Montessori inspired by Dr. Seuss

What’s on the Tray Wednesday?

This week is Read across America week and Today is Dr. Seuss’s birthday.  I realize that it is not Wednesday but I wanted to display what Montessori works we did this week to celebrate Dr. Seuss.  We read Cat in the Hat, Cat in the Hat comes back, Barthalomew and the Oobleck, One fish two fish, red fish blue fish, The ABC book, Wacky Wednesday and the foot book. 

Here are some math works we did with One fish two fish.

I was inspired by this book to make fish math works. 

We practiced skip counting with Evan Moore’s Take it to your seat math centers.  Each fish has a number on them and you have to put them in order and then write down the numbers you counted. 

We sorted colored goldfish crackers.  After they were sorted the kids filled out a color graph.

Here is our sandpaper numbers again doing their job! The kids put the sandpaper numbers in order and then count the fish to match each number. Like I said in my math post, I use these every month with new counters.

I found these Dr. Seuss erasers in the dollar bins at Target and I LOVE them!!  We use them all the time.  This is a pattern work.  He is making ABC patterns. 

Here are my lovely little counters as a number line! Dr. Seuss counters and the sandpaper numbers again. 

I also got the cute little Dr. Seuss boxes in the dollar section of Target.

These are pictures of our Practical life work trays this week.

This is a magnet work.  I made magnetic pom poms by hot gluing magnets to them.   Put the card stock printable on a metal cookie sheet.   The kids match the pom poms to the dots on the picture.  Great for fine motor skills

Here is a Spoon transfer tray with ABC noodles. Transfer from left to right.  This work tray was inspired by the ABC book by Dr. Seuss. (sorry about the orientation of the picture, blogger is playing tricks on me today)

We made blue jello with Swedish red fish and had goldfish for snack.

Here is our Seuss inspired language works.

Our class theme this year is Dr. Seuss. This is our Seuss word wall.  The sight word cards are from here.  For this game, the kids all line up on one side of the room and I call out a sight word.  The kids each have a swat stick and they race to swap the word first.  They keep track of their points by making tally marks on an index card.

At family hats for the cat in the hat!

My team teacher made these for the kids and they were on trays for the kids to add beginning sounds to the at words.  I think they are adorable!

The tray on the top is a Dr. Seuss Rhyming work from Donna Glynn's Dr. Seuss pack. 

We practiced our word families.  I had just consonants in a basket with these cards on a tray and the kids had to use thinking skills to make new words.  With Lakeshore learning letter tiles

The tray  in the middle is full of fish cutouts with beginning sounds and pictures.  I attached magnets to the back of them and the kids fished for beginning sounds with a magnet fishing rod.  I got these from www.kidssoup.com

In my next post I will talk about our science works and Wacky Wednesday!!  I am linking up with What's on the tray Wednesday and living Montessori now and Homeschool Creations, Preschool corner and 5K too!

Tell me a Story Tuesday! The Cat in the Hat!

Tell me a Story Tuesday!

The Cat in the Hat!

It is Dr. Seuss week!  Every day this week we will read a different story by Dr. Seuss and do activities to go along with that book.  Today we read The Cat in the Hat and The Cat in the Hat comes back!

For art the first thing we made was Thing one or Thing two.  This was a fun activity because we also were able to create homemade puffy paint!! 

First you add glue to a cup, next you add paint and stir it up good!  Finally you add shaving cream and stir again.  Keep adding shaving cream until the concoction is nice and fluffy!  This was super fun and super easy!

The kids traced their hands and cut them out.  They added their hands to the red bodies.  They drew the faces and wrote thing one or thing two on the belly.  Then they painted the blue puffy paint for hair.  When it dried it was still puffy! 

We had two art stations today they could make one or both.  The other station was a simple cut and paste cat in the hat.  This was a following directions craft. 

For snack we made cat in the hat treats.  We stacked red gummy lifesavers and frosting on ritz crackers to make a cute little hat.

We did a brain storm on what activities we could do on a rainy day.  Tomorrow we will use that brainstorm for writer’s workshop.  Since the book started out as a rainy day, we used that opportunity for a science experiment.  We talked about the water cycle and where rain comes from.  Our experiment was a visual of rain coming from the clouds.  I filled up clear cups about ¾ full.  On top of the water I allowed each child to squirt shaving cream.  This was our cloud.  I went around and dropped blue food coloring on top of the shaving cream and the kids were able to watch it “rain” in their cups.

Here are a few pictures of the other activities we did today! 

Cat in the hat following directions and reading game

Today I will post about Wacky Wednesday and Oobleck!  I am really enjoying reading about all of your Dr. Seuss adventures this week!

 I am linking up with www.livingmontessorinow.com for their Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss Linky party!  I am also linking up with living life intentionally

Rachel /

Grinch Preview

Right now we are working on our grinch unit.  Today we talked about how to make the grinch grin.  When we did that we watched his heart grow and grow.  We made Deanna Jump's Grinch faces for art.  We worked on Dr. Seuss rhyming words.  For math we used Dr. Seuss erasers to make AB and AABB patterns. 
Tomorrow we are going to make ice cream for science and we will talk about the GR blend and come up with "Grinch Grins" (words that start with GR).  We will also discuss feelings and how important they are.  I love it when young kids get a chance to really open up and discuss thier feelings.  It is so touching to see what is in their precious little hearts.  It is a wonderful reminder of who these little people are.  We will write our feelings on hearts.  We will have the Grinch posted in the classroom and whenever someone is "caught" being kind they will get to put a bigger heart on the grinch.  Whoever has the biggest heart at the end of the day gets a prize, (but they don't know that until the end.) 
On Friday we will have "Green, Grinch day!"  Everyone will come dressed in green, will get green candy canes and green grinch shakes that we will make with our homemade ice cream.  I will post more pictures all week long so stay tuned!! 
 I have started creating a freebie for you all coming soon and I wanted to post a preview of if.  When we reach 100 followers on facebook I will post the freebie.  http://www.facebook.com/KidzoneTeachermamaThis is my very first product so I am a little excited!