Three Little Kittens

This week our activities were inspired by the book  Three Little Kittens illustrated by Paul Galdone.

Gathering Activity: ICE PAINTING IN MITTENS

This was a wonderful sensory activity. We froze water and paint in an ice cube tray the night before using several different colors of paint. We let the children ice paint while wearing a pair of mittens.  They loved it! 

 

Circle:

We read The Three Little Kittens by Paul Galdone. 
  

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We sang the song "Mittens on My Hands"
(Sung To: 'Wheels on the Bus')

The mittens on my hands
Keep me warm
Keep me warm
Keep me warm
The mittens on my hands
Keep me warm
All Winter long!


Art: Hanging Kittens with Mittens
 

This activity needs lots of prep, but they are so very cute! 

We used the templates found here at  danielle's place We found it easiest if the ears, nose, mittens, etc... were precut before class.  And if the head, body, legs, and tails were already attached as one piece with a stapler so they can paint them easily. 

Make the cat that is featured below with the following modifications:
1-Let the children paint their preassembled cats.

2-Use glue to add the eyes, ears, nose, whiskers, mouth. 


3-Provide precut colored construction paper mittens for the children to place on their kittens hands when finished.  

Snack: Pie...of course!

We had individual fruit pies for each child. 

Activities: Mitten Sorting and Mitten Bean Bag Toss

Mitten Sorting: Everyone brought as many pairs of mittens and gloves as we could find.  We let the children ”hunt for” matches for the mittens.  

Mitten Bean Bag Toss:
We made bean bags out of mittens and gloves with no matches. We filled the mittens and gloves with beans and sewed up the ends.  (Hint:  It was easiest to fill them by using a funnel from a home canning kit).  

To play, place 3 empty pie tins in a row in front of a laundry basket.  Let the children take turns throwing the mittens and gloves in.   

The Snowy Day

All of our activities this week were inspired by the book The Snowy Day by Ezra Keats. 

 

Gathering Activity: Pipe Cleaner Snowflake

 
Materials Needed: White pipe cleaners and pony beads

 

We had the pipe cleaners already cut and placed 3 halves in a bag with the beads ready to go for each individual child to make one. 

 
1-Mommies crossed the three halves to make a star shape.

2-Children threaded beads onto each side of the snowflake. 

Our little ones loved doing this and would have enjoyed making several each.

Circle Time

 

We read The Snowy Day by Ezra Keats.  It is one of my favorite winter children's books.  I love the illustrations.  I love the descriptive narration.   The book is the story of a young boy's adventures playing outside in the snow.   He makes footprints in the snow, makes tracks with a stick, hits a tree, sleds, and makes snow angels.  He tries to save a snowball in his pocket, but of course it melts away.   I think the thing I like most about this book is this author's keen understanding of the thought process of a little boy.  As readers, we discover the snowy world with the sweet little boy who wants so badly to be a big boy.    The text is the perfect length for a read aloud for our twos and threes.

We sang  “Once there was a Snowman.”

Once there was  a snowman, snowman, snowman.

Once there was a snowman TALL, TALL, TALL.  (Reach to the sky).

In the sun he melted, melted, melted.

In the sun he melted. small, small, small.  (Melt into the floor).  

 

If you are unfamiliar with the tune of this song, you can find the music for the song here. 

We also used these cute snowmen I have for our flannel board and sang "One little, two  little, three little snowmen." 

 
 

Art: Marshmallow Snowman

 

We were inspired by the cute Marshmallow snowman found on the website No Time For Flashcards and had to create our own!  It was great fine motor practice.  And only a couple ended up in our little ones' mouths.  Leave it to my cute girl to be the only one to try and eat them after she had dipped them in glue!   

Materials Needed: Glue, marshmallows, construction paper with light pencil outline of a snowman, orange nose, and pens or crayons to draw features on snowman

 
1-Mommy and child trace outline of snowman with glue. 

2-Place marshmallows on the glue outline.

3-Glue on orange nose.

4-Let your child draw features on the snowman.

Snack:  Snow Cones

(The little boy in the story has a snowball that melts and he is sad.  I don’t think our little ones were too sad to eat their snowballs).  

 

We made snow cones using this awesome snow cone maker by Rival.   

We added milk, vanilla, and sugar to the shaved ice.  We wanted our snow cones to stay white like Peter's snow balls.

Activities: Snowball Fight and Shaving Cream

Snowball fight:   We had an indoor snowball fight using the cotton batting.  

