This week we read:
Ten Red Apples by Pat Hutchins
An Apple Pie for Dinner retold by Susan VanHecke
The Apple Pie that Papa Baked by Lauren Thompson
Our Apple Tree by Gorel Naslund
Apples for Everyone by Jill Esbaum
One Green Apple by Eve Bunting
We don't do an actual circle time right now because I spend too much of it chasing a rogue baby. I try to incorporate songs and fingerplays into the natural pauses in our day instead. I like to use songs for transition periods (coming inside after our walk, for example) and fingerplays are great for diaper changes or while cuddling on the couch.
Monday: bake an apple pie
We started our week off with an apple pie. Grandma even got in on the action (which is good because I despise peeling apples and we couldn't find the peeler).
Tuesday: wet-on-wet watercolour apples
We are big fans of the Waldorfy wet-on-wet watercolour painting. It's such a forgiving medium and it always produces such beautiful results. I set out green, red and yellow (apple colours).
Wednesday: make apple pies with play dough (rolling pin, pie plate, crimp cutter)
We didn't actually get to do play dough this week, sadly. If we had it would have looked something like this. I love incorporating things I have lying around the house (especially things from outside) into their play and the cinnamon adds and extra sensory experience with that lovely scent!
Thursday: Button Apple Craft
Whenever possible, I like to tie projects from different days into each other. It's especially nice to use paint projects in crafts because, well, you can only hang up so many paintings before you get overrun. I had the kids cut apple shapes out of their water colour paintings from Tuesday. They glued them onto construction paper along with a stem and leaf. Then they traced the outline with white glue and added buttons.
The kids really enjoyed the worksheets this week. Every morning A would ask when we get to start school. She took it all very seriously and actually cried when I told her we were taking Friday off! It's been nice to have them working on something instead of destroying things while I work with B.
You can find the worksheets we used below:
Apple Prewriting SheetApple Do-a- Dot
Apple Counting Book
Another Apple Prewriting Sheet
So that was my week with the preschoolers! Overall, it went very well. We're still working out some scheduling kinks but I am confident that this year is going to be awesome!
