Category: Subjects

Learning about the World

Our continents preschool lesson this week was quite simple and brief, but I had remembered my place on the map (and the globe) since then!
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First we read Me on the Map by Joan Sweeney. It’s is the general go-to book for such an introduction to our place in the world, mapping in general, and the fact that there are continents. It shows so clearly in steps that we have a place in a house, in a street, in a city, in a state, etc. I was not surprised that Strawberry enjoyed reading it with me. After we read it together, it was time to figure out our place “on the map.”

We began by finding her room. Then we walked down to the corner to find out our street name. Then we talked about our community as we headed home.
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We got out the globe and the magnifying glass (a tool that will make any project more fun). Spinning the globe always is fun, so once we got that out of our system, we flipped through a few library books about mapping and continents.

I was delighted to learn about Antarctica (that is where the penguins live) and to hear that my big brother Raisin was born on the continent of Australia. We found the continents as the book mentioned them.
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And of course we had to find where we are!
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Mixing Colors with the Color Kittens

The Color Kittens by Margaret Wise Brown is a simple Little Golden Book about two cats, Brush and Hush, who love to paint with colors. There is a hint of fairy tale in their story (as it is the explanation of how the world has so many colors) and the text has a pleasant but irregular rhyme that makes it a delight to read aloud. Brush and Hush’s adventures in making “all the colors in the world” are childlike and loveable. OF course we had to practice color mixing and making our own paintings after reading it together!
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Mom and I used our watercolors to do our own color mixing activity. Mom helped me find just the red, yellow, and blue paints on the tray. Then, Mom put three circles on the page, one in each of those colors. Finally, we used the brush to mix the colors together and see what they created!
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Of course, since the color kittens got to paint everything they saw, then it was time for me to do the same (on paper, however!). Mom loved finding little familiar things in my abstract and colorful painting. She found shapes in my painting, and, as it dried, the wet and less wet spots dried in different colors. I loved oooh and ahh-ing over it, and I loved making it.
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I love this painting so much Mom had it framed for my room!
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Hermit Crab Playing

Laundry day equals hermit crab day! I love acting like a hermit crab by crawling under the laundry basket. Mom decided to make it in to a learning game for me too!
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We cut out the various animals that hermit crab welcomes on to his shell.
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As we read A House for Hermit Crab, I ran over to put the picture on the “shell,” aka the laundry basket.
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Once it was read, it was time to be the hermit crab!
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I loved playing this game.
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Mom also made a cut-and-paste activity to practice ordinal counting and put hermit crabs’ friends in order, the same order they appear in the book. I noticed right away that the pictures appeared in the wrong order, so I cut them out and glue them where they belonged!
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