Listening to sounds

objective: 1. recognize and describe sounds 2. use the computer mouse to click on yellow dots Points to remember: 1. your child may not know the name of the object but use descriptions of the sounds 2. make sure to use lots of conversation Lesson: 1. Go to http://www.phonicsplay.co.uk/SoundStimuli.html 2. Allow your child to click on one yellow dot at a time 3. Each dot is a different sound 4. Some are real sounds and others are funny sound effects. So me start of quietly and gradually get louder, some are long and some are short so there's lots to talk about. For example there are bells, helicopters, chimes, tiger growls, and more. Modifications: 1. Fisher Price has a game called "Who's at the Door?" which is similar.

Red Sock, Yellow Sock

objective: 1. listen to a story with competing background noise 2. answer questions about a story 3. repeat a sentence or phase word for word Points to Remember: 1. Using the background noise/music in a story is a step after listening to stories without the extra noise. 2. I am teaching Brooke to repeat entire sentences to work on developing her auditory memory as well as allow me to see if she is typically leaving out certain parts of speech. Lesson: 1. We found the story Red Socks and Yellow Socks here: 2. Listen to the story in English (your other option is Korean if you want to listen in Korean too) 3. Stop the story occasionally to ask comprehension questions. Try to ask questions that your child can not answer visually like, "What is his name?" or "Cousin Kate said what?"

3. After listening to the story, press the Story Repeat button. Here the voice will read a line and then kids' voices will repeat it - have your child join in with the kid voices to repeat it.

4. The Story Alone button will have the voice read a line from the story and then leave quiet time for your child to repeat it.

5. Brooke's favorite button was the chant. They took the story, reduced the word a made a little song. The second time through the song, the voice leaves time for you child to repeat.

Modifications

1. The Green Dragon

2. Time for Sleep are two more options!

Happy Spring

Happy Spring lunch was a bunny sandwich, spring Oreos, jelly beans, watermellon, hard boiled egg, and carrot and celery sticks. Happy Spring!

Happy St Patrick's Day

We LOVE celebrating St. Patrick's Day at our house! I love creating the special memories with our children! My ultimate goal is for them to always wish they were at home on holidays -so I really do them special! Wouldn't it be great for my children to be grown and away from home and call me saying, "Mom, it is St Patrick's Day and I wish I was home to eat Lucky Charms and Rainbow Cupcakes." So, with that in mind, I LOVE celebrating and creating memories now!

Breakfast

We start at breakfast with Lucky Charms! This cereal only appears in our house on St. Patrick's Day - they don't get it at any other time during the year! Wow, they look forward to it!

Lunch

Lunch on St. Patrick's Day includes shamrocks, Leprechaun magic, and rainbows! They have a Lucky Charm rice crispy treat (I found these at Target this year), rainbow Twizzlers, a rainbow cupcake, and shamrock sandwich made from an English Muffin, cheese and a sliced green pepper to look like a shamrock, a pot of gold, and Leprechaun pudding. The Leprechaun pudding is vanilla pudding with some green food coloring hiding inside - the kids will stir it up so see the Leprechaun Magic turn it green!

This is our Pot of Gold Jello - yellow jello-jigglers cut into gold pieces!

I love our Rainbow cupcakes - white cake mix separated into 6 bowls and turned red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. Spoon one color at a time and use a toothpick to spread the color. Bake as directed on the cake box.

Dinner

Dinner was cabbage and sausage - that is Irish right? With green corn muffins and green salad.

Dessert was Shamrock Shakes:

Shamrock Shakes are mint ice-cream blended with mint extract, green food coloring, and milk! Yummy! Happy St. Patty's Day!

Leprechaun Magic Part 5

In our Steve Spangler Science Kit we were given some rare Leprechaun eggs. These eggs are so cool because they disappear in water.
Here are the Leprechaun eggs

Brooke says, "Magic Hands" and puts the eggs into the water. They disappear!

