Kindergarten is FIN-tastic!

My 5 year old son and his friends are starting Kindergarten this month!!!  He is a little nervous, so I decided to throw him a Kindergarten is FIN-tastic party based on his current favorite book, Don't Eat the Teacher by Nick Ward.

One of the writers at Toddler Approved is my REAL LIFE friend, not just a virtual one.  Our children are going to be in the very same class this year and we are going to be the class reps together.  We put our brains together to plan a super-fun party for 7 cute soon-to-be kindergarteners!  

Gathering Activity: Name Bracelets

Kindergarten Skills:  Name recognition, patterning, Name spelling, Fine Motor Skills

As the children arrived, they located their names that I had written on these adorable name plates I found here. The children found a bag with letter beads and sea animal beads that they used to make bracelets.  

TEACHER SAYS

As they finished their bracelets, they joined in a game of TEACHER SAYS, played just like Simon Says.  We played a noncompetitive version, where no one got out.  

Kindergarten Skills: Listening and Following Directions

Circle Time: Don't Eat the Teacher by Nick Ward 

Kindergarten Skills: Active Listening, Participation in Circle Time, Singing in a Group 

I love the book Don't Eat the Teacher by Nick Ward.  It is the story of a little shark who is nervous about his first day of school.  He has the unfortunate habit of BITING things when he is excited and nervous.  At school, he keeps "accidentally" eating things.  He eats a paintbrush, a story book, and even a friend (who is safe).  At the end, he tries to eat the teacher!  All of his friends yell at him "Don't Eat the Teacher!"  Intermixed in the story are introductions to different parts of the school day.  This is a simple and fun book!  It is VERY SILLY!  Every year that I read this to my Kindergarteners they begged for it to be read over and over and over again.  So much so, that the cover of my book is torn off.  I borrowed a friend's copy for the party. 

After the story, we sang the traditional silly camp song, "Baby Jaws."  

JAWS
(repeat each line) 
Baby Jaws, doot doot doot do (thumb and index finger open and shut like a mouth)
Mama Jaws, doot doot doot do (Hand opens and shuts)
Papa jaws, doot doot doot do (two hands together open and shut)
Grandpa Jaws, doot doot doot do (fists together to look like toothless mouth)
Giant jaws, doot doot doot do (arms together to make mouth)
Lady swimming, doot doot doot do (swimming motion)
Shark is coming, doot doot doot do (hand on forehead like fin)
Lady Screaming "A-HA" doot do (arms in air)
Shark is leaving, doot doot doot do (hand on forehead)
And That's the story doot doot doot do...ABOUT JAWS! 

Craft:  Shark Teeth Phone Number

Kindergarten Skills: Following Directions, using a glue stick correctly, learning phone number

Materials Needed: Blue paper plate, 3 triangles cut from blue poster board, 2 large googly eyes, 7 white small triangles with one digit of  the child's phone number written on each tooth, stapler, glue stick

1-Staple one blue triangle on top as the shark dorsal fin.  Staple the other two triangles on the side to make pectoral fins.

2-Glue on the googly eyes.

3-Allow the child to arrange the digits to create his phone number.  Glue to the plate in the correct order.  

 Game: Don't Eat The Teacher!

Kindergarten Skills: Taking Turns, Following Directions, Color Identification, Comparing Sizes, Fine Motor Skills

I created a large poster board sized game inspired by the game "Don't Eat Pete."  Using my Cricut, I cut out 9 sea horses: 3 sizes and 3 colors.  

1-The children sat in a circle around the game board. 

2-A goldfish cracker was placed in each square of the grid.  
3-The children took turns leaving the room one at a time.  When out of the room, a seahorse was selected as the "teacher" for that turn.   
4-When the child returned to the room, he ate one goldfish cracker at a time.  If it was not the seahorse selected, the rest of the children all said together, "THAT'S NOT THE TEACHER."  

5-The child continued to the crackers, attempting to find the teacher.  Once they ate the cracker chosen as the teacher, the other children all yelled, "DON'T EAT THE TEACHER!" 

6-Crackers were replaced and another child took a turn. 

This is such a simple game, but the kindergarteners thought it was hilarious! 

Outside Learning Games by Toddler Approved

Kindergarten Skills: Taking Turns, Letter Recognition, Number Recognition, Gross Motor Play 

The children changed into swim suits and headed outside for shark themed learning games that included WATER!!!!  For all of the details of the fun games go to Toddler Approved's post on the party. 

SHARK SNACKS

The children enjoyed shark tooth shaped pizza slices, a watermelon shark, and shark cupcakes. 

PARTY FAVORS: CANDY KABOBS

We created these adorable party favors using Swedish fish and shark gummies, inspired by Celebrations At Home Blog. 

We are participating in the KBN Back to School Bonanza! 


 

 Check out these other great Back to School Ideas!

10 Little Rubber Ducks

This summer, our family signed up to participate in The Educators' Spin On It: Summer Book Exchange!  Twenty bloggers agreed  to 1-0choose a favorite book to share and 2-)send it with activity ideas and supplies to another blogger!  Mommy and Me Book Club was paired up with the fabulous hostess of the event...The Educator's Spin On It!   We had sooo much fun putting our package together to send off to our friends at The Educators' Spin On It!  My three kiddos were very excited to send their kiddos our activities and a beloved book.  (I will share what we sent as soon as they post)!   But my kids were not NEARLY as excited to give as they were when the postman delivered a book box to our home!!!!

