January Planning

In January, we're going to focus on the letter C and how it can sound like /k/ or /s/.  


Concepts for January:


1.  COLORS:  We'll be using the Color Song by The Learning Station for our transition song.  See below for the video link to the Color Song.  Have your child point out the color blue one day while out and about.  Another day, point out as many red things as you can find.  Keep going with the rest.

2.  WHO QUESTIONS:  Who is wearing Red?  Blue?  Green? Yellow? Purple?  Orange?  Pink?  Brown?  Black?  White?


3.  FOLLOWING DIRECTIONS:  The Color Song give specific instructions on what to do if you are wearing a certain color.  Here is a great way to teach 1-step directions.  "If you are wearing red, shake your head."


4.  OPPOSITES:  hot/cold, big/little, fast/slow.


5.  DESCRIPTIVE WORDS:  along with colors and opposites for descriptive words, what else can we use?  We'll be talking a lot about "Cold" and what other words we can use:  icy, frosty, chilly, frozen, and snowy.


6.  Our last week will be all about cereal and descriptive words:  soft/crunchy, big/little, sweet/savory, hot/cold.  Snack time will involve cereal and talking about colors, shapes, size, and yummy/yucky.

December Week 3: Yummy Yucky Holiday Edition

Yummy Yucky is back!  We're going to use this book as a springboard to discuss yummy holiday food (candy canes, cookies, hot chocolate with marshmallows!) and yucky nonfoods (ornaments, tinsel, ribbons, pine needles, markers, paint, glitter, candle wax).  

What foods do you like to eat or drink?  I LOVE hot chocolate.....with whipped cream, not marshmallows, thankyouverymuch.  I love the homemade caramels I make for gifts every year.  I love the traditional Swedish foods from my ancestors - saffron buns, pepparkakor (think gingerbread cookies), and rice pudding with berry sauce.  Yum!!!

What foods do you not like?  I don't like marshmallows on sweet potatoes.  I don't like peas.  I don't like peanut butter (weird, I know).  

What about things we should NEVER put in our mouths, particularly things we decorate with around the holidays?  

Now is a good time to point out foods in magazines, foods you have for family dinners, and special treats your family receives or gives.  Smell them, feel them taste them.

Be sure to ask your children to sing the Must Be Santa song (click here for the post that has the video).

For snack time I'm bringing my hot chocolate maker and we're drinking hot chocolate with marshmallows (no marshmallows in mine).

ACTIVITY:  We're going caroling to the front office.  The children have been working hard on practicing their Must Be Santa song.  I'm eager to see how well they do with an unfamiliar audience.

Don't forget to wear your pajamas.  I'm wearing pajamas and slippers, too.  

Language Calendar

Once again the Moog Center for the Deaf put out a fabulous language calendar! You can download it and print it here.

December - Week 2: MAD! (and Happy and Sad)

Phoneme: /m/

Transition Song:  Must Be Santa (Raffi)

Concept:  Emotions.  What and How questions.  Opposites.

Materials:  Laminated M.  Laminated Santa pieces (See previous post).

Book:  How Do Dinosaurs Say I'm Mad?  by Jane Yolen and Mark Teague.

Song:  If You're Happy and You Know It Clap Your Hands.

Intro song and letter recognition as listed in previous posts.

Let's talk about "MAD!".  Show me your mad face.  Look at my mad face.  How do you know I'm mad?  Can you do a happy face?  Look at my happy face.  How do you know I'm happy?  Look at my sad face.  How do you know I'm sad?

What does your voice sound like when you are mad?  Is your voice loud or quiet?  Are your feet loud or quiet?

We're reading the book  How Do Dinosaurs Say I'm Mad?  by Yolen and Teague.  I ask the children on every page "Is this a good choice?"

Read the book together.  How can you tell Dinosaur is mad?  What did his parents do?  What did Dinosaur do next?

Sing the song together.  This song is adaptable.  We're going to have fun singing it like this:

1.  If you're happy and you know it clap your hands

2.  If you're sad and you know it cry boo-hoo

3.  If you're mad and you know it stomp your feet

4.  If you're silly and you know it make a silly face

Point out emotions of people around you.  Point out emotions of your child as they happen.  Don't ask "Are you happy?"  Tell them "You are happy.  I can see you smiling."  Label the emotion.

We're also singing Jim Gill's song I'm So Mad from his Album The Sneezing Song and Other.

Voice Volume and Preschoolers (It's usually loud!)

Preschoolers have a difficult time understanding vocal modulation.  Think Outdoor Voice (yelling is okay) versus Indoor Voice.  Then you have the voice you use in the library or at the movie theater (whisper) versus and Talking Voice (how loud you need to be to be heard at the table during Group Time).  In preschool, we have started talking about what voice to use at what time.  It is a good time to introduce the concept of loud and quiet.  

Now check out Leslie's book Quiet Loud.  She gives a lot of examples of quiet and loud.  We're going to be reading this book during Greeting Time, Snack Time, and at least one Large Group Time.  

December: Week 1

Subject:  M is for MUSIC

Phoneme: /m/

Transition Song:  Must Be Santa (Raffi)

Concept:  Music and Voices.  High and low.  Fast and Slow.  Loud and Soft.

Materials:  Laminated M.  Laminated Santa pieces (See previous post).

Letter recognition and pre-literacy/writing skills for letter M:  Use your pointer finger to trace the letter M.  Show me your pointer finger!  Ready?  Put it at the bottom of the letter M just like me.  "Draw up the mountain.  Go back down.  Back up the mountain and down to the town."  Repeat 2X.  Hold up letter M and in a loud voice:  "Give me a ME!  MAY! MY! MOW!  MOO!"  (Have kids repeat after every CV word.)
What words start with the Mmmmm sound?  Merry!  Moo!  Mine!  Mouse!  ME!  Whose name starts with the Mmmm sound?

Listen to the music!  (Play music that is loud/soft, high/low and discuss the concepts.)  Can you play loud?  Use tapping sticks to try tapping loud and soft.  Now use your voices like a fire engine siren and sing on an E vowel, siren up as high as you can and down as you can.  Yell.  Whisper.  What voices do you use outside?  In school?  In the library?

December Planning

I'm excited for this month.  Our transition son is "Must Be Santa" by Raffi.  There are so many concepts reinforced with this song:

1.  WHO QUESTIONS- this is a great introduction to the concept of WHO.  The song repeats "Who......" and then answers the question.  EX:  Who's got a beard that's long and white?  Santa has a beard that's long and white."  We can further this concept with concrete questions such as "Who is wearing blue today?", "Who painted a picture today?".  Later in the month, we'll add abstract questions such as "Who do we go to when we are sick?  They take our temperature and look in our nose and ears."

2.  PARTS/WHOLE - Parts make a whole.  In this case, the separate pieces we are putting together (beard, cap, red suit, red nose, boots) make up our Santa.  The children will take turns putting it together.

3.  COLORS - red suit, red cap, white beard, black boots.

4.  SEQUENCING - The song has a specific order to build the Santa.  This is great to help the children understand "What happens next?  What do we need next?"

The song is a bit fast for some of our language learners, so I will be singing it without music playing the first two weeks in order for the children to learn at a slower pace.  Then I'll add the Raffi music while the children take turn singing and putting it together.

And here is the song