Native American Books

Daily Life in a Plains Indian Village 1868 - The text is above C's level, but the pictures led to discussion anyway. I read and explained in 4 year old terms how the Plains Indians lived, what their family roles were, their food, jobs, etc. This is a really good book, they have awesome pictures of so many things that their life involved.

How Thunder and Lightning Came To Be - This is a Choctaw story and I was so excited that I found it at the library. We are part Choctaw (a small part, but a part nonetheless.) So, it was fun to read this to C, it's also a cute story.

Legend of the Indian Paintbrush

Winter

As you can see, we are still having fun studying winter. It is definitely not cold enough here to be dressed like this, but we are hoping to head to Mt. Etna tomorrow to play in the snow! Today, we talked about what type of clothes we wear when it's very cold. Carlee had the bright idea to play dress up with her winter clothes. We discussed which body part each article of clothing kept warm.

We read The Mitten by Jan Brett. I asked questions about each page after reading to check Carlee's listening skills and comprehension. She is doing much better at listening and remembering details in stories.

I drew simple pictures of a mitten and glove and let Carlee color and decorate them. We talked about the differences between the two. She also practiced her writing.

Other books we've been reading lately:

The Snow Child by Freya Littledale


Trouble with Trolls by Jan Brett

Sadie and the Snowman by Allen Morgan

My Favorite Time of Year by Susan Pearson

Avalanche by Michael Rosen


Don't Wake Up the Bear by Marjorie Dennis Murray and Patricia Wittmann - This is one of Carlee's absolute favorites. She loves how in the end the bear chooses to eat berries instead of the animals. She thinks it's absolutely hilarious. She has this one just about memorized.

Preschool Co-Op #2: Our Five Senses

This month it was our turn to host the preschool co-op. We worked on learning about our five senses. I had three "stations" somewhat set up. Our first activity was to read My Five Senses by Aliki. This book is too cute, and really simplifies the concept of our five senses for little ones. Then we practiced our sense of smell. I had about 6 film canisters, each with a different scent inside of it. For example, one had coffee, one had a cotton ball soaked in vanilla, another had a cotton ball soaked in vinegar, one had shaved candle pieces in it that smelled like rose, one had garlic powder, etc. The kids found that interesting. You could definitely tell which smells the kids enjoyed and which ones they didn't like at all. haha.

The next activity was about our sense of hearing. I read a book about a boy who heard a mouse in the house. It had a lot of sound words in it. Then we did an activity where I had a few plastic eggs set up with various objects inside that would make different sounds. Lined up on the table were small paper cups that held duplicates of the objects. The kids had to listen to each egg being shook, and guess which material was inside. The objects were: a bell, marbles, rice, and cotton. They guessed each and every one right! They really enjoyed this activity and did really well. Afterwards, I brought out more of the little bells and they each got one to shake and listen to.

Then we moved to the sense of touch. We did a craft activity where we traced the kids' hands and then they glued different precut textures onto the fingertips of their hands. There was cotton, plastic, sandpaper, fuzzy fabric, and a piece of sponge. They seemed to like this activity as well.

Our next activity was for our sense of taste. I brought out paper cups with different items for the kids to taste. One was a lemon (sour), one had sugar (sweet), one had premade and cooled coffee (bitter), and the last was a chip (salty.) They got to taste each one and again, you could definitely tell which tastes the kids preferred. =)

Then we all had lunch and free play. The kids really seemed to enjoy everything, and I'm surprised that their attention held for so long. The reason I had preplanned so many activities was in case they got bored with one activity, then we could just move on to the next, but surprisingly they finished each and every one of them.

Since I was running all the activities, I didn't get to take any pictures. These I borrowed and cropped from another mom.