Orange You Having Fun??

I have always said, "Having a Silly Provider makes everything more fun!" even when said provider comes up with a silly title to a post :)

So... we used our bright orange rice in the sensory table today.  I haven't seen this much action at the sensory table in a long time.  I don't know if it was the color that engaged the kids or the texture of the rice, sound of the rice on the different equipment or maybe just because they were excited it wasn't sand :) but whatever the reason.... they LOVED it!!!

I also introduced the letter Cc today in Circle Time!!  What better way to celebrate the letter Cc than making a Crown!!!  Tomorrow, after they have all dried, we will put them on for our Orange Finding Field Trip!!!  You can always find the color Orange with a Crown on your head!!!

"Cheese, now can I PLEASE get back to painting!!"

Scamp wasn't feeling 100% today, but she still gave painting a try

The jewels made her a little happier!!!

I made up this little activity this morning.
The kids loved Circling the C's with Orange crayon.
(I know, it doesn't make much sense... but we laughed)

Z is for Zebra

Wow... I can't believe we finished all of our letters!! I think that every year I have left out a W, Y, or X. This year we did them all!!! What fun we had too!!! I usually will usually not go through the alphabet in order (that is the way they teach in the local elementary school) but this year we went from Aa to Zz. I am glad we did too, because it was a great time of year to visit our local "Zoo." We have a zoo like park in the town over from us called Zootastic. It is a really great animal park, and we didn't have to travel across state lines to get to the closest large zoo near us.

We had talked about the letter Zz all week, learned about Zebra's and then we got to see this guy!! It was great, all the kids exclaimed, "ZEBRA!!!" when we saw him. To cute!!

We also got to feed lots of animals. The baby animals were the cutest things we saw all day!!

The Reptile Room actually was another favorite. The kids enjoyed hearing about the different lizards and even getting to pet one. Then the tour guide took out this interesting orange snake, of course I cannot remember the name of it, but it didn't stop the kids from talking about him all day. They got to pet him and found his skin to be quite interesting, not wet or slimy like they thought.

The kangaroo was so soft... we didn't think he would be. We actually had talked about seeing him at the "zoo" (I had found out earlier that they had a kangaroo from a parent) and we guessed his fur would be course, rough, or pokey. We were surprised to feel how soft and friendly the little guy was. Of course the guide had a great grip on his tail to keep him from jumping, thankfully :)

They also had a baby tiger, baby bear, some beautiful birds (that talked no less), a tortoise, camel, buffalo, and many more to see and learn about. We got to eat our lunch at some nice picnic table in the shade, right near a wonderful playground. We had a great day, it was a wonderful way to end our alphabet curriculum.

Now it is on to Spring/Summer activities. Like... mud, water, bugs, and lots of outdoor time!!!

Wednesday

Here is one of our new toys that came in the mail!! Yeah... we love new toys!! I didn't an get a photo of our Mystery ABC game (from Lakeshore Learning) that the kids absolutely love!! The mystery box is such fun, they love to put there hand in there and find an object. Some are still having a hard time matching it with it's letter, but this sure is a fun way to learn beginning sounds!!!

This is a favorite Easter activity. In the little wagon is the mini-ornaments for the tree.

This is our mini Easter/Spring sensory tub, another favorite.

Here is our "Box" with it's new window. They are enjoying playing so many things, and the little ones love just popping their heads out.

I always knew that an old brown box was a favorite play toy for kids, but I never thought ours would have so many uses and would be taken care of so well by the kids. I hate to think what will happen when it does wear out. Hopefully we'll be able to find a new one :)

A little Science, A Lot of Fun

Busy, Busy, Busy... that's what we are. We had a busy, fun morning completeing some crafts we didn't get to yesterday and doing our Tornado "experiment." I bought one of those little plastic pieces that you attach 2 soda pop bottles to, then twirl it around and it makes a "Tornado" inside the bottles. The kids enjoyed making it, but when they firgured out what it did, they thought that was even cooler. We first watched a You Tube video on Tornado's and then watched one that showed an actual Tornado touching down in an open field. The kids loved watching it, and trying to guess where it would show up on the screen. On some of the video the Tornado seemed to come out of no where. Very interesting.