 
Painting with Shaving Cream: We let the children make tracks through shaving cream on the table with sticks.  (Peter makes tracks in the snow with a stick).  We thought that the stick might help a couple of our little ones who are hesitant with new textures.  However no one seemed to have a problem with the shaving cream. They all dove right in! 

Bear Snores On

Our activities this week were inspired by Karma Wilson's Bear Snores On.


Gathering: Teddy Bear Story Time

Each of the children brought a teddy bear from home to join in the fun!  We read bear themed stories with our teddy bears and Mommies together in the living room while we waited for all of our friends to arrive.

Circle Time

We read Bear Snores On by Karma Wilson.  This sweet book tells the story of a hibernating bear whose cave is visited by several animals seeking shelter from a snow storm.  As each animal arrives, he brings a snack to share and soon the animals are having a party inside the cave while the bear continues to sleep.  In the end he wakes up and is very sad that they had a party without him.  The animals invite bear to join in the fun and the party continues until all of the animals fall asleep, except for the bear. 

We did these fun bear themed finger plays after our story.

Hibernation Song - sung to "Are You Sleeping"

Bear is sleeping, bear is sleeping
In the cave, in the cave.
I wonder when he'll come out, I wonder when he'll come out
In the spring, In the spring.

(song found here http://stepbystepcc.com/hibernation.html)

Bear Finger Play

Here is a cave.

(Bend fingers on one hand)
Inside is a bear.
(Put thumb inside fingers.)
Now he comes out
To get some fresh air.
(Pop out thumb.)

He stays out all summer
In sunshine and heat.
He hunts in the forest
For berries to eat.
(Move thumb in a circle.)

When snow sarts to fall.
He hurries inside
His warm little cave
And there he will hide.
(Put thumb inside fingers.)

Snow covers the cave
Like a fluffy white rug.
Inside the bear sleeps
All cozy and snug.
(Place one hand over the other.)
Author Unknown


Art: Bear Cave Craft

Materials Needed: Glue, blue paper, black tree cut out, yellow moon cut out, brown half circle, googly eyes, and cotton balls

The children glued the pieces to the blue paper to create a bear peeking out of a snowy cave.

 
Our project was inspired by this idea found here at Kiboomu. 

Snack: Popcorn and Honey Nuts

The book features an impromptu potluck which included  popcorn and honey nuts, so of course we had to eat those for snack!

Activities: Parachute Games and Pretend

Teddy Bear Hibernation Parachute Game:  

We placed every one’s bears inside the parachute. (a few other animals found their way into the parachute as well). We play Parachute games with them inside.  The children had fun tossing them into the air. 

Then we let the children “hibernate” with them under a cave that the mommies made with the parachute.  

Don’t Wake Up Bears:  Our children pretended to be asleep.  Then we would say "Wake Up Bears!"   The little ones stood up with their bears and did their best GROWLS!!!  

Antarctic Antics

 

Gathering Activity: Read Penguin Books.

One of our little Mommy and Me friends LOVES all things penguin, and brought several fun penguin toys and books to share during our gathering time.

Circle Time:  Antarctic Antics


We read the book Antarctic Antics:A Book of Penguin Poems by Judy Sierra during circle time.  It is a cute collection of poems about penguins.  There are simple riddles to figure out. Lots of fun scientific facts about penguins are shared in the pages, too. (Even the mommies learned lots of fun new things).  It was the first time we had done a book of poetry at Mommy and Me, and the little ones seemed to like them a lot.  The first poem is about the penguin hatching and the poems continue to follow the life of a penguin.  I think the kids' favorite was one called "Regurgitate."  It tells how a daddy penguin feeds his baby.  We used one of the poems as a finger play as well.  We counted penguins together.  Afterward, I shared a cute song I found here.

I'm a Little Penguin
(sung to tune of "I'm a Little teapot.")
I'm a little penguin black and white,
I waddle to the left and I waddle to the right.
I cannot fly but I can swim, so I waddle to the water and jump right in!

Art: Paper Plate Penguins

We made these cute penguins together.   

Snack:  Olive Penguins and Penguin Cupcakes

 

Olive Penguins and Penguin Cupcakes

These were really yummy treats we enjoyed together. 

Activities:  

1-Penguin Shuffle:  The children took turns waddling down the hall with a ball between their feet.  They were pretending to carry eggs the way the that Daddy penguins do.  

2-Iceberg Hop: Use white  pillow cases  and allow the children to hop from iceberg to iceberg.  Then play musical icebergs, taking away one iceberg at a time until all of the children are sharing one iceberg in the end.

3-Feed the Penguin:  The children threw bean bag "fish" into a box to feed the baby penguin.