Tot School Letter "G"

"G"is for Gumballs

28 months

Dot Art Gumballs

Little Sweets put gumballs on the gumball a gumball machine I drew.  She used bingo stamps to make the gumballs.

Alphabet Gumball Machine

I drew a gumball machine that had letters on the gumballs.  Little Sweets identified the letters and matched gumball letters.

Gumball Counting Game

Little Sweets used pom poms as gumballs.  She counted the circles on the gumball machines and put the pom poms ontop of the circles.  She also identified the number on the machine.

For more great tot school posts go here. http://1plus1plus1equals1.blogspot.com/2010/11/tot-school.html

Tot School- Letter "F"

Letter "F"  Family and Fall

Family "I Spy" Game

Little Sweets has a very large extended family. I thought it would be fun to make an "I Spy" game with family members pictures. She had to point to the picture of the family member I named.

Birthday Cake Counting Book

I made a book with pictures of Little Sweets cousins. Under each child was a birthday cake with candles. Little Sweets had to count the number of candles to figure out how old each cousin was.

Fall Festival

While we were in Ohio we went to a fun fall festival.  Little Sweets went on a hayride, played in hay playground, visited a pumpkin patch, and visited an apple orchard.  She was tired that day, but must have enjoyed it because she asked me the other day if she could go on a hayride again. 

Little Sweets smelling the pretty fall flowers.

Little Sweets on the hayride.  

Here's a picture of the pumpkin patch.  We didn't pick a pumpkin because there was no way pregnant mommy was going to carry it up the hill.  We did get a pumpkin at the store though. 

Painting  a Leaf

I had some leaf cutouts left over from when I taught kindergarten.  Little Sweets had fun painting the cutout in autumn colors. 

Leaf Matching Game

This was also another item from my fall kindergarten tub.  It is a large piece of chart paper with different color leaves glued to it.  When I taught kindergarten I used it for counting, writing down numbers, and graphing the number of different colored leaves.  Little Sweets counted the leaves and matched the leaves by color. 

Leaf Color Game

Little Sweets is still working on identifying colors so I came up with this game to help her.  I  made color mats and hung them on the wall.  Each mat has velcro on it so we can hang pictures from it.  I made fall colored leaf stencils, laminated them, and put velcro on the back.  I gave Little Sweets the  different colored leaves told her the color and had her place it on the correct color chart on the wall.  She did a great job. 

College Football

It wouldn't be fall without college football.  Daddy and Little Sweets are haning out on the couch getting ready to watch the Buckeyes!!!  Little Sweets just loves the Buckeyes.  

For more great tot school posts please go here.

Blogging Break

I am taking a break from blogging .  I hope to start posting again in a few weeks. 

Book Review- A Christmas Prayer by Amy Parker

I recently received the book A Christmas Prayer by Amy Parker in the mail courtesy of booksneeze.com. This is an adorable board book that reminds children that Christmas isn't just about recieving presents.  The charecter in the book is giving thanks for the blessings of Christmas.  This is a great story to read while putting up a Nativity or just to read at Christmas time to remind children what Christmas is about.  I absoluetely love this story and plan on starting a tradition by reading this book each Christmas with my children.

 
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from BookSneeze.com book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. For more information about this program please go here.

Review- One Hand, Two Hands by Max Lucado

I recently received the book One Hand, Two Hands by Max Lucado in the mail courtesy of booksneeze.com.  This is a delightful book that teaches young children that hands are for helping.  The young girl in the book gives examples of how you can help with your hands.  Such examples include; cleaning her room, washing the dishes, and writing a card.  The illustrations are adorable and young children will enjoy looking at them.  The author also uses rhyming text which will draw the attention of young children.  Overall, I would give this book four out of five stars. 

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from BookSneeze.com book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. For more information about this program please go here.

Tot School Letter "E"

Letter "E"

26 months old

We did lots of egg activities this week for the letter "E."

Color Matching Activity

I colored the bottom of an egg carton.  Little Sweets matched the correct plastic egg with the correct spot in the egg carton. 

Math Activity- Number Matching

I put foam numbers in plastic eggs.  Little Sweets opened the eggs and found the foam number. Then she matched the numbers to the numbers on a number card I made. ( I made the number card by copying the foam numbers on our color copy machine.)

Language Arts Activity-Letter "E" Stencil

I printed a letter "e" stencil from the DLKT website.  Then I had Little Sweets put blocks on the stencil.  I got this idea from Confessions of a Homeschooler.  ( I think she has a stencil you can print out too.

Science- Floating Egg Experiment

I got this idea from the everything preschool website.  We put a hard boiled egg in water and it sank.  Then we put salt into the water and it started to float. 

Science-  Coloring Eggs

Little Sweets helped me color eggs.  This was her first time and she really enjoyed this activity. 

Snack-  Hard boiled Eggs

Little Sweets helped me peel the eggshells off the eggs.  She was fascinated by this.  She kept saying; "oo, wow" as she did it.  We saved the pretty shells for a later art project.  Then she ate some of the egg. 

Art-  Eggshell Collage

We used the broken up eggshells to make a pretty collage.  We got this idea from the Everything Preschool Website. 

