Lesson - Trees

Welcome Song

Announce Date

Theme
Ask: Who can name some trees?

Today we are going to read a book all about trees. [The book for this lesson teaches all about trees so I used the book in place of talking about the theme.  I admit that it is difficult to read this entire book to a group of preschool age children so I skipped some pages.  I also tried to engage the kids by asking questions and having them show me their branches and roots as we read about the parts of the tree.]

Activity sheet: In the Treetops (Hidden Pictures) (p.224 in Big Preschool Activity Workbook)

Story
I Can Name 50 Trees Today! 
by Bonnie Worth

Activity
Tall as a tree, (reach way up high)
Wide as a house, (reach arms out to sides)
Thin as a pin, (arms down at sides)
Small as a mouse. (crouch down in a ball)

Spanish Vocabulary
árbol = tree
hojas = leaves
rama = branch
corteza de árbol = bark

Letter of the day - T
Tree starts with T.  What sound does T make?   Can you think of any fruit that grows on trees that starts with the letter T? (Tangerine, Tangelo)  Let’s make some T’s with Duplos.

Activity sheet: Circle pictures that start with the sound of the letter T (download here)

Number of the day - 0
Can you show me zero fingers? Zero means none.

Activity sheet: Circle the trees that have 0 apples (p.123 in Brainquest Workbook: Pre-K)

Craft
Glue bark, sticks and leaves onto construction paper to create a tree.  I collected up materials from our Eucalyptus trees which have bark that falls off in big pieces.

Sample I made to show the kids

Activity
Go for a walk outside and look at different trees.

Closing Song
This song is very repetitive and easy to learn.  I taught the kids the words and then had them act it out while we sang along with Rachel.  They started off kind of swaying their arms and then dropping them down to the ground along with the lyrics.  But by the end, there was just a lot of frenetic movement.

Free Phonics Online

I heard about Starfall from an educator.  It is a free online educational website for phonics.  For preschoolers, it teaches the ABCs including the sounds of all the letters.  For older kids, it has resources to help them learn to read.  Best of all, tt is free of commercial characters and ads and you do not need to register to use the site.  It's a great site to explore with your kids but they also have some printouts you can use for preschool lessons.  I especially like that they have notes to parents/educators on the material both on the site and on the printouts.

Preschool songs with Rachel Rambach

We didn't have a preschool lesson this week so I will post the next lesson next week.  In the meantime, I want to share this wonderful YouTube contributor with you.  My son attends a sing along with a wonderful woman named Elenah a few times a month.  Last week he was singing parts of the song in the video above to his sister.  He kept singing "The sun goes up, the sun goes down, the good green earth goes round and round" so I e-mailed Elenah for the rest of the lyrics.  So she told me about Rachel Rambach.  She has some wonderful songs for kids and I really like that she explains how she uses each song in the classroom to make them participatory for the children.  I will be using her videos as a resource for my lessons. 

Activity Sheets

I think I will call worksheets "activity sheets" from now on.  They aren't meant to be "work".  They are simply to get the kids involved and to practice using a writing implement (we use crayons) and to practice circling things, tracing lines, or even practice writing letters or numbers.  Since I intend them as activities rather than "work", I'll refer to them as activity sheets from now on.

Sometimes Aaron gets stressed out about tracing letters or numbers and wants me to help him, which I do.  I don't want it to be stressful, but I also want him to try things even if he thinks he can't do them.  I try to pick pages that I think suit his level.  And I praise all his attempts and tell him he doesn't have to finish anything he doesn't want to.  But generally he wants to finish the page.  He enjoys the challenge. I worry that other kids won't feel the same way, but I try to pick activity sheets that incorporate various levels on one page.  For example, circling letters on the top and tracing them on the bottom.  Kids who are too young to trace letters can skip that part.

About the Format

So my lessons have a basic format that I follow, but I'm finding it's still in flux and once I figure out the best flow, I'll update the basic format I use for each lesson post.

We always start with a welcome song (which the kids love), the date and then the theme.  For the theme, I type up a kind of script, but I don't follow it exactly.  I usually start off with questions for the kids and then based on their responses and level of interest, I may have more questions or I may cut out parts of the lesson or embellish.  But I like to have my typed up script on hand because I tend to lose my train of thought and I reference my script frequently.

Once we do a workhseet on the theme, I find it's easier to just go on to the the letter and number worksheets while the kids are sitting at the coffee table and I end up doing Spanish afterwards followed by the story.  But I'm thinking about trying to incorporate the Spanish vocabulary into the theme part of the lesson so it feels more integrated into the lesson.  The craft is generally the last thing we do before a closing song or rhyme.

Any suggestions on format are welcome!

Lesson - Vegetables

Welcome Song

Announce Date

Theme
Ask: Who likes vegetables?  What are your favorite vegetables to eat?  Do you have any vegetables growing in your yard?

Last week we talked about fruit and how fruits grow from the flowers of fruit trees, bushes and plants. Vegetables do not come from the flowers of a plant. Vegetables are other parts of a plant, like:
(show samples for each bullet point from Vegetables.pdf and have the kids guess what each picture is and guess other types of vegetables from the same category)

• Leaves: lettuce, spinach, chard
• Roots: carrots, radishes
• Tubers (part of the roots): potatoes, yams
• Stem shoots: asparagus
• Leaf stems: celery, rhubarb
• Seeds of the plant: corn, peas and beans
• Flower buds: broccoli, cauliflower, artichokes
• Bulbs: onion, garlic

Some foods that we consider vegetables are really fruits but we consider them vegetables because they are not sweet like most fruits. These include: tomatoes, squash, peppers, cucumber, snap peas, and avocados.

Just like sweet fruits, vegetables are very good for us. They help us grow and keep us healthy.

Vegetables come in lots of colors. Can you name some of them? (Green, red, purple, yellow, orange, brown, white) The more colors you eat, the healthier you’ll be!

Worksheet: Healthy (p.294-295 in Brain Quest Workbook: Pre-K)

Story
Little Pea 
by Amy Krouse Rosenthal
My kids love this story about a pea who hates candy.  But in order for Little Pea to get "dessert" he has to eat 5 pieces of candy.

The Carrot Seed
by Ruth Krauss
This is a short book about a boy who has faith that his carrot will grow despite what everyone around him believes.  Aaron (my son) picked this story which I decided to read in addition to Little Pea since it is short and on theme.

Spanish Vocabulary
maíz = corn
guisante = pea
tomates = tomatoes
aguacates = avocados
pimientos = peppers
frijoles = beans

Letter of the Day -V
Vegetables start with V
Worksheet: Voting for Veggies (p.55 in Scholastic Success with Kindergarten)

Number of the Day -  7
Count out 7 pieces of unpopped popcorn or dried beans (which we'll use later in the craft).
Worksheet: Circle groups of 7 (download here)

Craft
Collage on cardboard or card stock using cut out pictures of vegetables from magazines or seed catalogs, plus dried peas, corn, and various types of beans.

Closing Rhyme
(Adaption of tradition rhyme, suggested by Jean Warren)
Take turns letting the kids fill in what they are eating.  We had a small group and some of the younger ones wanted to do it again so we did this a few extra times.

One, two, three, four
[Child’s name] at the kitchen door.
Five, six, seven, eight.
Eating [vegetables] off his/her plate.

Follow up ideas
Visit a local farmer’s market or the produce section of the grocery store and see how many vegetables your child can identify.
Have your child plant some carrot seeds  in your backyard (or garden if you have one)

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