Then we can pull them back out and there they are!

The Magic is in the water-absorbing polymer that forms an amazing clear sphere. Due to the refraction in the cup of water, it looks as if the spheres completely disappear.

So what can first, the Leprechaun or the egg?

Leprechaun Magic Part 3

Just as we sometimes get snow in North Carolina, the Leprechauns sometimes get snow in the land of the Leprechauns....and I have some. Now the snow looks like ordinary white snow, but with some Leprechaun Magic, the snow is actually green!





Our container of Leprechaun Snow:

Idea and supplies from Steve Spangler Science.

Leprechaun Magic Part 4

Everyone knows that Leprechauns hide their pots of gold at the end of a rainbow. But we are never fast enough to find the gold! Leprechauns are tricky creatures and, I think, they hide their pots of gold at the end of rainbows we can't see! So, we got some special glasses to help us find the rainbows.

We put on the glasses and rainbows appears all over the house! They were everywhere!

Here is why? The Rainbow Detecting Glasses have special lenses that diffract the light. When light is separated we see red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet - the rainbow!

Leprechaun Magic Part 2

How do Leprechauns catch green fish? They use green worms and we know how to make them.
We added some soduim alginate to a water-calcuim solution. The calcium helps to link the small molecules of the alginate into a polymer, a long chain of smaller molecules......in other words, it makes green worms from worm goo.

Idea and supplies from Steve Spangler Science

Leprechaun Magic Part 1

With St. Patrick's Day soon approaching, we have begun some Leprechaun Magic at our house.

Today we learned the secrets of the Leprechaun Sandwich bag! Leprechauns eat enormous sandwiches at lunch time and we happened to find one of their sandwich bags.

We tied a knot at the end of the bag. I asked Jake to try to blow up the bag. He tried about 10 times and gave up saying it would take forever.

I told Jake that I could blow up the bag with just one breath! And I did! Then we talked about why I was able to blow it up with just one breath and he was not even close after 10 blows.

Here is why:

Here is Jake blowing it up with one breath.

Idea and bag from Steve Spangler Science

Sequencing

objective:
a. to sequence 3 events in a story
b. to retell the events of a story using the pictures as a guide
c. to reinforce logic skills, patterning, and sequencing
d. To prepare for pre-reading and pre-writing

Points to remember:
1. Make sure you are working in a quiet environment so you child can hear you easily.

Lesson:
1. Read the story to your child showing the pictures as you go.
Eddie the Elephant rolls in the mud. He thinks it is fun to splash and play and get all dirty.
To get clean, Eddie will give himself a shower. He sucks up water in his big trunk.

Eddie sprays himself all over with the water! That looks like fun!

2. Set the 3 pictures on the table and ask, "Which came first?" and let your child choose the picture. Then ask, "Which comes next?" and finally, "Which comes last?"

3. Once your child has put the pictures in correct sequence, ask her to re-tell the story

Modifications:

1.

Birthday Party Video

Brooke and Kate had an I Spy birthday Party

This is the front of their invitations: I took my own I Spy picture (notice the picture of Brooke and Kate on the I Spy page) and it reads "I Spy with my Little Eye 2 birthday girls who are turning 5, a cake, a game, and a balloon to take." The inside of the invitation had all the details.

At the party we had an I Spy puzzle and books

A make-your-own I Spy Bottle where the children found 10 items in the big bucket and make a bottle to take.

The Balloon Fairy


And an I Spy Game where the children had to find objects on the floor. The caller would say, "I Spy with my little eye something green" and the kids would move to stand on something green. Then the caller would say, "I spy with my little eye something that lives on a farm" and the kids would move to another picture. More than one child can stand on an object at a time and there were at least 3 options for each category. I adapted the idea from our Hullabaloo game and it worked perfectly. The pictures on the floor are stickers on pieces of white paper.