Yesterday we didn't get to do our Cloud craft, so we finished it today. Glue, cotton balls, & construction paper... they loved it!! We will spray the Rain Cloud with diluted black/gray paint so the cloud is not a fluffy white. Princess loved making the Rain Cloud, but it was her who said to me that the "cloud" part needed to be darker, not the white from the cotton ball... Love Her!!!

Exploring the letter Ww has been a lot of fun this week. I found this on my camera when I downloaded the photos, not sure who took the photo, a childcare child or one of my sons, but I like the colors so I put it on.

We really love our I Spy Letter bags. We have been using them to play different letter games, sound games, I Spy games, and even gross motor activities. Today we threw them back and forth, and when you caught the bag you found an item and said it's name. It's a great game for the Toddlers, for both their vocabulary and gross motor skills. The preschoolers loved throwing and catching the bag too.

I hope we get in all the activities I have planned this week, but I am not sure we will get to our worm activities. We will be doing a planting activity soon, so maybe we will make the connection to worms, dirt, and the letter Ww as a review later in the month. We'll see.

Wind, Rain, Clouds, Sun... All This Morning

Today was a perfect Weather day. The morning started off with a downpour, then some dark gray clouds rolled in with the help of the strong wind that blew, then the sun shone beautiful and bright. I could not have asked for more perfect weather for our Weather Unit!! The kids got to experience the weather first hand. Feeling the wind and rain on their faces, then watching as the sun came out and warmed up our playroom. We looked feverishly for a rainbow when we saw the dark gray cloud start to move away... it seemed to be perfect for a rainbow, a little bit of moisture in the air, dark back drop with the sun coming out... but No, I guess the weather didn't cooperate as much as I wanted it too :) That's ok, we made a rainbow anyway. We really thought there should have been one today, so we made our own. I made a large rainbow on a sheet of paper, colored some of it in so the Toddlers would be able to match colors, and set out the colored paper, scissors and glue. The kids did a great job.

(Will you look at that hand position, she is growing so quickly!!)

The Internet is wonderful!! We found a book about Dippy the Raindrop, and listened as the author read it to us. Even though it was a little long, they enjoyed it and wanted to listen to it again. Instead, we did a little experiment. I had a pan of water (our lake), and cotton balls. We pretended the cotton balls were the clouds, that start out nice and dry and fluffy. As it passes over the lake, it picks up water (the kids put their cotton balls into the water). Then when it gets to heavy with water, it rains. They loved it!!!

(I don't know if you can see the drips toward the bottom of the photo, but Princess thought it was soooo cool!!!)

Our Boat House has become a nap time castle for a special boy or girl. While the kids are washing up after lunch, I sneak into the playroom and put someones cot into the Boat House, surprising someone special when they come in for nap. They kids look forward to seeing who is going to get their cot in the special napping castle, and I have a spot to put it during nap :)

More Letter V activities & a New Sensory Table

Violet Vegetable V printing

(ok, purple, but we thought it could pass for Violet today)

We love open-ended art. Any teacher directed, "learning" type of art is always done, but not with the gusto as open-ended art activities. Each child spent just the right amount of time doing the Vegetable printing activity and quickly tossed those veggies (sweet potatoes) off to the side and got those hands in there. I managed to save the V paper and hung them up to dry while they got the Manila paper and went all out with the "pretty violet paint."

I love kids... I put out the "violet" paint, told the kids, "We will be making Vegetable V prints with Violet paint, what sounds do you hear??" Princess scrunched up her nose and said, "Isn't that purple paint Miss Michelle??"... "Yes," I said, "but Violet is another name for purple. Since we are learning about the letter V and it's sound, I thought we would call purple Violet today. What do you think?"... Princess said, "Oh okay, just as long as you really know it's purple." :) Love her!!

