Showing posts with label Cars. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cars. Show all posts

Saturday, March 26, 2011

Tot School- c is for car and cat (26 Months)

Tot School
Jonathan is 26 Months
This week we started learning about the lowercase letter c. We're focusing on the hard c sound such as in "cat" and "car".

Bible 


We have a new memory verse this week from the Songs for Saplings CD:

"We will be changed into his likeness" 2 Corinthians 3:18. 

We printed out the memory verse from the Totally Tots printable. Right now, all we personally do is sing the song together and look at the memory verse page.


Books 


We read lots of books this week about cars and cats. Here were some of our favorites- click on the links to see our reviews!

My Car by Byron Barton
Have You Seen my Cat? by Eric Carle
Millions of Cats by Wanda Gag
Cool Cars by Tony Mitton
If You Give a Cat a Cupcake by Laura Numeroff
If I Built a Car by Chris Van Dusen





Motor Skills 


We started out with nice weather this week, but ended up being in the 20s and 30s by the end of the week. I think this is the longest winter I can remember. I can't wait for Spring.

Still, we got to play outside at the beginning of the week. Jonathan used his new crazy coupe car:


We also tried to move and stretch like cats on one of the colder days. And we played with our basketball hoop quite a bit.

For fine motor skills, we did a lot of work on puzzles. We did some chunky puzzles by Melissa & Doug which featured cars and cats. These puzzles are too easy for him now, but he still enjoys putting the pieces in:


We also did a three piece cat puzzle that Carisa over at 1+1+1=1 provided as part of her new tot school printables page. It took him a couple tries, but he figured out how to put the pieces together to make the cat picture. We also used her cat lacing card and he really enjoyed that activity too.




Math


We did a couple math activities this week. I downloaded some printables to go along with the Cars movie from 1+1+1=1. We used her Counting with Cars activity and counted how many cars were on each card. This gave us good practice of counting 1-10. Jonathan has the sequence of 1-10 down, but he doesn't always keep track of which items he's counted. So this was a great activity to give us practice counting.


We also have been using the Parking Lot Game printable from Happy Brown House to line up Jonathan's new matchbox cars and count them. He puts one car in each space, which helps him visualize and count the cars.

Pre-Writing 


We've been driving Jonathan's matchbox cars on some Highway Letter Cards from Making Learning Fun. He loves driving his cars on the roads and it's great practice for getting the motion of the letters down:


We also did some "C is for Cat" printables from 1+1+1=1. I laminated a few of her "C is for Cat" pages and gave Jonathan a dry erase marker. We did the "Find the Cats" page where he tried to connect all the cats by making lines on the page.

We also did the Connect the Cats page where he traced the dotted lines. He actually did surprising well at this one. While the lines weren't perfectly straight, he got the concept down pretty well!




Art


We played with paint, by rolling his toy cars through paint and then onto paper. We also used a car cookie cutter and stamped cars onto the paper using the paint.





We used our Do-a dot markers to find uppercase and lowercase Cs on another one of Carisa's C is for Cat printables. We also used her printables to color cats different colors.

And we played with yellow playdough using a Cc Playdough mat from Homeschool Creations. We used our car and cat cookie cutters.

Videos 


We had Cars movie night(s) last weekend, where we watched the Disney/Pixar movie. Jonathan was really enthralled with the story. He liked Lightning McQueen!

We also watched "Millions of Cats" on a Scholastic Storybook Treasures DVD.


Music


Jonathan's favorite song this week was the "Car Car" Song by Woody Guthrie. We listed to a version of the song on a Kimbo CD.

Games


We used another one of Carisa's printables to play a Memory game. I printed out two sets of the cat shapes printable from 1+1+1=1 and we played a memory-style matching game with them. He already can name the shapes, so we worked on finding "matches". First we matched the shapes with all the shapes facing up. Then we attempted the "memory" style game with the shapes facing down. That was a little harder of a concept for Jonathan to grasp- the taking turns and turning one set of cards over at a time. But, he still had fun and got the concept of matching.


