Language Group Week of November 28, 2016

Family Theme

This week in Language Group, we started a new unit...Family!

We read the book, “Are You My Mother?” by P.D. Eastman.  In this book, a mother bird goes to find something to eat for her baby.  While she is gone the baby bird hatches.  He looks up and down but cannot find her.  He falls a long way down out of the nest and walks around looking for her.  On his journey to find his mother he encounters many animals and objects and asks them, “Are you my mother?”  (kitten, hen, dog, cow, car, boat, plane, and a snort/backhoe).  The baby bird is very sad, until the backhoe scoops him up and puts him back in his nest.  His mother came back to the nest and he knew that she was his mother, because she is a bird too.

For our activity, we played a game called, “Are you my mother?”  The children sat in a circle, holding pictures of the different animals and items in the book.  One child was the baby bird and walked around the circle asking, “Are you my mother?”  The children in the circle had to look at their picture and answer the questions appropriately.  When the baby bird found his/her mother, that child was the next baby bird.

This activity worked on:

1. attending to the book
2. expressively identifying animals and items in the book
3. location words up/down
4. asking yes/no questions
5. answering yes/no questions
6. turn-taking

Activities you can do at home include:

1. Using family photos, talk about the various members of your family (mother, father, sister, brother, grandparents, etc.).
2. Ask your child yes/no questions and model the appropriate answer if you need to.
3. Send your child to ask various family members yes/no questions (i.e.: ask dad, “Do you want a cookie?”).
4. Give your child directions that include location words (up, down, in, out, on, under).
5. Try this song!

My Family

If you peek into my room at night

(stand on toes as if peeking)

My family you will see

(nod head)

They kiss my face and tuck me in tight,

(blow kiss)

Why? Because they love me!

(hug yourself)

Miss Diane and Miss Linda

Language Group Week of November 14, 2016

Fall Harvest

This week we read a book about another food crop we harvest:  the potato.  The title of the book was “Pigs Love Potatoes” by Anika Denise.   In this charming counting story with simple rhymes, one baby pig wants potatoes, then his brother, then his sister, then his father, then a host of neighbors…...everyone wants potatoes!   In the end, ten potatoes must be peeled, and boiled, and mashed, and finally eaten.

As a related activity, a “piggy box” was made which consisted of a pig with an open mouth stuck to a box.   Children took turns feeding laminated pictures of potatoes to the pig.   How many potatoes each child gave the pig was determined by using a spinner with the numbers 1 through 4 on it.    The children spun, counted out the correct number of potatoes, and fed the piggy!

This activity worked on the following skills:

1. attending to a read-aloud story

2. predicting (who might arrive next and want potatoes)

3. responding to story comprehension questions

4. counting with one-to-one correspondence

5. following activity directions

6. waiting for a turn

For carryover at home, you might try:

1. make mashed potatoes with your child.....talk about the actions of peeling, cutting, boiling, draining, and mashing

2. when you buy a bag of potatoes at the grocery store, have your child guess how many are in the bag and then count them when you get home

3. take potato slices and dip in paint  to make potato print artwork

4..cut off the eye of a potato, put in a bowl of water and grow your own potato plant

5. play a game of “Hot Potato” with three or more people:

Hot potato, hot potato, 1, 2 3

Hot potato, hot potato, don’t burn me

Hot potato, hot potato, 4, 5, 6

Hot potato, hot potato, better be quick

Hot potato, hot potato, 7, 8, 9

Hot potato, hot potato, down the line

Hot potato, hot potato, here comes 10

Hot potato, hot potato, in your hand!

Miss Linda and Miss Diane

Langauge Group Week of October 31, 2016

FALL HARVEST THEME

This week our language lesson for fall focused on the changing colors of leaves.   We used the book “Fall is Not Easy” by Mary Kelley which shows in simple illustrations how trees change during the seasons of winter, spring, summer, and fall.   The magic of the book is that in fall, this one particular tree just “can’t seem to get it right.”   Its leaves turn strange colors and  rearrange themselves to become ‘pictures’:   a yellow and black happy face; a rainbow; red and white stripes like a candy cane; black and white spots like a cow; etc.   The children were encouraged to predict what the tree’s next transformation might be, and to label what it actually  was.

 As a related activity, we created replicas of the illustrations of the tree’s transformations, made a tree trunk, and had the children take turns following directions to “find the one that looks like a hamburger”, for example, then place it at the top of the trunk.

Activities worked on during this lesson:

-listening and attending to a story

-making predictions

-labeling pictures

-identifying colors

-following directions that include embedded descriptive clauses

-waiting for a turn

Activities you can carryover at home:

-look at the clouds and ask your child to describe what pictures they see

-go out and collect a few handfuls of leaves to examine….talk about their colors and shapes and how they are the same or different

-make a leaf rubbing

-sing a leaf song (we’ve included a simple one for you)

Leaf Song (Sung to tune of “London Bridge”)

Leaves are falling all around

All around, all around

Yellow, orange, red and brown

To the ground.

Miss Linda and Miss Diane

Language Group Week of October 24, 2016

Fall Harvest

This week we continued our monthly theme of fall harvest.  Corn is one of the products that we harvest on a farm, so we learned a song about five crows who a scarecrow tries to scare away from eating the corn.  This is a simple, repetitive song (song to the tune of “Five Green and Speckled Frogs”) so it is easy  and fun for even very young children to learn.  We used the poster to help the children “countdown” the crows.

