Good Night Gorilla Tip-Toe Gross Motor Activity

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Walk on tip toes in this gross motor quiet activity inspired by Good Night, Gorilla.
Good Night, Gorilla by Peggy Rathman is a simple but favorite book. In the book, a zookeeper says goodnight to the animals, but the sneaky gorilla grabs the keys and lets himself out. He helps the other animals out as well, and they follow the zookeeper to his home. For our activity, we practiced being sneaky and quiet on our tip-toes, just as the animals had been.  Our tip-toe gross motor activity provided an active time after story time that was fun for all. Continue reading →

Hands-on Marco Polo Silk Road Game

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There is one game we have come back to time and again in our homeschool, and that is the Marco Polo Silk Road Game. In this game, we review the ancient trade routes that Marco Polo traveled as he went from Venice to China. We try our hand at buying and selling goods along the way, and we hope to return to Venice to make a profit! Marco Polo’s Silk Road Game is hands-on and interactive learning at its finest as we actively try to make our way through dangerous deserts and trade for better prices in the faraway cities.

Learn about ancient trade routes with the Marco Polo Silk Road Game.
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Learning Science History through Literature-Rich Curriculum

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My son loves learning science history through literature. Stories make everything more fun.I love history. My son loves science. We both love great books. So when I had a chance to take a look at Beautiful Feet Books’ History of Science, I was couldn’t resist. Learning science history through a literature-rich curriculum seems like the perfect compromise.
I’ve long thought that learning subjects through stories is the way to go, so Beautiful Feet Books has always attracted my attention. When I told Raisin what I’d received in the mail and we went to open it, he got excited. Science History! Books! What could be better! Continue reading →

Whole Body Butterfly Life Cycle

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Strawberry simply loves butterflies right now! As we prepared a report about butterflies for our recent project fair, we took the chance to act out the parts of the butterfly life cycle. This whole body gross motor play is just how she learns! I know she’ll not forget the details we discussed: egg, caterpillar, chrysalis, butterfly with antennae and proboscis. These are now ingrained in her memory. Plus, it was tons of fun to act out!
Use a party blower as a proboscis in this whole body butterfly life cycle gross motor imagination game.

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Dusty Rhyming: A Picture Book-Inspired Game

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Playing with rhymes and thinking of rhymes is a fun pre-reading and early reading skill. In this rhyming game, we try to think of rhymes for the cards we draw before we draw a broom or vacuum to clean up our pile of dust!Before a child is ready to jump into learning to read, it’s important to review basic phonemic principles, such as hearing the parts of words. Rhyming is a fun activity that is ideal for kids preparing to read or just starting out. After reading a favorite picture book, we played a “Dusty” Rhyming Game to practice making our own rhymes. Continue reading →

Princess Preschool STEAM: Designing a Castle

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Inspired by her favorite princess and a fun picture book, my preschooler designed a castle of her dreams.My preschool daughter loves Princess Sofia and her animal friends, so I try to tie in her stories to our learning moments whenever we get a chance. We watched an episode in which Sofia and a friend must design and build their own dream castle, and we read Chris van Dusen’s amusing book If I Built a House. Then, of course, we had to try designing a castle of our own dreams! Continue reading →

Flower-Themed Word Family Picture Sort

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Now that Strawberry is becoming more and more aware of words and sounds and even starting to sound out consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words, she was very excited to try a flower-themed word family picture sort.
Put the image-flowers into the correct flower pot with this word family picture sort perfect for spring!
Strawberry loves flowers. The beautiful springtime is finally showing us tiny green buds and she cannot wait to see the blooms. For this activity, Strawberry said the name of the picture on each flower. Then, she found the matching short vowel pot to put it in. Using mini-flower pots from the gardening center and popsicle sticks and clothes pins made this word family picture sort into a multi-dimensional hands-on activity. Continue reading →