There really is something magical about story time. Nothing beats that feeling of choosing a story and snuggling up together to share a new adventure. Okay, maybe not everyday is picture perfect, but more often than not story time is the perfect time to bond with your kids. That's why I'm so excited to partner with Put Me in the Story for this post--anything that gets kids excited about story time is awesome! They motivate kids by putting them … [Read more...]
Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons Craft
Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons is one of our very favorite books so we had to choose it for this month's Virtual Book Club for Kids. The fun and colorful story by Eric Litwin is beloved by preschoolers everywhere for good reason--it's just plain cool! The groovy repetitive text and Pete's great attitude about life make it a story your kids will want to read again and again. Then when you're done reading you can sit down and make a Four … [Read more...]
Vowel Sounds Practice Game
Vowel sounds are hard to practice, especially the A, E, and I. To make the phonics practice fun we created a fun vowel sounds practice game with cups! Phonics Practice Game 3 plastic cups permanent marker pom pom or gem or something similar The vowel sounds can be harder to remember and reproduce correctly than the consonant sounds. To get in some extra practice I wrote 3 of the vowels on the cups and set up a simple phonics … [Read more...]
Fun Sight Word Practice: Ghost Zappers
Making sight word practice fun makes it more effective! The more sight words new readers know automatically the better they can comprehend the text they are reading. Since Halloween is coming we decided to practice with a little sight word ghost zapping! The premise of the game is similar to our Fire Hose Fact Practice Game, where the kids read and squirted the chalk sight words. I used white sidewalk chalk to draw ghosts on our driveway with … [Read more...]
Glitter Pumpkin Suncatcher Craft
Simple kids crafts are my favorite! Not only are they easy to set up, but then kids can make them again and again on their own. These glitter pumpkin sun catchers are so fun that your kids or students will want to create their own sparkly pumpkin patch for your windows! One of our favorite Halloween books is The Legend of Spookley the Square Pumpkin (affiliate link) by Joe Troiano. It's a sweet story about how one pumpkin's differences ending up … [Read more...]
Mouse House Craft
This cute mouse house craft was my 4 year old son's idea. He saw the granola bar box and placed his toy mouse inside. We found a book at the library that goes along with the craft perfectly. {Affiliate links are included in this post.} A New House for Mouse A New House for Mouse by Petr Horacek is a cute story about a mouse searching for a new house that can fit her and her apple. Mouse peeks into the burrows of several animals to see if they … [Read more...]
Splat Sight Word Painting
We love to get hands on with learning over here at my house. My kids are full of energy and taking learning away from the table often helps them get excited about learning something new. Right now I am working on sight words with my oldest who is 5yr. This day I decided to give Splat Sight Word Painting a try with him. All 3 kids ages 1-5yr got involved in this activity. Big brother gave it a thumbs up for learning and we will be doing this again … [Read more...]
Books About Starting Kindergarten
One of the very best ways to prepare kids for Kindergarten is by reading to them. A lot. Reading kids books about starting Kindergarten not only helps develop literacy skill it can also help ease anxiety and make them feel more confident about starting school. Here are some of our favorite books about going to Kindergarten! (Click on the titles below for an affiliate link to Amazon to learn more or purchase the book.) Books about Starting … [Read more...]
