Letter Hunt

Lately, we've been learning and reviewing letter sounds. Here is a new activity we tried. 

I gave the girls an alphabet chart and had them name each letter.Then, I modeled how to find and cut out letters from magazines and match them up on the chart. 

We only got through about 10 letters before they were ready to move on. I want to make it fun and not boring, so we will pick up where we left off another day. 

 

Phonemic photos

I've had a hard time posting because lately I'm really focused on teaching Lil to read, and O is just along for the ride.  Teaching reading is exciting, but there aren't always kodak moments.  

Today Lil used some of her basic letter sound knowledge to find some " Kodak moments" of her own.  I gave her a list of letters and my iPad and set her loose to snap pics of items for each letter.  She had fun and it was a good review for her.

She started with the first 10 letters today.  Here are the pictures she took:

Snowflake Impressions

Cynthia(Nanny):
After Christmas sales are always a good way to find supplies for winter projects or even Christmas projects for next year.
I found these snowflake window clings for .50 in the Christmas clearance section of my grocery store.
I modeled how to rub a crayon lightly over the raised part of the snowflake onto paper. They remembered doing this in the fall with leaves.
This time, they had better results because they were able to color in one direction instead of scribbling.

Snowflake Number Game

Cynthia(Nanny):
I made number cards using a snowflake graphic.
I placed the cards (numbers 1-12) in a paper bag and played a game with the girls.
This was an easy way to practice number recognition in an engaging way.
This is also a good game they can play independently during center time or during meal prep/cleanup times.

Snowman Size Ordering

Cynthia (Nanny):
I printed out three sizes of the same snowman for the girls to order by size.
We talked about size words and synonyms for those words like small and little and big and large.

Snowman Tear Art

Cynthia(Nanny):
I love tear art projects. They have a cool visual effect and it's a great small motor activity for little hands.
I started by drawing a white outline and then modeled how to tear the paper and glue onto the snowman.
They needed some help with tearing, but did a good job trying.
After we were done, they were excited to add details to make it better.

Adding details to projects now will hopefully lead to adding details to their writing as they get older. Adding details to make writing pieces more interesting is a tough skill to learn, so the more early exposure; the better!

Snowball Scooping

Cynthia(Nanny):
Since we don't have cold, snowy winters we have to improvise when we teach winter themes. I made a cotton ball sensory bin for the girls to play with. Then we tried scooping them onto their heads while being blindfolded.