Spring Cleaning Preschool Style

After Shy Bear came down with what appears to have been Roseola, I decided that this week would be spring cleaning week (a fever of 105 in a 10 month old can be REALLY scary).  Time to get rid of all those nasty winter germs that have been plaguing our family with sickness or at least do my best.  My time is very limited, so I knew that it was either forego preschool this week to focus on a deep, thorough cleaning of the entire home or make it educational for Lil' Bear.  Not only did it turn out educational but fun too.   This was the most fun I ever had cleaning. 

We did sweeping into shapes:

I had planned on doing squares, triangles, and circles, but I ran out of painter's tape in the middle of the square.  Lil' Bear did a good job trying to sweep into the shapes.
We did dusting dots:

I placed green dots on all of the furniture (which all ended up being wood, so Lil' Bear learned what wood was this week, and he ended up comparing and contrasting wood and other materials throughout the week).   Lil' Bear went around looking for the green dots and wiping down what he could reach with a damp rag.  Of course I had to go behind him and do a thorough job, but all I wanted was for him to learn and do alongside me.
And by far the most favorite activity was painting with colored soap:

I placed a few drops of food coloring into some clear dish soap, added some water and let Lil' Bear "paint" away in the kitchen and the entry way.  He "painted" in the kitchen for 3 hours with only a break for lunch, no kidding!  He was soaking wet but all I had to do was clean up all the soapy water with an old towel, and Lil' Bear certainly had a lot of fun with it.  

We also started our St. Patrick's Day countdown.  We got a little bit of a late start, so we started at Day 14.

Day 14:  Sensory Bin

In the bin we have split peas, green plastic ice cube thingies, flowers from a lei I cut apart, gold beads from a Mardi Gras necklace, a scoop, and a bowl .  This was the first sensory bin I attempted, and it is a hit with Lil' Bear.


Day 13:  St. Patrick's Day computer games
I had a pretty hard time finding any computer games for St. Patty's Day that were any good.  I finally did find one that Lil' Bear wanted to play over and over again searching for the pot of gold. 
Next week we will be back to our alphabet theme weeks, and we will be doing D is for Dump Truck.
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