All Categories - Blooming Butterflies: Early Learning

Cinco de Mayo

4/30/2019

May 3rd, 2019

Cinco de Mayo is coming up! And we learned bit about it; where it is celebrated, why it is celebrated, and traditions around the celebration. We had a lot of fun listening and dancing to music and seeing the bright and decorative clothing. We coloured paper sombreros with oil pastels, and folded and decorated fans. We also decorated felt skulls with glitter glue, beads and sequins. We also made paper mache goop and took the first steps in making paper mache maracas! Lots of gooey gooey fun!

Our letter this week was Z. We have reached the last letter in the alphabet! The kids practiced forming their letters in salt and using out letter construction kit. Next week we move our focus onto numbers.

Earth Day

4/26/2019

April 26th, 2019

It was Earth Day this week. We brainstormed and learned ways we can make the Earth a healthier place to live. The kids immediately thought of recycling, composting and picking up trash outside, all of which they we very adamant about doing all week. They also thought of riding their bikes or walking, and as the week continued we talked about using less water, turning lights off, and planting trees and flowers. The kids journaled about the ways they would make the Earth a healthier place.

We spent a few days up in NoseHIll Park, climbing, running, exploring, journaling and discovering. We took our journals up NoseHill and drew/wrote about the purple, yellow and white flowers we saw. We were lucky enough to find pellets, possibly from a hawk. What a neat learning experience

We reused cardboard tubes to paint with and made Earth Da”lava lamps” minus the lamp part. We also made Earth Day Oobleck; a non-newtonian substance. It’s a solid and a liquid!

Our letters this week were X and Y.

Easter

4/19/2019

April 18th, 2019

Happy Easter!

The Easter bunny came early! So all the kids went on an egg hunt on Thursday. They were so excited! Of course we had more than one egg hunt too. So the kids went on a letter egg hunt where they then had to identify and/or write the letter they found in the eggs. They also used coloured eggs for sorting, counting and making colour patterns.

This week everyone experienced some new ways of painting. They marble painted paper eggs as well as drip and splatter painted paper bunnies. It had be great having such nice weather to be able to do our art outdoors. We were even able to go on a couple adventures; one up the stairs to NoseHill Park and a second to the Green Park to have a picnic. The kids have been waiting all year for a picnic!

Our letters this week were V and W.

We also wished very happy birthday to a newly turned 5 year old! We had fun baking cookies and making orange icing with sprinkles.

Have a warm and safe Easter holiday!

Bunnies

4/12/2019

April 12th, 2019

Boing Boing Boing!

Bunnies are so cute! We learned about the difference between bunnies, rabbits and hares. We also learned that rabbits have white fur in the winter to camouflage with he snow and brown/grey fur in the summer to blend in with the summer surroundings. We were lucky enough to find some of the white fur that the rabbits have been shedding.

Everyone made cottontail bunnies and foam shape bunnies. They also did a great job with their directed drawings of bunnies!

The Little Bunny Foo Foo finger play was quite a lot of fun! I think we did it about twenty times over the week!

The kids went on an egg hunt to collect 10 eggs of their chosen colour. They did an awesome job counting them up and helping their friends find theirs as well.

We had surprise snow so of course we took advantage while we could, making snowmen in the middle of April. And because it is Calgary, there was a lot of puddle jumping during the very same outing!

Our letters this week were M and N. We worked on uppercase and lowercase letter matching using laminated carrots and dirt.

Bridges and Tunnels

4/7/2019

April 5th, 2019

Bridges and Tunnels were our focus this week. We brainstormed the many ways in which bridges and tunnels are used and who uses them/makes them. We learned how a bridge is stands up and the importance of having the right materials and a strong base. We did an experiment to see which out of 3 paper shapes (cylinder, rectangular prism, triangular prism) is the strongest, to hold up a bridge. The prisms fell over as 8 and 3 books. The cylinder stood the strongest at 30 books! The kids did a great job counting how many books each shape held.

We made bridges using big and small marshmallows, chopsticks and toothpicks. We also made tunnels using paper tubes and masking tape. It was a real test in patience because building it doesn't always work the first time!

The kids started a tape resist painting. When the tape comes off they will have a maze of white tunnels.

Our letters this week were K and A. We used popsicle sticks to build these letters, and other letters and shapes.

