Creepy Crawlies

    We have spent the past two weeks exploring insects and spiders. Some of the books we used for the unit included Miss Spider's ABC, I Love Bugs and Moosekitos: A Moose Family Reunion. We also looked at the video of a dung beetle from Animals Town. The video of the beetle helped us focus on the head, thorax and abdomen as well as the exoskeleton.

     Our sensory experiences included a sticky easel for insects, insects in the water, finding insects in the beans and using our bubble wands. The wands are made from PVC pipe, cheesecloth and rubber bands.

 

We also explored the outdoors with magnifying glasses and found some spiders and ants.

     Our art and table activities included bingo markers at the easel, easel painting, chalk writing, wikki sticks and insect worksheets found through Google and bean mosaic beetles from Animals Town. We also completed a squish art activity that followed the story of a yellow caterpillar who visited other insects before turning into a butterfly.

 

     We also looked at the idea of flight and floating in the air through paper airplane tosses, balloons and paddles as well as racing balloons.

 Other activities that focused on insects included feeding some hungry fish at the light table, making a "catch the bug" toy with a small wiffle ball, cup and yarn, a worksheet from Making Learning Fun, sorting magnet "eggs" and insects.

   

 

 

 

     We also "chased ants" with a pepper chase activity. Sprinkle pepper on top of water and add a q-tip with Dawn liquid for the chasing effect.

    Activities that we completed these past two weeks that did not have a specific focus included domino play, playing with a variety of balls in our drain pipe structure and floating boats. We also had the opportunity to explore the inside of a VCR.

 

  

 

 

     We will begin our look at seeds and planting next week. I will post our activities at the end of the two-week unit. Here is a video that we enjoyed as we looked at the insect body segments.

 





Dinosaurs, Favorites and Mom

An unfortunate baseball incident for my son along with finals for college pushed this post out a week. I did combine the last two weeks of activity for this post. Spring weather finally arrived and outdoor exploration has stolen the interest of the children. I remember my own childhood days of exploration when the warm weather arrived and couldn't imagine competing with the magic Spring brings.

For our dinosaur wrap up we used the book Saturday Night at the Dinosaur Stomp. We used our "stomp" wall to help keep the beat as we read the story outside. The music fence was inspired by this post.

The dinosaur table activities were found here and at this site. I also included activities from TpT. The dinosaur ten frames are also from TpT, but I could not find the original pdf from Alliegator. Here is the Pinterest link.

Other dinosaur activities included this activity from TpT. We looked at what carnivores and herbivores ate by completing and activity inspired here and then completing the worksheet.

Our sensory experience included a sticky table and playing in potato flakes and water as inspired here.

Our dinosaur art included working with model magic and stamping. Our light table activity included a skeleton activity with straws. The skeletons were found with Google images and printed on translucent card stock.

 

 



One of the activities the children came up with was a baby chick hatchery that could be turned into a baby dinosaur hatchery.

Our focus on favorites included finding the "Itsy Bitsy Spider" in sand and cutting strawberries after reading The Little Mouse, The Red Ripe Strawberry, and the Big Hungry Bear.

 

 

 

Our focus on mom included the book A Mud Pie For Mother.  We also transplanted our zinnia plants into a terracotta pot that had been painted with a pour painting technique. This is a technique we will be revisiting this summer.

Our sensory and light table activities included sand, shaving cream and our favorite paddles and gems. The toddlers used our colored discs and bath mat shapes.

Other outdoor activities included making bubbles with Dawn bubble solution and fly swatters along with chalk rubbings.

The children also had a great time building with the different blocks these past two weeks. Here are a few of their creations. Most of these involved team work and cooperation.

Next week we will begin our look at insects and lead into gardening. I will leave you with one of our inspirations for our stomp fence.