e is for egg

Image source

Sign Language 


We reviewed the sign for egg.

Books 

An Extraordinary Egg by Leo Lionni


This is a cute story about three frogs. One of the frogs named Jessica finds what the others think is a chicken egg. When the egg hatches, a baby alligator emerges and they befriend the baby "chicken". Jessica and the chicken are inseparable and the chicken even saves Jessica's life. When their baby is reunited with its mother, the silly frogs still think the alligator is a chicken. Lionni's pictures are very beautiful (as always) and appealing to little ones. Jonathan easily sat through this book. He didn't totally get the humor until I pointed out that the alligator wasn't a chicken and then he laughed at the silly frogs. It's a great story about friendship and differences.

Guess What is Growing Inside of this Egg by Mia Posada

This book was a hit with Jonathan. It's a nonfiction book about eggs. Each page has a picture of an egg (and a little of an animal) with a poem/riddle. Then the reader is invited to guess which animal the egg belongs to. The next page reveals the animal and gives more facts about the egg. Jonathan really got involved with the story and had fun naming the different animals. I don't know if he fully grasped the point that all the animals laid eggs- but he still enjoyed the story a lot.

The Odd Egg by Emily Gravett


Emily Gravett is an award winning British author/illustrator. This book features several birds, each of whom have an egg that they are waiting to hatch. Duck, however, does not have an egg of his own. One day he comes across a big egg and adopts it as his own. The pages are cut with graduated sizes so that children can watch as the eggs hatch and see the excitement of the mama birds. The other birds make fun of him until his own egg hatches and an alligator is born! Jonathan liked turning the pages and seeing the baby birds and laughed at the alligator thinking the duck was its Mama. It was a cute story with clever and engaging illustrations.




Video 


We watched a YouTube video of baby chickens hatching:




Art 


We used several pages from Carisa's Tot School Printables. We painted a picture of eggs and Dot-Painted the letter Es on another page. We also played with a lowercase "e" stamp that I found in the dollar section at Michaels.

Most of our other egg activities were Easter-tie ins. There are some great Easter printables out there!

Math 


We practiced number matching using an Easter egg printable from Confessions of a Homeschooler. Jonathan knows the sequence of 1-10, but he has trouble remembering which dots he's counted.

A fill the basket printable from Love My Life x4 worked out much better in terms of counting since he had to physically move the eggs that he counted.

We also worked on simple A-B-A-B patterns using our plastic Easter eggs.

Food 


I would have attempted scrambled eggs, but my picky eater won't touch them right now. Maybe next year. :)

Anyways, we had a lot of fun exploring eggs!


Library Links 


An Extraordinary Egg
Guess What is Growing Inside of this Egg
The Odd Egg


Web Resources 


Chickens Aren't tOnes @ Totally Tots
E is for Egg @ First School
E is for Egg Printable @ Lightning Bug Literacy
E is for Egg Toddler Unit @ 1+1+1=1
E is for Egg @ Totally Tots
E is for Egg @ Walking by the Way
Easter Printables @ Love My Life x 4
Easter Printables @ Confessions of a Homeschooler

Easter Day Two

Yesterday we continued our Easter egg unit.

Books 

We read The Easter Story by Patricia Pingry. This was another age-appropriate introduction to Easter, focusing on the biblical narrative more than the traditions of Easter. It shares about who Jesus is, where He lived, and a little about His ministry with the twelve apostles. It then goes into the Easter story, being truthful about Jesus' death without being scary. It talks about how Jesus is alive today and how we can live too if we believe in Him! It's short and it held Jonathan's attention well. He had fun pointing out Jesus on each page. We'll be reading this book each year, I'm sure!

Math 


We sorted Easter erasers and tried to put them into patterns:

Art 

We tore up Easter colored tissue paper and pressed it onto contact paper that I had cut into the shape of a cross: 

Sensory Bin

We played with an Easter sensory bin. I filled it with tissue paper, Easter grass, confetti, plastic eggs, bendable bunnies, colorful cups, etc.:

Music

We listened to some Easter hymns/children's songs. Jonathan started jumping around to the children's song "Ho-Ho-Ho Hosanna"

And that was our day! 

Easter Day One

We started our Easter egg unit yesterday. Most of my ideas are coming from the Joyful Heart Learning program over at Hubbard's Cupboard.

Books 

We read The Best Thing About Easter by Christine Tangvald. This is a perfect introduction to Easter! The narrator (a little girl) shares her favorite things about Easter- Easter eggs, Easter candy, bunnies, ducks, and chicks, getting dressed up and going to church-- but none of those things are the best thing about Easter. She shares how the best thing about Easter is Jesus! The story shares how a very sad thing happened (Jesus died) but that Jesus is now alive and He loves us! It's a wonderful message for children and Jonathan picked up on it quite quickly. We read the book several times (at his request) and by the second or third reading, he knew that the best thing about Easter was Jesus! (Although when daddy quizzed him later he did say Easter eggs). This is such a sweet book-- the only thing that would have made it better would be if there was a little boy featured in the story as well as the girl.

Nursery Rhymes 


We read Humpty Dumpty. And we acted out the story using an Easter egg. We put the egg on a box and let it fall down and "crack". Then we put it back together.

Music


We listened to the Wiggles sing Humpty Dumpty:



Egg-tra Ordinary Sounds


I filled 12 plastic eggs with different materials (rice, beans, pasta, pennies, pom poms, and pumpkin seeds) and placed them in an Easter basket.

I encouraged him to try to match the eggs by shaking them and listening to the sound. He did this for a few minutes. However, he got much more interested in dumping out the contents of the eggs. I hadn't sealed them because I thought he might want to look inside to help match the eggs-- I'll know better next time!

I let Gracie play with some of the eggs too (supervised of course!) She loved it!

Art 

We colored a Humpty Dumpty coloring page as well as a letter "Ee" page from Carisa's Tot School Printables over at 1+1+1=1. He had a lot of fun using his Do-a-Dot markers again. 

We had a very fun day!