Big Energy-Little Learners...Can I do it all?

Books Alive! - Giraffes Can't Dance by Giles Andreae I put out the book and the Giraffe.  While reading the book I narrated with the stuffed animal.  I had him dance all around like Gerald does in the book.  Little dragon also had a stuffed animal and they ended up dancing together.  Items used:  Giraffes Can't Dance by Giles Andreae Giraffe stuffed animal A monkey stuffed animal (not in the photo)

The end of the week always seems so busy!  I feel like I am trying to get everything finished and put together by the weekend.  I have my plan set out but this week, full of stress and sleepiness, I wasn't able to finish everything on my to do list. Busy Bags Thursday was all about busy bags!   While I prepared breakfast Little Dragon played with blocks. I picked blocks because they are squares.  We are practicing squares this week and on his own Little Dragon identified both the letter x and the letter g.  He stacked the blocks at first then brought his desk over to make a castle.  He asked for 'guys' to play with too. The second busy bag the foam garden. Since I cut up the foam flower I wanted to use them for more then just the tub.  This morning I made the time.  I put craft sticks and hard foam rectangle on a cookie sheet.  I attempted to stack all of the flowers but they kept falling or Little Dragon would knock th...

Completing all the daily activities I have planned has been more difficult this week then last.  I have been feeling so tired.  Not lazy tired, I can't force my eyes open even with  coffee tired.  I don't usually sleep more then 6 hours a night but the last 3 days I have been getting at least 10. It will be three weeks on Monday since we have seen Athena.  Emotions are high.  We are trying to continue living normally but everything is a reminder.  Jerry has continually attempted to communicate with the bm and is not making progress. :(. I am continuing to pray for both Athena and her bm. Praying to get through this week. Tuesday Spencer said he did not want to do preschool after breakfast.  I told him I had some activities planned for us to do together but we could watch a show first then complete our lessons.  As I said above I have been really tired. My little dragons new favorite show is Numbers Ahoy.   It is educational and co...

Gumball There is not a list of activities in this folder because this just one game. I found this activity on  http://www.makinglearningfun.com  where there are many other ideas you could make into file folders.  (I have a stack of 'to do' folders I haven't gotten around to making yet.) I colored the gumball machine, cut it out and glued it to construction paper.  I printed out all the cards, colored them, cut them and glued them to construction paper then placed them in the Ziploc. I only printed 2 of the graphing sheets.  I currently have 2 kids and don't need more then that but you could print as many as you would like. I placed them in page protectors.  What is great about that is they are pretty much dry erase.  Washable markers also wipe right off! To play this game you place all the cards face down in a pile.  The kids take turns pulling a card to see how many and what color of gumball they got. Play until the cards are gone or det...

Giant People We used:  Poster board Pencil Yarn Cotton Balls or Googly Eyes Straws Pom Poms Felt or Tissue Paper Trace the children laying in a funny pose on the poster board.   I then cut out tissue paper for their shirts and they glued it on.   Add yarn for the hair and cotton balls colored with marker for the eye color.  I chose cotton balls because it would show the kids's actual eye color and they had fun coloring them with marker.  We glued pom poms on for the nose and bent red straws for mouth.   The arms and  pants the kids decided they wanted to color themselves with crayons.   This activity went along our bible study on Adam and Eve 'God made you special.'

Weekly Review (All the activities we did that I didn't have time to blog about) This was a hit!  As always I close the door and prepare the bath while the kids are jumping up and down with excitement outside the door asking if it is ready yet.   I think it is my favorite part :) When it is all ready I open the door slowly and ask "are you sure you need a bath?  You aren't that stinky." They scream "yes! yes!'" Spencer adds in "I stinky, ewwww" To make this bath: I made clean dirt and put drops of food coloring in it.  I left the stirring up to the kids.  I stuck foam flowers to the walls and popped the fake flowers off the stems and put them in the water.  I dyed the water green, but you can't really tell in the picture.  Lastly I set out garden/sand toys and some giraffes. Paper Town With Spencers obsession with cars I thought that a paper town would be a perfect station!   My idea came fr...

I am exhausted. We had a long busy day in preschool today.  The kids really enjoyed having something to do constantly and I didn't have bored, whiny baby dragons. :) Before we started any activities I helped the kids clean up the playroom. There has not been a lot of time spent down there recently-because of the mess-plus I want to start setting up dramatic play areas downstairs so it needed to be done. After the playroom was clean, all the toys in the right place, the kids wanted to stay downstairs and play. Of course :D. (My plan worked) This gave me time to make breakfast and set up preschool. I like setting up when the kids are busy so they are not trying to play with things as I set them up.  They tend to get bored easier when that happens. I have been stuck on new station ideas and decided I need to leave the stations out longer so I don't go through them so fast. Stations Shape patterns- I set out a tray with different shapes and colors and gave the k...