Language Arts

We also put up the letter "E" on our wall and read lots of books.  An "E" book we read was An Extraordinary Egg by Leo Lioni.

Other Pictures

I thought this was so cute.  Now that Little Sweets is potty trained so are her dollies.

Little Sweets loves hanging out with daddy.  She really likes to help him water the flowers. 

I didn't have any planned Bible Activities this week  though we talk about Jesus daily and read Bible stories adaily.  We also just started praying with Little Sweets for missionaries.  She loves to do this and always reminds us before bed that we have to pray for the missionary families. 

I actually hadn't planned on doing any of the "E" activities this week.  I was going to wait until next week, but Little Sweets randomly pulled out her eggs and asked to play with them so I just went with it and continued with more egg activities the rest of the day and week.  She had fun so I am glad we did tot school this week. 

Tot School - Letter "D"

Letter "D"

(26 Months Old)

This week we had a lot of errands so we didn't get much tot school in.  Here are some pictures of some of the letter "D" activities we did.

Math Activity

"D" is for Dora Counting Cards.  I made these Dora cards for Little Sweets.  She used foam numbers to match the numbers on the card.  I wanted her to count the characters on the card, but most of the time she just matched the number without counting.  She loves counting, but I think she got distracted by the foam numbers.   

Dramatic Play

"D" is for dollhouse.  Little Sweets loved playing with her Little People doll house.  She likes to mix all her little people together so if you are wondering that is baby Jesus sleeping in the crib. 

File Folder Game

"D" is for dog.  Little Sweets loves dogs.  I found a matching file folder game at the file folder fun website.  Little Sweets loved matching the pictures of the dogs. 

Art

Little Sweets enjoyed making dot pictures using her bingo dot markers.  She also put dots on a letter "D" stencil that I made. 

Language Arts

We read lots of books together this week.  I picked out some Dr. Seuss books and Little Sweets really enjoyed them.  I didn't have any pictures from last week, but here are some pictures of Little Sweets looking and books from a few weeks ago. 

Bible Activity

This week we didn't do an art activity with our Bible stories.  We did continue to read a Bible story before bed and listened to Bible songs. 

Other Activities

I took Little Sweets to the splash pad near our house.  She loves running through the water.  It was really nice because all of the school aged kids are in school now so I don't have to worry about her getting run over.

For more great tot posts go here.

Tot School Letter "C"

Letter "C"

26 months old

This week we worked on some letter "C" Activities.  We also continued with potty training and Little Sweets has done fantastic.   : )

Language Art Activities

 Letter of the Week Alphabet Cards

Each week we put up the letter of the week on the wall. Little Sweets reviews the letters that on are on the wall throughout the week. Here she is finding the letter "C."

Tracing the Letter "C"

I drew the letter "C" using a highlighter. I helped Little Sweets trace over the letter with a darker colored marker.

Read-alouds and Laptime Reading

We read lots and lots of books together.  Little Sweets loves to sit on mommy and daddy's laps and just listen to stories.  She also likes to get a big pile of books together and lay on the floor reading them.

Math and Fine Motor Skills

Caterpillar Fun

I made caterpillars on the computer and printed out the pictures. Then I glued them to note cards. Each caterpillar is made up of a different number of circles. I wrote the number of circles on the corner of each card. Little Sweets put circle stickers on the circles that made up the caterpillar. Then she counted the stickers afterwards and I showed her the number

The note cards I made.

Little Sweets putting the circle stickers on the caterpillars. (She is working on her fine motor skills.)

Little Sweets showing mommy her caterpillar.  She was very excited.

Little Sweets counting the number of  circles on her caterpillar.

The finished note cards.

More fun with Caterpillars

I pulled out the caterpillar pattern cards that we worked on during our bug unit.  You can print out a copy for yourself by going here.  You may need to enlarge the caterpillars  depending on the size of your pom poms.  Little Sweets matched the pom poms to the colored circles on the caterpillar.  This was a great activity to use to work on her fine motor skills as well as matching.  I also showed her the color patterns on the caterpillars. 

The caterpillar cards.

Little Sweets placing the pom poms on the cards.   

Art/Fine Motor Activity

Cookie Cutters and Playdough

Little Sweets had fun using cookie cutters to cut out playdough cookies.  She also enjoyed just playing with the playdough.  Playdough is great for building children's fine motor skills.

Coloring

Little Sweets loves coloring.  She is coloring a Dora picture in this picture.

Cotton Ball Sheep to go with our Bible Story

One of the stories we read from Little Sweets Children's Bible was The parable of the lost sheep. (Matthew 18: 10-14)  After we read and talked about the story Little Sweets covered a sheep that I had cut out with white cotton balls.  She enjoyed this activity, but wanted to wash her hands every few minutes because the cotton would stick to her fingers.  : )

Other Activities

Language Arts Matching Game

Little Sweets matched the letters from her alphabet puzzle to the letter cards on the wall.  She thought it was so much fun that she asked to get more cards out so she could do more matching.  She loves this game and plays it almost everyday. 

Little Sweets matching a letter to the cards on the wall. 

Other Cards and letters that she matched.

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