Little Owl Lost

Our activities this week were inspired by the book Little Owl Lost by Chris Haughton. 

Gathering Activity: Mommy and Child Owl Memory Game 

We printed a copy of this adorable owl themed memory game from Mama's Monkeys.  It is offered as a free download. We prepared one for each mom and child pair to play as we gathered, and then they took them home to play as well.  These were a big hit with our little ones! 

Circle Time

We read Little Owl Lost by Chris Haughton.  This was a new find for me, and is now one of the most read books in our collection.  It is a very familiar theme, a bird falls out of a tree and gets lost.  Other animals help him find his Mommy.  However, Haughton's take on a familiar theme is fresh.  The pictures are bright and bold and simple.  Our little ones laughed aloud when the frog helping the baby owl find the mommy kept choosing the wrong mommy.  They enjoyed joining in for the repetitive parts of the story.  The moms loved that the mommy owl cries for joy when she finds her baby.  Then she invites the search party back for cookies.  It was loved by both moms and toddlers. Now my two year old daughter loves to pretend she is the owl falling out of the tree ALL the time.  It is very sweet.

Owl Fingerplays:

(Tune of Skip to my lou)

Owl in the tree says, "Who, who, who."

Owl in the tree says, "Who, who, who."

Owl in the tree says, "Who, who, who.

Who, who, are you?"

5 Little Owls-Fingerplay

5 little owls on a moonlit night 5 little owls are quite a sight.

5 little owls Are you keeping score? One flew away! And then there were 4.

4 little owls Happy as can be, One flew away! Then there were 3.

3 little owls Calling "Whoo! Whoo!" One flew away! And that left two.

2 little owls having lots of fun. One flew away! And that left 1.

1 little owl We are almost done. He flew away! And that leaves none.

Both of these were found here:

http://www.perpetualpreschool.com/preschool_themes/owls/owl_songs.htm

Art: Paper Plate Owls 

The Mommy in charge of the art project this week had a sick little one, so she couldn't make it.  I pulled together supplies we had on hand.  


Materials Needed: Two paper plates, one whole and one cut in half,  2 white cupcake liners, black paint, magenta circles for the eyes and magenta triangle nose, turquoise paper napkins torn into strips or ric rac, glue, stapler

1-Staple the half plates onto the whole plate to create the body and wings of the owl.

2-Allow the children to paint the plates.   (We only had blue on hand, but I recommend black to make the owl look like the one in the book).

3- Glue the cupcake liners on the owl to make eyes.  Glue magenta circles inside. Glue on triangle nose.

4-Glue down the strips of paper napkins to create feathers.  (I had planned on using ric rac, but only had napkins on head.  They still worked, but didn't really look like the owl in the book).

Snack: Owl Sandwiches

The kids loved making these cute owl sandwiches.  You can find out how to make them here.  

Activities: Owl Bean Bag Toss

I could not resist this idea for an adorable owl bucket I saw on Oriental Trading Company. We made our own and the kids had a great time throwing bean bags into the bucket.  To make your own, follow the directions here.

The Day it Rained Hearts

*****The children each brought Valentine cards to share with our friends. 


Gathering: Make Bags for Our Valentine Cards

I wanted to make our Valentine mailbags with umbrellas and hearts to go with our book.  

  

Materials needed: White paper bags, small heart stickers, 3 cupcake liners per child (we used cute Valentine themed ones), 3 pipe cleaner halves, glue,crayons, letter stickers for names 

1-Glue cupcake liners upside down to look like umbrellas.  Bend the pipe cleaner to look like an umbrella handle and add it to the bag.  
2-Place heart stickers on the bag to look like it is raining hearts.
3-Add letter stickers for their names.  

4-Place valentine cards inside for our friends.

Circle Time: The Day it Rained Hearts

We read The Day it Rained Hearts by Felicia Bond.  It is a very sweet and simple story of a little girl who makes Valentines for all of her animal friends one day that it rained hearts from the sky.


 We sang a sweet song together after our story.  My little girl has sang it all week long. 


I wrote one letter on each of five hearts, and took one away each time we sang the song. 

Heart-o (tune of bingo) Instead of clapping, we blew kisses, each time we took a heart letter away.

“There is a word and it means love and heart is it’s name-o.
H-e-a-r-t.  H-e-a-r-t. H-e-a-r-t and Heart is it’s name-o.”


Art: Heart Garland

In the story the little girl strings together 7 hearts to make one of the valentines.  

Materials Needed: 7 large hearts per child (hole punch the hearts on each side to make for easy threading), yarn or ribbon, glue, crayons, sequins, stickers, any other collage materials you might want to bring

1-It was easiest to FIRST let the children thread their hearts together.
2-Decorate the hearts with collage materials provided to make your own garland. 

 

Snack: Valentine Popcorn, Strawberries, and Pink Milk

We enjoyed yummy Valentine Popcorn we made from this recipe at Nest of Posies. It is VERY ADDICTIVE!

We rounded out the treat with strawberries and pink milk!

Heart Activities

1-Conversation heart scoop “relay”

We had two buckets set up across the room from each other.  One child begins at the starting line next to a bucket filled with conversation hearts. Give each child a measuring cup scoop (Target had heart shaped ones in the dollar section).  The children carried the filled cup and emptied it into the bucket across the room.  Then they returned the cup to the next friend waiting.   

Helpful hint:
Don’t make it a competitive game.  But do supply enough materials for two or three “teams.”  (6 buckets, 3 scoops) That will give each of the children several turns, but still an opportunity to practice taking turns while their partner goes.

2- Let It Rain Hearts

We used paper and foam hearts to rain down on our little ones.
This was a fun idea inspired by Totally Tots!
(Idea based on activity found here).

3-Stacking Conversation Hearts

Give the children large conversation hearts and allow them to try and make the tallest tower they can before it falls.  They loved this game and kept trying over and over again. 

Valentines Day Blog Hop

Mommy and Me Book Club is excited to be participating in a collaborative Valentines Blog Hop hosted by Mama Pea Pod!  Please click on the button above to find tons of wonderful activities to celebrate this special day with your little ones!

Click here to see the Valentine fun we had last year with the sweet book, Snuggle Puppy.   On Thursday, we will have activities, crafts, and treats to share from this year's Mommy and Me Valentine selection, The Day it Rained Hearts.

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. 
  

.

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!