A is for Alphabet

 It’s so exciting to start a new Preschool year. I love it! There is a big difference between two and three-year-old preschoolers and 4-year-old preschoolers ready for kindergarten next year. This year, I have my 4-year-old. She knows her upper-case letters (by name and can write them) and a lot of her numbers. She knows animals and shapes. We’ll be working on lower-case letters, writing numbers and just playing and having fun doing the things that she loves … princesses, drawing, moving, and pretending. That’s what I love about preschool at home: I can customize it to fit each of my kids.

• Color Letter A Hat … This is a great FREE printable from Beth at 123 Homeschool 4 Me. There is a hat for every letter A-Z! 
  1. Download and print the letter A hat here.
  2. I cut out the hat and taped it ahead of time.
  3. Color!
  4. Trace the letters and talk about the pictures.
  5. Tape to fit head and wear!

• Introduce Alphabet Strip
  1. Put an ABC strip somewhere in your house where the kids can see it. Our last strip was this one. This year, we are using this one.
  2. Let the kids look at the ABCs and tell you the ones they know.
  3. Sing the ABCs as you point to each one.
  4. Find letter A!

• Learn ‘A’ sign language … I love doing this with my kids. I think it’s great for them to learn some sign language to go along with the letters.
  1. It’s come in really helpful when my kids want to know how to spell something and I don’t want to add to the noise (noisy house, quiet church) I just sign the letters to them!
  2. “The Handmade Alphabet” by Laura Rankin is a great book to learn sign language A-Z. Available here.

• Read “ABC: A Child's First Alphabet Book” by Alison Jay … I love this book! The pictures are so interesting. We have fun looking for items that start with each letter in the pictures. Available here. 
  1. Look at the cover and point out A, B, and C.
  2. What else do the kids see on the cover?
  3. My daughter wanted to “help me read”. So I would say “A is for…” and she finished by looking at the picture. Sometimes it was right and sometimes it was close enough
  4. Have fun looking at the little details.

 

• Do ‘A’ Journal Page
  1. We are using a simple primary composition notebook this year. Like this one.
  2. Write ‘Aa’ and “Alphabet” on the page.
  3. Practice writing big A’s and little a’s.
  4. Stick ABC stickers all over the page. Tons of choices here.
  5. My pictures show the difference between a 2-year-old and a 4-year-old

• Watch “Chicka Chicka Boom Boom” video (or read the book) … I’m always a fan of the book, but sometimes it’s fun to switch it up and watch a video version. Book available here.

 

• Chicka Boom Boom tree
  1. PREP:
     • Clean 3 tin cans and hot glue them together.
     • Spray paint brown.
     • Draw a simple leaf shape on green paper.
  2. Have the kids cut out the leaf shapes. Add small snips to make a palm-type leaf. My 4-year-old can do this herself. I cut out the leaf for my 2-year-old and he added the snips
  3. Let the kids tape the leaves to the tree.
  4. We added a few pom-pom coconuts to the top.
  5. Watch or read “Chicka Chicka Boom Boom” again. Have the kids add magnetic letters to the tree.
  6. Of course, the fun part is tipping the tree over (“BOOM! BOOM!”) and starting all over again.

• Play ABC Find & Stick
  1. Write A-Z on a piece of paper.
  2. Give your preschooler a sheet of ABC stickers.
  3. Have them cover up the letters on the page with the matching ABC sticker.
  4. TIP: For a challenge, write lower-case letters on the paper and use upper-case stickers to match. Or vice versa!

 

• Make Alphabet Bead Necklaces … a simple activity, great for fine-motor practice.
  1. Tie one bead to the end of a length of elastic thread. ABC beads here. Elastic thread here.
  2. Let the kids string ABC beads! Of course, my 4-year-old would rather go fancy. She skipped the ABC beads and make a bracelet with our fancy beads. We’re flexible
  3. TIP: The wiggly elastic thread is too hard for my 2-year-old. He did great threading those itty bitty beads onto a pipe cleaner!

September Plans for Letters A & B

Welcome to a new preschool year!

My three older kids just started elementary school yesterday, so we are finally ready to start preschool! It’s been kind of fun to see how preschool changes in our home each year. This year, I have a very-ready-for-school 4-year-old. She loves to draw, dance, play princesses and is into writing letters lately. So we’ll be doing a lot of that. And also my just-turned-2-year-old son, who is along for the ride

I will get our full September calendar up as soon as it’s ready, but keeping it real, I have the first two weeks planned and I’m pretty happy with that. Here are the first two weeks. Click the image to print through Google Docs.

