Mouse Paint

This week we read mouse paint. On Monday we experimented with play dough and mixed colors to make new colors. Yellow and red made orange, blue and red made purple and yellow and blue made green. On Wednesday we talked about what order the mice painted the pages. We painted sections of a large sheet of paper in order using potatoes. Messy and fun! I didn't get any pictures. These kids keep me busy during pre-school and I forget to grab the camera.

Here is the finished product of our paint activity.

One of their favorites, snack time. :)

What a great year. We can't wait for the fall.

Week something or other...

I have honestly lost track. My last week with the Busy Bees was right before Spring Break. Spring was everywhere.

Sheep craft...

Looking at springtime books...

Working on letters... These three work as a team!

Paige paints the letter P with glue and then glues beans on to form the letter.

And painting Easter eggs...

How fun! Where has the year gone?

Week 21

This week we learned about a curious dog named Angus.  He was tired of the same ol' things.  He discovered an open road, cars that run away, animals with horns, and that if he follows the milkman, he will lead him back home.  He realizes the meaning of "Home sweet home."  

Our pre-schoolers each got to have their own dog this week and even made it some dog food (play dough).  They loved pretending to be dogs themselves- rolling over, shaking hands, fetching.

We looked at a few places on the map and labeled where our Grandma's and Grandpa's lived.

A highlight of the week was learning about caves!  While Angus was exploring he ends up having to spend the night in a cave.  We brought our flash lights and talked about what we might find inside.  We read our book and ate our snack inside too.

 

I think most of our Busy Bees would agree that their most favorite activity is painting.  Helping each other paint seemed to be even more fun! :)  

It was a great week!

Week 19

In preparations for week 19, I was on the fence about what to do. I took me a while to track down the book. When I looked over the activity suggestions from our curriculum, I felt they were more appropriate for a one-on-one setting, not a group. I was worried some might be scared as we read this story, since that has happened in the past as we sang the song. I almost dumped it. I toyed with reading Dr. Suess books and doing things for his birthday instead.

But as I looked at the book again, I got a little inspiration. It truly has beautiful illustrations and the text is so inviting for a read aloud. I am glad I stuck with it. The kids LOVED it. The text was so fun to read. We can leave the Dr. Suess stuff for elementary school. :)

After we read the book the first time, we did a little sequencing. We talked about the beginning, middle and end. What came first, what came next and what came last. We looked for scenes from the story and put them in order. Here, Bronwen holds up a picture of a cave and finds its place.

After the second reading, we discussed our five senses. We talked about how the family in the book was able to enjoy their bear hunt because they used their five senses. The felt the grass, smelled flowers, squished in the mud, walked through the river, saw the dark forest, cave and bear! Then we did a little five senses exploration of our own.

Bronwen uses her hands to feel the grass.


Lincoln and Calli use their noses to smell the flowers.

Sydney and Paige use their ears to hear water splashing in the bowl.

We spent some time working with letters. A little dot-to-dot painting and writing practice of the letter A...

and exploration with magnetic letters...

Paige sorts her letters by color.

Then I encouraged them to find the letters in their names. Fun to see what they came up with...

Sydney and Bronwen enjoying snack outside on a beautiful day...

And wrapping up the week with a bear decoration craft. Can you guess who made each one? It was cracking me up watching them put these together. Personalities totally shining through.

Valentine's Day Party!

The Busy Bees had a lovely party on a rainy day. Engaging activities, yummy food, valentines... it was perfect. Great job co-op team!

Week 13

After the bakery field trip, I thought it would be fun for the Busy Bees to bake and sell their own goods. They had a good time playing grocery store. They did well sharing and taking turns.

We used some letter stamps this week. Interesting to see what letters the children could identify in their artwork. Many found the first letters in their names, their sibling's names or in the Mario Brothers' names. They are practically in the family. :)

We read The Mitten by Jan Brett. Afterwords we each picked an animal to be from the story.

Then we acted out the story and squished each animal inside our mitten!

Later we talked about dressing appropriately for the weather. Here they are dressed for it all... sun, rain or snow!