Friday, March 4, 2011

Tot School: Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss!

We had such a fun week. We took a break from our normal schedule to celebrate Dr. Seuss' birthday. Instead of separating by day and child this time I'm just going to separate by book.

CAT IN THE HAT
Inspired by this post at Superheroes and Princesses I created a a snack that is supposed to look like the cat's hat. The pictures of the snacks at the link definitely look cuter, but Asa was immediately able to tell what they were supposed to be. I used strawberries, cool whip, and a graham cracker. YUMMMM!
Wearing his cat hat that he made. With some stinking red eye to boot.
Silas enjoyed getting into the crafts this week. He went to town coloring his hat.
He wasn't as fond of wearing it as he was of decorating it though. :)
In the Cat and the Hat book there is a portion where the cat balances things while standing on top of a ball. While my kids would have loved to attempt that I thought it might be too dangerous. I set up another alternative instead. Annabelle and Asa took turns trying to balance the scale against the constant (a rock). Then we would count how many of each item it took to equal the weight of the rock. They had a lot of fun with this.
Measuring out buttons to balance the scale.
I gathered every different kind of hat I could think of in the house and put it in a laundry basket. We had a lot of fun exploring with them.
Asa's favorite hat was one of Zak's winter hats. You can't really see it in this picture because it's black, but Asa thought he was pretty cool sporting something of daddy's.
He was saying, "Hey! I can't see....where am I?" What a goofball. :)
Annabelle tackled him to remind him of where he was. We had a lot of fun with the hats. lol
Silas insisted on wearing this hard hat. Yes, it is backwards....that's just how he rolls. :)
My favorite shot of little Summer Squash. What a cutie. :)
THE FOOT BOOK
We started off by reading the book and then did this fun measurement activity that was found at 2 Teaching Mommies. There are so many fun Dr. Seuss activities at that site! Check it out if you have a minute. Annabelle and Asa took turns measuring the different objects pictured by using their feet. They would then color in the corresponding number of feet. Disclaimer: This is not an accurate form of measurement. lol
Measuring the laundry basket. (Man, someone should put all that laundry away!)
Not the best picture, but I think it is sweet. Asa is waiting patiently for his turn while Annabelle finishes up coloring her feet.
Next, we had some fun decorating our feet.
The finished decorations. Annabelle and Asa both told me what they wanted on their feet. Asa said I want to spell 'foot'. So funny.
Finally, we read the Bible story about Jesus washing the disciples feet and talked about how we should be helpful, kind, and servant-hearted. And we washed the marker off our feet.
GREEN EGGS AND HAM
All three of the kids (yes, I let Silas paint for the first time ever!) pasted clip art images of eggs and ham onto a paper plate and then painted them green.
Silas started off very good.
Then thought that he should taste it (the paint is non-toxic and I severely watered his down). He decided it didn't taste too good so........
He enjoyed painting his face instead. Apparently it tickled. :)
I gathered up some green things and put them all in a laundry basket. This was intended more for Silas, but Asa and Annabelle had just as much fun with it.

Asa working on lacing.
Silas found a triangle.
Trying to figure out how to stick the pipe cleaner into the button hole. That's the look of concentration right there.
HORTON HEARS A WHO
I LOVE these bead letters that I found for a great deal on Craig's List this week. They are the cutest little beads. After I read the story, discussed the importance of listening carefully, and made elephant ears we played a little game with these beads. The game idea came from the 2 Teaching Mommies link I gave above. Annabelle and Asa were both really excited because they had been eying these little guys since I brought them home.
I lined up several letters and would say the phonic sound of the letter. Than Asa (or Annabelle) would come over and pick up the letter that made the sound and put it on his string. I was amazed at the outcome. Asa did not get a single one wrong!
MR. BROWN CAN MOO! CAN YOU?
I unfortunately didn't get any pictures playing this game, but we had fun playing it nonetheless. It is also from 2 Teaching Mommies (told you they had some great stuff)! I cut apart the cube that they had for this came and taped the pieces to our large dice that we have. The kids always love it when I pull out the large dice. The dice would land on a noise and Asa (or Annabelle) would have to identify the noise and put a mark on their chart. We played until the first noise made it until 10.
So that was our really fun week. I know that a few other families did this same theme this week and I'm excited to see their ideas. Happy blogging.

jess_hak

I'm linking this up to 1+1+1=1. Head on over and check it out!
Tot School

11 comments:

  1. I love how you made the die. LOL We never got around to that activity because I never finished making the die. That would've been sooo much easier. LOL

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  2. Wow, you had an AWESOME week! I have the same scale as you! I love your Sensory Bin!! And my ABSOLUTE favorite thing you did was the foot washing. Talk about precious!

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  3. What an amazing week! I love how you had activities to go along with each book. It looks like your little ones had tons of fun-- I'm bookmarking these for next year!

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  4. So many great ideas! I need to get one of those scales. Where did you find yours? My kids would LOVE that.

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  5. Thank you for the kind comments ladies! I really enjoy reading them.

    Krissy - I actually purchased that scale for $2.00 at a thrift store. The ones stores here must get a lot of them because I see them quite regularly.

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  6. Thanks for following my blog I am now following you back:) March will be over before you know it and your hubby will be home. I will be back later to read more posts:)
    ~Jada Roo Can Do

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  7. So many great activities! I'll have to do a Dr. Seuss week next year...or earlier--too much fun!

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  8. Wow, this was such an incredible week and so many creative ideas! The Suess hat treats look really yummy. I love the marker painting on the feet and I was so moved by the activity of washing one another's feet like Jesus. Such a good verse to live out.

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  9. What a great week of activities! I really love your scale experiment and would love to try it soon!! Kerri

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  10. Thanks for sharing the resources! I found the bear hunt lapbook and I'm so excited to see the Bible lessons @ Henny Penny's! I've been reading through your older posts in preparation for when we focus on the letters c and d. You have such great ideas! Thanks for sharing them. :)

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