A quick run-down summary with links:

ALPHABET: Most of the activities are found HERE.

AUTUMN: Most of the activities are found HERE.

ANIMALS: Some of the activities are HERE. Others (including printables) are HERE.

APPLES: Activities found HERE and HERE.

BUTTERFLY: Most of the activities are found HERE.

BEARS: Most activities are HERE. Gummy bear song is HERE.

BIKES: All activities and printables are HERE.

BANANA: A new theme day for us! I will post activities after we do them!

BLUE: Most activities are HERE.

 

Have fun! I will post all about our days after we do them. If you have any questions, please ask! All of the ABC themes we’ve done in the past can be found HERE or in the “ABC Themes” tab at the top of my blog.

K is for Keys {Pirate Treasure Hunt}

We love treasure hunts around here.

And my 3-year-old has watched “The Pirate Fairy” almost every day for the last three weeks. So when I found this book for our {K is for KEYS} day, it ended up being a perfect fit!

• Explore keys
  1. Place several different keys on the rug (we spread out a blanket). I used these two sets of keys from Michaels. The one on the left is actually a page of stickers, but I just peeled the sticky stuff off the back You could also use any keys from your key ring!
  2. Give the kids time to explore the keys. My 3-year-old started noticing details and pointing out differences and similarities.
  3. Sort the keys … long vs. short, color, shape, etc.

• Read “Jake and the Never Land Pirates: The Key to Skull Rock” … This is a Pre-1 reader. The story includes pictures above some of the words, so non-readers can “read” along. This is a fun treasure hunt type of story. Jake and his crew have to get a skeleton key back from Captain Hook to find the treasure Peter Pan left for them. Available here.
  1. Find all of the letter K’s on the cover.
  2. Use one of your keys to circle the word “key” in the story as you read. The story actually says “skeleton key” but I just read “key” through the story. My 3-year-old could spot the key picture and loop it with the top of the key.

• Go on a {K is for Keys} Treasure Hunt!
  1. Cut out several large K’s from colorful paper. Write the clues on each of these K’s. I like to add little activities to do with the clues.
  2. Hide Clue #1 at the back of the book. When we finished the book, we had a clue waiting for us to find our very own treasure!
  3. Customize the treasure hunt to fit your house and preschooler. These are the clues and activities we did!

Clue #1 … “Fill up this K with keys to get your next clue.”

• My 3-year-old used all of our keys to cover the big letter K. Then I handed her the next clue.

Clue #2 … “Find all the K’s in the basket of blocks”

• We looked through our ABC blocks (found here) and found all of the letter K’s. It ended up being a good sorting activity. Yes-K blocks went in one pile. No-K blocks when in another.
• And of course, stacking blocks happens naturally

Clue #3 … “Use this KEY to open a lock in your bedroom to find the next clue!”

• I taped a key to the clue. I got these locks at the dollar store!
• I showed my 3-year-old how to put the key in the lock and turn it. She was thrilled to have it pop open and unlock the doors.
• The clue was waiting inside! 

Clue #4 … “Where do we hang our car KEYS?”

Clue #5 … “Open this lock to get your next clue”

• I hung another lock (not from the dollar store) by the clue.
• She fit the key in the lock, twisted and opened it. Then I handed her the next clue

Clue #6 … “There is a lock in the bathroom. Use this KEY to unlock it and find your clue.”

• I just snapped a lock from the handle of a drawer. Yes, she could have just opened the drawer without unlocking it, but she used the key to unlock the lock and open the drawer

Clue #7 … “Search for 12 KEYS in the rice & match them to this page!”

1. Ahead of time, I put a letter K and 12 keys on the scanner, then just printed out a page. All of the keys on the scanner went into a bowl of rice.
2. The kids searched for the keys and matched them up to their picture on the paper.
3. TIP: If you do not have a scanner, just trace around the keys and the kids can match the key to it’s outline.

 

Clue #8 … Yes, this is really clue #8. I lost track and wrote #7 again “Open the dryer! You will need this KEY!”

• Again, tape the key to the clue.
• I put a small treasure box ($2.99 at Michaels before coupon!) in the dryer.
• It was locked and my 3-year-old used the key to open it and find her treasure!
• Chocolate gold coins and bead necklaces! It was a fun treasure to share with her little brother.

• Color your treasure box! … I purposely got a blank treasure chest, so my 3-year-old could have fun coloring it to make it her own.
  1. Instead of paint, we used markers today. We have these fun metallic markers and they made it extra shiny and looked like gold.