BIG Tot School: Farm Theme

This week in our Fruit of the Spirit Curriculum we were talking about Gentleness and learning Psalm 23.  This one will take us a few weeks to learn, but Sophie is already doing a great job.  We also played "Follow the Shepherd" and talked about how we follow God like sheep follow a shepherd.

Literacy Actvities

Emergent Reader.  We used this super simple emergent reader from Measured Mom and Sophie loved it!  Her face after she read it all by herself is priceless! She was so proud. (The text says, "A chicken." with a picture of a chicken, for example - obviously she was not reading the animal words but was using the picture, but it was a perfect first step for her!)

Initial Sounds Farm Fences.  This idea from Stir the Wonder was a hit!  I had put the popsicle sticks together ahead of time, but Sophie helped me "build" the fences by making playdoh balls and standing them up.  (Playdoh is the way to my child's heart...).  Then she put a letter in front of each fence, and matched up the farm animals to their correct "home" using the initial sounds in their names. She played this multiple times independently after our first time together.  

Farm Poem. We wrote a farm poem together using the "I am" model from PreKinders. To draw the pig, I drew one with simple shapes one step at a time, and she tried to mimic my drawing.  I thought her pig turned out great!

Rhyming Cards. From This Reading Mama's Farm Printable Pack

Spelling Animal Names. From This Reading Mama's Farm Printable Pack.  This was one of the first times I really encouraged Sophie to match the letters from left to right (rather than just matching up letters as she found them).  It took several gentle reminders, but I think it is important I start guiding her that way as we move past just letter matching into forming words!

Math Activities

Farm Animal Pattern Blocks.

Measuring Sensory Bin. This was the world's simplest sensory bin, but Sophie spent HOURS playing in it this week.  No exaggeration.  It started as a tin full of popcorn kernels and some measuring cups, and eventually some Toob farm animals made it in there.  We talked about how the bigger cups could hold more than the little cups and how it took multiple little cups to fill a big cup. Easy peasy, but the favorite activity by far.  I gotta do this more often!

Feed the Pig Counting Activity. Sophie was so meticulous to get the correct number of kernels right in the bucket "so they didn't get a tummy ache."

Roll and Count Farm. From 3 Dinosaurs Farm Printable Pack. 

Other Activities

Animal Matching. We matched our Toob animals with the pictures, and on another day matched the mother animal to the baby animals using these cards from This Reading Mama's Farm Printable Pack.

Shadow Matching. From Gift of Curiosity. This was the most challenging shadow match she had done, as some of the animals had similar shapes and were in similar positions. I was pleased that it actually stretched her a little bit and gave us a chance to describe what we saw in the pictures.

The week wouldn't have been complete without a visit from our neighborhood ducks. These little guys were born this Spring and have made themselves at home on our street. They have obviously been fed a lot, because they are not scared of people at all.  They followed us up to our porch!  It was actually a little bit eerie, to tell the truth! But of course the kids love it! 

Linking up at 1+1+1=1 Tot School Gathering Place and Teaching Mama's Everything Early Childhood.