I love multi-age groups... Little Miss M is studying Princess, following her lead on where to put her hands.

I have been upgrading our equipment here at Kozy Kids... and I finally got our fancy, dancy new indoor sensory table up and going. I bought this one. I love it, except the shelf underneath. It seemed like a great idea, until I realized to get the water out I needed to find a small enough pitcher to get between the shelf and the bottom of the tub, open the faucet, let a little water out, stop it, dump the water into a bucket, and repeat. Many times. You would think for the amount of money it was, they would have thought that little snag through.

Anyway... I do love it, really. They kids did to. I purchased some great water exploring tools from here, and let the kids at it today. They spent at least an hour there this morning, all 4 of them. Little Man spent some time as well, but since he loves to splash and mouth everything, we had to limit his time there. He understood and had fun doing his own thing :)

(Love this photo, with the water gushing out of the pump Sprout has)

See, this kid can occupy himself with just about anything!! It did help that the kids were right next to him playing and talking to him and I was sitting on the floor playing peek-a-boo with him!!

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During lunch this week, we have been trying new vegetables. I have been putting different types of raw veggies on each plate with a little dip for the kids to try. I just forgot to post/photo about it. Today was fun, I put on a beet, broccoli (trees), tomato, & radish. Sprout finished ALL of hers!! Every last bite and asked for more. Gotta love that girl. She has eaten every new veggie I put on her plate except for all of her sugar snap peas and orange pepper. Otherwise, she has eaten a carrot, cucumber, celery, lettuce, purple cabbage, and the things we tried today. She is a real trooper, at first she didn't like the look of some of the veggies, but our rule is we must take one bite to try it. If we don't like it, we don't have to eat anymore. We had a lot of "yucks" & "no ways" but, everyone tried everything at least once.

Tomorrow we will be learning about Volcano's. Everyone who studies Volcano's has to do the baking soda & Vinegar experiment. The kids will be excited when they see the ingredients out on the table. It is always a favorite!!

Veggies and a Little Science

This week we will be exploring the letter Vv. I thought it would be another 2 letter week, I mean what could we do with the letter V?? Apparently a lot!! We are starting out with Veggies or Vegetables, depending on what you call them at your house. We read Eating the Alphabet by Lois Ehlert, which is a really great book. The pictures in it are amazing and the vocabulary the kids are introduced to is perfect for all age levels. After we read our book, I took a tray (that had been covered) and asked the kids what they thought might be under the paper towel. Most saw an apple peeking out, so it wasn't to hard to guess that it was, "food," "apples," and "fruit." When I uncovered the tray, there was a lot of OOHHH & AHHHing... I guess it is a treat to see real fruit and vegetables in the playroom. We talked about what we saw, naming each fruit and vegetable. We then got to pass each one around, smelling it, touching it, and looking at it. We then compared the group first by similarities and then differences. Then we sorted them into the 2 categories... Fruits & Vegetables.

It was a real treat to see the kids take the tray off the shelf many times to sort and categorize the fruit and vegetables. Though I think I might have to put them in the fridge soon.

During one of my searches on the Internet, I found this experiment with celery and food coloring. I have done it with carnations, but never celery before, so I was excited to give it a try. The kids and I talked about how plants, specifically veggies, grow. Which led to getting enough water. We talked about what we do when we are thirsty, Drink Water, and how drinking water keeps us healthy and growing. Then we tied it into the celery and that I bet the celery needed to "drink" water to grow.

Each child got to help pour the water, put in the food coloring, and select a stalk of celery and stir the water up. After each stalk was positioned exactly like some of them wanted them to be, we waited. And waited, and waited... waiting is hard for toddlers and preschoolers :)

We have kept a close watch on our celery stalks, but no real progress yet. We are hoping after nap to catch a glimpse of the waters journey up the stalk to the leaves... but we will see. I hope it doesn't take more than 24 hours... because I don't know how long those lovely little bottle of water will last upright.