My children are a bit obsessed with birds of all kinds...but ducks are currently the favorite! Can you imagine their excitement when there was a GIANT YELLOW DUCK on the outside of the package? Guesses of what duck book might be inside flew wild across the kitchen table.


My eldest son made everyone cover their eyes while I opened the box and revealed the book....

  10 Little Rubber Ducks by Eric Carle! It is a sweet story of a box of rubber duckies who fall off of their transport ship and out of their box into the ocean.  Each rubber duckie meets a different ocean animal on his adventure. Perfect for summer!  The book counts from one to ten as it introduces each animal.  (AND it wasn't one we already had or one that any of the kids guessed!  Hooray for surprises)! The Educators' Spin On It sent us SEVERAL envelopes with Rubber Duckie book inspired learning activities!

It was a very rainy day outside, so we started on the activities right away!  (Although there were so many fabulous learning activities, we did have to spread them out over two days)!

My eldest wanted to read the story to his younger siblings.  (Which was perfect for being able to take pictures, so I didn't mind.  Is there anything sweeter than siblings reading together)?

MAKE RUBBER DUCK FACTORY SIGN
For our first activity, we used the supplies sent, to make our own Rubber Duck Factory Sign.  Each child helped by either writing or decorating.    This was such a fun way to set the stage and spark the children's imagination as we proceeded through the rest of the activities. 

CREATE THE CHARACTERS FROM
 THE STORY AND RETELL

We used these fun art supplies and created each of the characters from the story....including the sun.  Everyone took a couple of different animals and set to work.  I was surprised at how creative they were with the pipe cleaners.  Then they enjoyed retelling the story with the characters they made, over and over again...especially my youngest.  She wasn't really interested in moving on to another activity.... even an hour later. 

MATH ACTIVITIES: MAKE NUMBER DUCKS, PRACTICE FACT FAMILIES, AND ORDINAL NUMBERS

Next we had fun with MATH!  My sons created the numeral ducks together and practiced addition and subtraction facts.  Then they played with these adorable ordinal number cards!

SPELLING PRACTICE

My 5 year old practiced spelling these animal names from the story using letter beads and word cards.  He loved it and asked for more words when he was finished. 

ABC DUCKIES
My three year old enjoyed making and playing with these ABC duckies with me.

MAKE YOUR OWN ANIMAL STAMPS 

One of the fun activities was to make our own stamps using sticker characters from the book and bottle caps.  This was another activity that my 3 year old had no desire to stop!

 TEN DUCKS IN A BOX

We used the duck stamp to create several boxes of ten ducks and practiced counting by tens.

WHERE IS THE DUCK?  POSITIONAL WORDS AND MAP PRACTICE

My 7 year old enjoyed playing "teacher" and calling out the positional words to his little brother.  "Move the duck east of South America....Move the duck under Antarctica."  I was surprised how quickly my 5 year old picked up on the names of the continents in order to play the game!

WATER COLOR ANIMALS INSPIRED BY ERIC CARLE

For our culminating event, the children watched a video online about how Eric Carle creates his art and then tried their hands at creating their own!

Thank you so much for the fun activities and new book for our collection!  We had such a wonderful time participating and look forward to seeing everyone else's posts! My 7 year old is creating a list of all the people we know and which books he would like to send them now!

 Here are some of the other participants who have already shared their book exchange posts!  Make sure to check out their book inspired fun!  I will continue to update between now and the end of July!  THANK YOU, Educators' Spin On It, for all of your hard work organizing this exchange and, our own family thanks you especially for the fun activities you mailed us! 

No Doubt Learning
Having Fun At Chelle's House- Five Little Ducks

Make Do and Friend
Taming the Goblin
Growing Book by Book
The Vincent Family
Enchanted Homeschooling Mom
Here Come the Girls - The Worst Princess

Commotion in the Ocean

This week's activities were inspired by Giles Andreae's book Commotion in the Ocean.
 

It was our last week of Mommy and Me of the school year.  (But we will be doing book inspired play dates all summer with all 3 of my children)!


Gathering: Ocean sensory bin

We were inspired by a cute ocean themed sensory bin at The Picky Apple and made our own with ocean themed items at our house.  

Circle Time

We read Commotion in the Ocean during  circle time.  This is a fun book that features many different animals that live in the ocean.  Each animal is given its own page and witty poem to describe its features.  The poems are short and funny.  The book kept our preschoolers attention, which is a big deal considering they were all wearing swimsuits and excited about swimming! 

We did the traditional finger play "Fish Story."

"One, two, three, four, five -
Once I caught a fish alive.
Six, seven, eight, nine, ten -
Then I let it go again.
Why did I let it go?
Because it bit my finger so.
Which finger did it bite?
The little finger on the right."

Art: Paper Towel Roll Octopus
One of my favorite blogs is Mom to 2 Posh Lil Divas.  When I saw this adorable octopus, I knew it would have to be our craft to go with Commotion in the Ocean! 

 Snack: Blue Ocean Yogurt Snack with Fishies and Cookie Sand
 

We were inspired by these cute fishy snacks at Welcome Baby.  The kids loved them! 

Activity: Swimming

One of our Mommy and Me friends invited us to swim in their pool.  It was the perfect way to end a wonderful year together!