Play • Play any song on the dance at the pond CD from our preschool curriculum. Have the children dance around using their crawfish clapper.

As we finish up our pond life unit we had a great day picking up nature items on our walk and then coming back home to make our very own mini ponds

As an Experience Early Learning Blog Ambassador, we receive the Experience Early Learning Preschool curriculum in exchange for our honest and authentic stories resulting from our personal experiences. As always, our opinions on amazing stuff for children are 100% our own. Keep in mind that all preschoolers do things in their own time and on their own terms. What one is ready for, another might not be. Please use your best judgement when planning activities for your children. #preschool #EELblogger Experience Early Learning | Facebook | Twitter | Pinterest | Instagram

Dragonfly day

Welcome back to Mrs Kats kids. This week we looked further into pond life with our preschool curriculum. experience early learning (formally mother goose time). We focused on pond insects, we really enjoyed our Dragonfly day and I would love to share it with you.

At circle time we talked about how dragonflies carry food with their feet. Dragonflies can travel at speeds for up to 30 mph, which makes them some of the fastest flying insects in the world. Dragonflies also have the unique ability to fly backwards. They start their lives in water so it is very common to find dragonflies near rivers, swamps, lakes, ponds, and streams.

During music and movement we played a “dragonfly Chase” song that came with our preschool curriculum CD.

I encourage the children to flap their arms and fly around the room when the music began. There where three words we had to listen out for and then act out the action. “Chase me”, “forward fly”, “backward fly”.

Dragonfly puppet

Supplies for each child( supplied by our preschool curriculum)

•Jumbo craft stick

•wing shape

•tissue paper

•adhesive dots

Your supplies

•glue

•markers

•beads

• The children decorated their craft stick with many different designs and colors using markers.

• next they tore tissue paper to create the wings on their dragonfly and glued the Tissue paper to the wing shape pattern our preschool curriculum supplied us with.

•Lastly the children added beads and adhesive dots for eyes and more of a dramatic effect.

Pond plants

Welcome back to Mrs Kats kids. This week we looked further into pond life with our preschool curriculum. experience early learning (formally mother goose time). Each day we focused on different types of plants you would see at a pond….. Submergent pond plants, bog plants, emergent pond plants, floating pond plants, and algae.

Submergent Pond Plants

Submergent pond plants are completely underwater. they are a great place for fish to hide and or a major source of oxygen in the water.

Activity: Peaceful Pond

Materials: underwater submergent plants picture, paper, crayons and markers, watery blue paint, paintbrushes.

Set up: set out peaceful Pond picture

Make: have the children look at the photo of the submergent plants and ask them to paint a picture like the photo. This is also a good time to turn on some classical music, here are some following questions I asked the children.

•What types of lines do you see in the photo?

•What kind of pond life can you include in your picture?

•How will you add water colors?

•What do you notice about how the crayons resist watercolor?

Bog plants

Bog plants are usually found at the waters edge in shallow water their roots grow underwater and their foliage emerges.

Emergent pond plants

Emergent pond plants are routed with stiff stems and stand above the water surface.

They grow with their roots in the mud underwater and have leaves or spikes that grow through the surface up into the air. Lily pads are a good example of emergent plants.

Lily pad day was so much fun!!

We worked hard on our letter and number recognition. I had 26 lily pads with a letter on each. I would ask the child to hop like a frog to the letter G and bring the lily pad back to me. We took turns till all the Lily pads were gone. We did the same activity with lily pads numbers 1-20.

Next each child made their very out lily pad and frogs and worked on counting.

Letters on lily

Trace the letter N and W with duck counters from our preschool curriculum supplies on the lily pad.

Floating pond plants

Floating plants have roots that hang in the water but the plant is not attached to the pond bottom.

Algae

Algae are simple organisms that make food from sunlight by photosynthesis, but lack the roots, stems and leaves that a typical plant has.

Set up: picture of Algae

Materials: paper, glitter, Bowles,glue, shaving cream, blue and yellow paint, brushes.

How to make: I asked each child to look at the photo and make their own algae painting on their paper. Here are a couple questions I asked.

•What colors do you see in the photo?

•What happens when you mix the two colors together?

•What design can you make in your algae?

Welcome to Pond Life

We started our new unit with experience earlyLearning (formally mother goose time) this week.

This week our theme was Life around the pond. Young children can begin to observe nature and living organisms in their environment, such as a backyard, schoolyard, or a pond. This week we have brought nature into the classroom with books, sensory bins, and dramatic play props.

Turtle pull Toy

Today we talked about how when turtles get scared they hid in their shell. The children had a great time decorating a paper bowl to make a turtle shell. They used green paint and Brown crayons to really make the turtle shell pop.

Next we glued the bowl to a green paper turtle cut-out and added wiggle eyes.

Last we added yarn and really made them come alive by walking them Around the house. We even built some structures with sticks leaves and rocks to make homes for our new turtles.