A video of the party is below. Just so you know, the party was right after preschool on March 9th which was Ash Wednesday. You'll notice the kids have ashes on their foreheads - they did that at preschool, not at the party! Just so you know! :) But it would make for a unique party idea!

Birthday Lunch

Birthday Lunch today included a 5- sandwich, 5 Oreos, 5 Fig Newtons, 5 cake, 5 carrots, 5 strawberries and 5 Kiwi all with a pretty bow!

Going to the Park

I found this great listening game at The Listening Room. They post a new listening activity each week for preschool and school age children. This one is called Listening at the Park.

objective: a. to listen to clues about objects on the game board b. to give auditory clues about objects on the game board by describing gender, colors, actions, etc.

Points to Remember 1. you will need a die and 2 game pieces

Lesson: 1. Player 1 begins by placing a token on the start space at the top of the gameboard and rolling the die. Player 2 then chooses a card from the face down pile. Without showing it to Player 1, Player 2 describes the item on the gameboard.

2. Player 1 must then LISTEN and find the matching item on the gameboard. When the item is found Player 1 can move his token the indicated number of spaces.

3. Play then passes to Player 2

Modifications:

1. Grandpa and Brooke played this game, you can have more members of the family join in the fun. 2. Create your own game board of an I spy page or a busy scene from a magazine.

Sequence and re-telling

objective:
a. to retell a story
b. to sequence the events of a story
c. to listen and recognize parts of a story


Points to remember:
1. Story re-telling is a 5 year old skill; don't press you child if this is difficult and she is under that age of 5.
Lesson
1. Using the 6 cards, make up a story about the pictures. Here is mine:

The cow, the pig and the sheep decided to make a snowman. The cow rolled a big snowball for the bottom, the pig rolled a medium snowball for the middle, and the sheep rolled a small snowball for the head.

The animals put their snowballs together to make a snowman. They put mittens and a scarf on the snowman. They gave him a carrot for a nose.

After making the snowman, the cow and the pig and the sheep got very, very cold.

The farmer came outside and said, "You animals should put on a hat so you are no cold!"

The cow put on a hat, the pig put on a hat, the sheep put on a hat, and the snowman put on a hat. Now the farmer is cold.

2. Once you tell your child the story, have your child retell the story using the picture cards.

3. Your child will not tell it exactly the same but as long as their is a part for each picture, I am happy. Brooke's story went like this:
"The cow made the bottom, the pig made the ____ (I gave her the word middle) and the sheep made the face. Put on gloves and scarf and nose. They are so cold. Man says you need to wear a hat. The cow put on a hat, the pig put on a hat, the sheep put on hat, the snowman put on hat. The man is cold."

4. Next work on listening to a part of the story. Put the cards face up in order on the table. Slip a sticker under one of the cards without your child seeing. Say the sentences for that card. You child will then pick up the card that goes with the sentence and find a sticker is she is correct.

Modifications:

1. Use with any 4-6 picture sequence cards. Here is on on a monkey we have done before.
2. Practice this at night by talking about the events of your day in sequential order.

Rhyming Cards

objective:
a. listen for rhyming words
b. pronounce each word correctly

Points to Remember:
1. I have read the books Cat in the Hat and Green Eggs and Ham with Brooke many times. Make sure your child is familiar with the books - it will make it easier to find the rhymes.
Lesson:
1. I found these cute Dr. Seuss Rhyming Cards at Activity Mom and we used them to play a matching game.
2. I put all 18 of the cards on the floor
3. I began the rhyme by saying, "I will not eat it with a goat, I will not eat it in a _____"
4. Your child will say boat and pick up the 2 cards
5. Reinforce the rhyme by saying "goat and boat rhyme"
6. Have your child say, goat and boat
7. Repeat, "I will not eat it in the rain, I will not eat it on a _____"


Modifications:
1. By saying the line from the book Green Eggs and Ham, it makes it easier for your child. Try having her match rhymes without the clue from the book.
2. Use the cards to play Go Fish