Building with Trees...

On Wednesday our Mother Goose lesson was all about building with trees!

The kids started out the morning cutting apart these letter cards from their literacy workbook...

...they played a matching Memory game with the cards...

They also practiced their counting and number recognition on this activity in their math workbook...

Today we were excited to start the month of July on our calendar!  I will be closed on the 3rd, and 20-24, so I circled all the days the kids will not be at preschool.  Being that we already celebrated G's 3rd birthday last week, we are excited to celebrate B's 4th birthday on the 8th!

We looked closely at our theme poster for the month and discussed all the materials that we could use to build something with.

I took out our shape and number clock, and we reviewed the numbers and shapes as we built a tower that we imagined was a tree trunk.

Mother Goose provided us with this tree poster and foam shapes.  I set this out right away in the morning so that I could make sure everyone had a chance to work on it all by themselves.

During the month of July Mother Goose has encouraged us to hide a "Secret Shape" under this folder.  The kids can lift the flap and reveal the hidden shape.  On Wednesday our secret shape was a rectangle...

I asked the kids to build a large rectangle out of blocks.  J immediately proposed that we place the blocks along the edge of our large rectangular rug.

When the kids were finished building their rectangle out of blocks we imagined it was a dance floor.  We danced to the song, "Building with Wood" on our Mother Goose Nature Detectives CD.

Next we headed outside and I read the following book to the kids...

I provided each child with a square of clear contact paper.  I encouraged everyone to build something on their contact paper out of items found in nature.  L made a bird...

We put another piece of contact paper on the top to preserve our creations...

Next, Mother Goose provided us with these materials to build a pine cone bird feeder...

I gave the kids a dollop of peanut butter and a popsicle stick.  They spread the PB on the pine cone with their sticks...

Then they rolled their pine cone in bird seed or sprinkled it on top...

I attached yarn to each child's pine cone for them to hang from a tree.

How exciting!

Next, I encouraged the kids to find items in the backyard that they could use to build a small animal house...

Hard to see here, but B and G arranged wood chips exactly the way they think they should be for a small animal...

N and S were determined to dig a hole in the ground for a bunny...

Our numbered bag for the day was 2...

Two was the perfect number because K brought in 2 geode crystal rocks to show and tell with the group!  What an awesome piece of nature this was!  They didn't exactly fit in the bag, but they were perfect!

Our letters for the day....it was tough to think of something in nature that begins with the letter X.

Our book for the day...