Shell Math

Supplies: •Turtle Mat • Cups • Marker

I wrote numbers 1-14 on the cups and placed them on the table next to the Turtle Mat.

We took turns picking up a cup and identifying the number. Next I asked them to find the matching number on the turtle Mat and asked the child to put the “turtle shell” (cup) on the matching turtle.

Snake

Have you ever noticed that snakes come in many different colors and designs? We looked at many snake pictures and then I had the children design their very own snake.

Materials: •straws •pipecleaner •beads •scissors

The children first cut the straws in small pieces. Next the children demonstrated fine motor control while threading the beads and straws onto the pipe cleaner making it look like a snake.

Tadpole Ribbon Dancers

We discussed tadpoles and I asked the children “what do you think happens to a tadpoleb?” Then I explained that a frog legs it’s eggs in water. The eggs hatch into tadpoles which live in water until it Metamorphoses into an adult frog.

Here is a little song!!!

Five little tadpoles

Wiggling in the pond.

One grew legs… Jump!

Now it’s gone.

Check out our tadpole ribbon dancers we made to go along with our song!!

I also let the children dance with their tadpole tails to the tempo of any song from our dancing at the pond CD from experience early learning.

I hope you all had a great week and we will see you again next week. Thanks for stopping by.

As an Experience Early Learning Blog Ambassador, we receive the Experience Early Learning Preschool curriculum in exchange for our honest and authentic stories resulting from our personal experiences. As always, our opinions on amazing stuff for children are 100% our own. Keep in mind that all preschoolers do things in their own time and on their own terms. What one is ready for, another might not be. Please use your best judgement when planning activities for your children.

Nursery rhymes: “Little” rhymes

Little boy blue, come blow your horn. The sheep’s in the meadow, the cows in the corn. where is the boys after the sheep? He’s under the haystack, fast asleep!

What does the boy blow?

What sound does a horn make?

How can you make horn sounds with your mouth?

Making a horn

Materials: (supplied by our preschool curriculum) •snow cone cup •cardboard tube •adhesive foam dots.

Your supplies: •yellow paint •markers

How to make: The children painted their tube and the snowcone cup yellow. Once dried, we taped the cone to the tube and added the foam dots as keys. Next, we turned on some music and pretended to blow our horns.

Little Bo Peep

Little Bo Peep has lost her sheep and doesn’t know where to find them. Leave them alone, and they’ll come home, wagging their tails behind them.

Peekaboo sheep

Materials: (supplied by our preschool curriculum) • sheep pocket and puppet • craft stick • green festoon

Class room Materials: •tape or glue •scissors •green markers and crayons

Make and Play: The children colored the sheep and then cut it out and typed the sheep onto the craft stick. Next, they colored the pocket green (making it look like grass) and taped the sides together leaving a hole for the craft stick it fit into. Last the kids glued the green festoon on the top.

Lost sheep

we are so lucky that experience early learning supplies us with themed counters each month and give us Plenty of activities to use them. Beforr playing a math game we talked about what it means to be lost. We built a fence with wooden blocks and put the sheep counters inside the fence. I explained that the fence will help the sheep not get lost.

Sheep in the meadow

I set out the in the meadow poster, cards, and sheep counters. The children chose a number card and placed it on the game poster. Next, they placed the same number of sheep counters in the meadow we repeated until every card was used.

Nursery Rhymes: Food Rhymes

Many nursery rhymes tell about food, such as eating a pie in “Little Jack Horner” or making a cake in “Pat-a-cake.” Food rhymes encourage children to practice simple gestures to go along with words. This is important because it helps expand their imaginations as they promote creative rolls while role-playing.

Puffy Paint Cupcake

We started off our day with Pat-a-Cake, Pat-a-Cake, bakers man, bake me a cake as fast as you can. After circle time, we made puff paint cupcakes and had a great time pretending to be bakers. We used shaving cream, glue, food coloring gel, sprinkles and cup cake liners.

Community Cake

This was a really fun math activity from our preschool curriculum. We put the cupcake number cards in a circle on the floor and played the song pat-a-cake from our nursery rhyme CD provided by experience early learning curriculum. I paused the music and called out a number. The Child who could identify the number first then counted out that many foam hearts and placed them on the cake game poster.

Little Jack Horner

Little Jack Horner sat in a corner

eating a piece of pie.

He put in his thumb

And pulled out a plum

And said, .” What a good boy I am!”

Plum &Thumb Prints

I Set out the Inspiration Plum Photo from our Preschool curriculum and asked the children “what do you see in this photo?” The children then dipped the soufflé cup into the purple paint and stamped their paper making plums. Next, the children used their thumb print as the pits.

Hot Cross Buns

We loved ending our week just like we started….. little bakers. The children always get excited when I pull out the baking props. Today, we pretended to make cinnamon gooey buns, The children had a bath last designing their own icing on top.

Next, we worked more on our fine motor skills and copied the bun designs onto a tray full of sugar.

I hope you all had a great week and we will see you again next week. Thanks for stopping by.