Baking 


We made cupcakes to go along with our "If You Give a Cat a Cupcake" story. Jonathan had fun helping me ice the cupcakes:


and eating them too!




Practical Life 


Jonathan made a big step in potty training this week-- he's at least using the potty every time I ask him if he needs to go. He was holding it in until after he got his diaper back on.

I realized he kept leaving the room when he needed to go potty, so this time I started closing the door partway when he would sit on the potty. I think having the privacy has helped him! He isn't initiating going potty, but it's a big step forward! We've been using M&Ms as rewards and he loves picking out what colors he wants.



So we've had a busy week





I'm linking up to:

Link & Learn @ No Time for Flashcards
Tot School @ 1+1+1=1
What My Child is Reading @ Mouse Learns, Mouse Grows




Thursday, March 24, 2011

c is for car

Image Source
(I am in love with this Etsy store!)

Sign Language


We reviewed the sign for car


Books 


My Car by Byron Barton

Jonathan has really liked Byron Barton's books with their bold illustrations, and this one was no exception. This book is about Sam, a guy who loves his car and takes good care of it. The book explains how Sam drives his car, checks the oil and the gas, and obeys the laws as he drives. Jonathan loved this book and kept asking to read it again. It's the perfect book for the car-loving child!


The Racecar Alphabet by Brian Floca

This is a very imaginative book that goes through the alphabet with alliterative words related to car racing. The detailed watercolor illustrations depict 100 years of history, featuring racecars of differing decades. The 26 cars race and zoom around the track in an exciting race. This is such a fun book but the details were still a little above Jonathan's head. I think it's one that we will appreciate even more as Jonathan gets older.

If I Built a Car by Chris Van Dusen

This is such an imaginative book! In this book, a little boy tells his father about the fancy car he would build- complete with swimming pool and the ability to fly and go underwater. The story is told in a rhyme that is reminiscent of Dr. Seuss and the illustrations are fun and detailed. Jonathan enjoyed this book a lot and wanted it read over again- the highest praise from my 2 year old!
Cool Cars by Tony Mitton

This is our second book from Tony Mitton's Amazing Machines series. The book shows animals riding in different types of cars. The illustrations are vibrant and the rhyming text describes what cars do. It's a fun, informative read and it was probably among my favorites for the week.



Motor Skills 


I found a Crazy Coupe at a local consignment sale. We were blessed with some nice Spring weather at the beginning of the week, so we were able to play outside:

He loves his new car! 


Movie Night 


We watched Cars of course-- this was Jonathan's first feature length animated movie and he was really drawn in. We broke it down into two nights, and he seemed to really enjoy it.

Math 


We downloaded some Cars printables from 1+1+1=1. We used the Counting with Cars printable the most, to practice counting 1-10.

Jonathan got some new little cars last week for giving up his pacis and he absolutely loves playing with them. So we also have been using the Parking Lot Game printable from Happy Brown House. Instead of using the dice, we've been using the game boards in two different ways- the numbers board to help him count how many cars he has. And the colors board to help him sort his cars by color. He loves parking his cars!

Pre-Writing 


I printed out some Highway Letter Cards (A-C) from Making Learning Fun and Jonathan's enjoyed moving his cars along the "roads". It's great practice for learning the motions of writing letters someday.




Art 


We played with paint by rolling our cars through red and blue paint. We also used a car cookie cutter to stamp cars onto our painting:



Music 


We listened to a rendition of Woody Guthrie's "Car Song".



We had a lot of fun with this-- Jonathan loves cars!

Library Links 


Cool Cars
If I Built a Car
My Car
The Racecar Alphabet

Web Resources 


C is for Car @ First School
Cars Tot Pack @ 1+1+1=1
Racecar Activities & Printables @ Making Learning Fun
Parking Lot Game @ Happy Brown House
Cars @ No Time For Flashcards
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