 

As a related activity, a number of crows performing various activities were created.   Some crows were simply standing, some flying with wings spread, some eating corn.   Some crows were girls as evidenced by the pink bows in their hair.  Three crows were placed out at a time, and one child was called upon to respond to a question/directive.   Examples included:   find the two crows that are the same;  find the crow that is different from the other two;   find a girl crow;   find a crow who is eating;  find the crow who is not eating. Once that child had his turn, a set of three more crows were laid out and it was the next child’s turn.  Children were also asked to explain why they made their particular choice (e.g., how do you know the crow is flying?  Why do you think this is a girl crow?).

This activity focused on a number of language skills and concepts including:

1. listening to and following directions
2. responding to questions
3. understanding same/different
4. understanding gender (boy/girl)
5. understanding actions
6. negatives (the crow who is not a girl)
7. attending while waiting for your turn

Activities you can do at home inlcude:

1. Count items in your home.  When setting the table have your child count out the correct number of forks.
2. Ask your child questions using the negative (e.g.: Which one is not a spoon?).
3. Talk about same and different while sorting the socks in the laundry.
4. Sing the song we did at school!

5 crows, all shiny black

Sat on a scarecrows back

Eating the most delicious corn

YUM! YUM!

Scarecrow,he shouted “BOO!”

One crow, away he flew

Then there were four black shiny crows

Just 4!

Continue to 1...

Then there were no more shiny crows

No more!

Miss Diane and Miss Linda

Language Group - Week of October 17, 2016

Fall/Harvest Theme

This week in Language Group, we talked about the fall, specifically about apples.  We read the book “Apple Farmer Annie” by Monica Wellington.  In this book an apple farmer named Annie shows us her apple farm in the fall.  She tells us she picks them, sorts them by color, and uses them to make different things (apple cider, applesauce, muffins, cakes, and pies).  “She saves the most beautiful ones of all to sell fresh at the market.”  She loads her truck, drives to the farmers market and sets up her stand.  She has lots of customers and sells all her apples.  Annie is very tired when her day is over.

For our activity, we had a large paper tree with different colored and sized apples.  Each child was asked which apple they wanted to place on the tree, or directed to find a particular apple and place it on the tree (next to another red apple, at the top of the tree, etc.) When the tree was full of apples, the children took turns picking one, naming the color and sorting it by its color.

This activity worked on:

1. attending
2. turn-taking
3. color concept (red, green, yellow)
4. size concept (big, little/small)
5. superlative /-est/ (biggest, smallest)
6. sorting by color
7. following directions (i.e.: find a big green apple)

Activities you can do at home include:

1. Stuff socks (red, green and yellow ones if you have them) and use them as apples with this poem.  Decide how many you want to use (counting one to five) and have your child count how many fell.  Take turns being the tree and allow the other person to shake “the tree.”

Way up high in the apple tree 
5 big apples smiled at me 
I shook that tree as hard as I could
And down came the apples 
M-mm they were good!

2. Have your child help you sort the laundry by color (sort all the socks by color).
3. Place items out and have your child find the biggest and the smallest (your shirt and your child’s shirt).
4. Give your child directions including size and color (i.e.: get the big cookie, get the red crayon).

Miss Linda and Miss Diane

Language Group Week of April 4th - Miss randi and Miss Elizabeth

Rainforest Theme has begun!

This week in language group, I showed the children a book I put together about the rain forest.  It talked about the different layers and had three animals under each layer.  We looked at the pictures and talked about each page (layer and animals).

For our activity, I printed pictures of rain forest animals and cut them in half to make puzzles.  Each child picked a piece and sat down.  A child was then called and asked to find the other child with the the other half to their animal.  The two children put the puzzle together and named the animal!

Miss Diane

March 11-18- Language Group - Miss Randi and Miss Elizabeth

We have started Community Helpers!

Our first activity was being a detective, looking at clues

figuring out who the community helper is.

I made Case Files that had clues in them to each Community helper.  We looked at each clue and made guesses along the way!

We labeled each picture we turned over and talked about what the item was used for!

Miss Diane

Week of January 25th - Language Group - Miss Randi and Miss Elizabeth

This week in Language Group we read the book

"If You Give a Moose a Muffin"  by Laura Numeroff.

 

For our activity, I made muffins with picture associations on them.  I placed the muffin bottoms on the floor in a row, then each child was given a muffin top and asked, "What does it go with?"

 

 

 

Some of the associations included:

shoes/socks, candles/birthday cake, paints/paintbrush, dog/bone

baseball/bat, train tracks/train

 

After completing a few, we would count how many muffins we made for the moose to eat!

 

Miss Diane



Week of January 18th - Language Group - Miss Randi and Miss Elizabeth

This week in Language Group, we played a game based on Laura Numeroff's book

"If You Give a Dog a Donut."

 

 

I made a game board based on the various vocabulary in the book.

 

 

We chose which dog we wanted to use to be our game piece.  The children had to describe the dog they wanted.  For example, the most common choice was, "The one with black ears."  We also talked about the size of their ears.

 

Each child had a turn moving the dog from space to space and then had to answer a question.  Some questions included:

Do you like to dance?

Do you like orange juice or apple juice?

What is a baseball for?

 

Once they answered a question, they chose a donut (block) and stacked it.  We counted the donuts and hoped they wouldn't fall!

 

 

Miss Diane