A is for Airplane

I am excited to be beginning a program that I think will provide both the structure and flexibility that both my son and I need. I got most of my ideas from this site. Counting Coconuts is full of creative ideas and wonderful pictures. I also spent a good bit drooling over her classroom. It uses the Montessori method which I have heard of before and have been interested in but haven't had the time to really look into. Disclaimer: I am in no way saying that I am following the Montessori method. I don't know enough about it yet to know what it all entails, but I have chosen to incorporate a few things into our preschool from the Montessori method, and as I learn more about it, I may jump in with both feet.

We also discovered Starfall which we love. It helps to teach him his alphabet with phonics at the same time.

I love the idea of workboxes of which my son can choose what he wants to do. It gives him some independence that way. The following are the workboxes I put together for this week:

Practical Life:

Pouring: Lil' Bear absolutely loved pouring water from a little pitcher into three different sized cups. I was pretty sure that he would like this activity as he likes learning to do things for himself, but I didn't expect that he would enjoy doing it so much that he spent nearly 1/2 an hour on this activity alone.

Sensorial:

Play dough: In the box I included red playdough, heart cookie cutters, a fork, a knife, and an imprint that said "I love you." I was really impressed that on the second day of doing this activity, as soon as we brought it out, Lil' Bear remembered that the imprint said "I love you."

Language:

Starfall : Lil' Bear enjoys doing this so much, and I absolutely love beginning teaching him phonics right away. He has already been picking up other words with the "a" sound.

Patterning: Using airplanes I cut out of construction paper, I would start a pattern, and Lil' Bear would finish it. I was very impressed with how quickly Lil' Bear picked up on this.

Math: I think math is definitely Lil' Bear's favorite at this point. He loved all of the activities and did them over and over again.

Addition game: I used an egg carton and little foam hearts and a die. He would roll the die, then count out the corresponding number of hearts placing them in egg carton on the top row. He would roll the die again, and again put the corresponding number of hearts in the egg carton on the bottom row. Then he would count up the number of hearts in both rows. I like how this is beginning to teach him addition as well as counting. This was definitely his favorite activity of the week.

Cards and counters: I made up cards with numbers 1-10 on them and he would count out the corresponding number of airplanes I had cut out of construction paper.

Art and Music:

Stamping: Lil' Bear loved, loved, loved this.

Art basket: Lil' Bear seemed to love having the opportunity to decide what he wanted to do out of the basket.

Bible:

This week I taught Lil' Bear the story of Noah's Ark. We did this during circle time, as well as at breakfast and lunch. I also made him a workbox consisting of 2 sets of farm animals that I got from Target's dollar section, as well as some short animal story books. He enjoyed acting out the story and reading about some of the animals that were on the ark.

I plan to add more workboxes to his selection in the coming weeks and building up a reserve to begin rotating through to keep things interesting and new.

Books that we read this week:

I Love Planes by Philemon Sturges

Big Book of Airplanes by Caroline Bingham

Airplanes by Byron Barton

Noah's Ark by Lucy Cousins

See you later, Alligator by Annie Kubler

Lil' Bear and I are having so much fun doing our activities together, and I am excited to learn more about Montessori and incorporate even more into our preschool.

Sorry about all of the pictures appearing at the beginning of the post. I tried to get them into the text but was unsuccessful, and rather than drive myself bonkers now, I decided to research what I'm doing wrong later.

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