Preschool: Letter H

I taught Caleb’s preschool today, and it was a little nutty. I was glad to see that Caleb was completely comfortable being himself around his preschool friends since he usually clams up in groups, but it also meant he required more than the usual amount of intervention.  I’m so thankful that he’s making friends!

Here was what I came up with for the Letter H:

Opening play time: Build houses using boxes.  We used various sized boxes to make houses for elephants, giraffes, big puppies, little puppies, and even frogs.  Part of this time was spent hiding in the boxes as well…and spinning with boxes over their heads.  Boys….

Introduce the letter: Read the letter.  Say the sound.  Repeat for hat, hug, and hop.

Story: Heaven.  Since we had been building houses just before this, I started off by saying heaven is Jesus’ house.  We also read an abbreviated story about heaven from The Jesus Storybook Bible.  Heaven is a wonderful, exciting, happy place! 

Heaven Sorting Activity:  What is in heaven?  What is not in heaven?  I loved seeing the kids imitate the happy, sad, and angry faces.  Hilarious!

Song:  Big House, originally by Audio Adrenaline.  We used a kids’ version.  I took the time to introduce some hand motions before playing the song, and the kids actually followed along and did the actions as the song played.  Usually, when we’ve tried songs, I see a lot of “deer in the headlights” faces. 

Craft: Heaven’s gate.  We spent a lot more time talking about what is in heaven during the craft (along with monitoring glue stick usage).  The kids glued on things they thought would be in heaven like Jesus, angels, toys, good food, trees, and musical instruments.  Then we glued a door on top, showing that Jesus is the only way to heaven.  On Caleb’s, I think Jesus got buried under the Christmas tree and piano:

Bathroom break

Game: Hide and Seek with the letter H.  Our kids are too young for full-blown hide and seek, so I simply hid an “H” cut out of construction paper and had them find it. 

Snack time: Honey Nut O’s.  Before snack time we talked about how God Hears us all the time, whether we whisper, shout, or just think.  so we practiced by whispering, shouting, and then thinking, “Thank you for snack.”  Whispering and shouting went really well.  Not so sure they got the “thinking” part.  We also spent time talking about what kinds of foods would be in heaven.  Foods like Halloween candy, oatmeal with “flies,” mac and cheese, and ice cream.

Craft (again): Thank you card for the guy in charge of the Paint-A-Plow program. (By this time the kids were done with crafting!)

Show and Tell: Each child brought something that started with “H” and told us about it.  Honda, helicopter, horses, hammer, heart, hot rod.  This is another time when Caleb needed some intervention…to not hammer on his classmates. 

Counting by Hundreds: I had written 100, 200, 300, etc. on different sheets of paper.  We read the numbers together, and then I laid the sheets of paper on the floor and had them find different numbers that I called out.

The end.  They were done and ready to play, and moms were starting to come. 

If you’re still reading, you must be my mom.  It takes quite a bit of planning to keep 6 active preschoolers engaged all morning long!

Paint is Easier to Clean than I Thought

Recently I learned of an opportunity to have preschools paint a city snowplow, so I signed our little preschool group up.  We were all a little nervous giving our kids real paint, but it was well worth the mess!  We also got a short tour of the garage, which included dump trucks, graders, street sweepers, and snowplows.  Little boy heaven?

Typical preschool photo…about half the kids and no one looking at the camera.

Some kids were done by this point. I think Caleb and Sophia would have kept painting all day.

Sophia was starting to blend in by this point.  Surprisingly, it wasn’t too difficult to get the paint out of her hair. 

Another First

Sophia’s first sentence: “I do it.” 

I think we’re in trouble.

Elephants for Breakfast

This is what happens when I’m asked, “What’s for breakfast?” first thing in the morning.  Since I don’t know yet, I jokingly respond, “Elephants.”  And instead of getting the joke, someone starts looking for elephants.  “Where are the elephants, Mama?” 

Luke even acquiesced, “It does sort of look like an elephant.” 

Can you see it?  Use your imagination.  It’s kind of like looking for pictures in the clouds on a warm summer day, except it’s a cold and dreary November day. And it’s french toast. 

The bonus?  One little boy, who has refused to eat even one bite of french toast for the past few months, gladly ate two slices along with “elephant food” (banana and sausage).  Evidently this elephant was an omnivore.

Freedom

I needed this reminder (as a parent and as a person) from chapter 19 in Loving the Little Years by Rachel Jankovic:

“Obedience to God’s law is freedom.  Your kids should feel the same way about obeying you.  Sometimes you should give them little jobs to obey knowing full well that they will love to do it…. You should not be training them that obedience is bondage.  Do not do epic training camps that teach them that obedience leads to sitting quietly on your hands and speaking to no one.  Obedience to Scripture is life…. God does not command things that make life miserable—His commands are a means of joy.  Make your children understand that obedience leads to freedom and joy—it is the path of life.” 

Halloween Recap

Monster cupcakes.  I’m not sure adding more sugar to this holiday is a good idea, and I’m not claiming which cupcakes I decorated and which ones Caleb decorated. 

Playdoh Pumpkins.  This year Caleb decorated his pumpkin by himself. 

We also carved the pumpkins—one surprised face and one sleepy face since it couldn’t stand up straight.  Evidently I had taken my fill of pumpkin pictures by that time because I have none.  The kids loved putting the “puzzle pieces” back into the pumpkins.  Neither of them got close to the pumpkin guts. 

We also took the kids trick-or-treating to about 10 houses.  By that time, Caleb’s dump truck was full of enough candy to last several weeks, and we had said hello to our neighbors.