The big kids have been working on their "at" words. We did an activity where they had to match the "at" word on the tube with ball and slide it through into the cup. The big kids did a great job trying to teach and guide the little ones.

We also did a bunch of crafting, we made muffins and went on an adventure to the “Secret Park”. They definitely got a little muddy along the way!

Dinosaurs

3/31/2019

March 29th, 2019

RAWR!

It was all about the dinosaurs this week!

Almost everyone immediately had a favourite dinosaur, or three or four! We each picked our first favourite and practiced writing its name, then cut out our traced feet and added claws to them. Now we had dinosaur feet!

We learned about the types of foods different dinosaurs eat and how you can tell what they would eat based on select characteristics. The kids dug through play dough dinosaur poop to find the remains of what each of our three dinosaurs ate. They had to figure out who the herbivore, the carnivore and the omnivore. The look on some of their faces when they thought the play dough was real poop was pretty funny!

Baking and vinegar activities are always fun so we hatched baking soda dinosaur eggs to reveal a baby dinosaur.

We played a dinosaur number identification game, where a number was called/written and the kids had to find each number on their dinosaur picture card. Number sequencing was practiced using mini dinosaur puzzles, and matching and adding dinosaur numbers was also practiced.

We’ve been working hard at name building (first for all and last for the big kids) by sequencing individual letters.

Our letters this week were B and R. We practiced building these letters with our letter construction kit.

This week we also made play dough, worked in our journals and played opposite/equals games. Oh and don't forget all the puddle jumping and playing in the mud!

Rainbows and Colour

3/23/2019

March 22nd, 2019

The Leprechaun came! The kids were so excited to see that gold was indeed left for them and that their shamrock pathway helped lead the Leprechaun to their rainbow. They counted the gold coins that the Leprechaun left and made groups of the same number of coins so they all receive the same amount.

This week we have been talking about rainbows, why they occur and what colours they have. The big kids, and sometimes the little ones too, have been using the ROY G BIV acronym to remember the order the rainbow colours appear. Naturally this, and our story “Little Blue and Little Yellow” by Leo Lionni, has led to exploring colouring making with the primary colours to make secondary colours. It’s so cute to see some of their faces when they see a new colour emerging! We also made and painted with Puffy Paint to make rainbows. It’s fun to see the paint grow when you put it in the microwave!

We also read “Monsters Love Colors" by Mike Austin and “The Colors of Us” by Karen Katz. The latter helped us to talk about how everyones skin colours are different and that that’s what makes us unique and beautiful.

Our letters this week were D and P. They were trying really hard to get as many P words as they could. They made it to 63!

We also spent time being crafty, doing puzzles together and working in our journals.

It has been wonderful to be outside for longer and longer as the weather has been warming up! We are already talking about the picnics we want to go on once the ground dries up! There was lots of play in the remaining snow, in the puddles, in the mud, in the trees, and rolling down hills. Spring is here!

St. Patrick's Day

3/15/2019

March 15th, 2019

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

We were definitely excited to get ready for St. Patrick’s Day this week! The kids made a large group rainbow out of torn construction paper, for the leprechaun that will visit it and leave his gold coins at the end of. They had a great time laying out a shamrock path for the leprechaun to follow to the rainbow. They had to make two paths because they weren’t sure if leprechauns come through the chimney like Santa or if they come through the door. Too funny!

We had with coloured bubble blowing paint through many straws and exploring different colours of green using green, black and white paint. We decorated shamrocks with glitter glue, pom poms and sequins. The older ones wrote their names on them, while the little ones either tried writing the first letter or simply recognizing their pre-written name.

The kids went on a hunt for numbered gold coins, of which they had to identify and match to the number 1-20. They threaded their own paper 4 leaf clovers for good luck, and identified numbers on a little rainbow and added the correct number of beads to a pipe cleaner. The kids also used number counting/recognition matching puzzles and number identification/representation matching.

Our letters this week were S and J. The kids worked in their journals and we wrapped up our Mystery Bags this week. It looks like I will have to schedule another round, as the kids really seemed to love it!

Mardi Gras

3/5/2019

March 8th, 2019

Mardi Gras!

It was one big festival this week! We learned where Mardi Gras is celebrated, learned about the yummy food eaten and the fun costumes worn, and of course the parade! The kids were amazed at how well the stilt walkers could walk way up there!

We dyed rigatoni pasta to make necklaces with. Those little fingers were put hard to work threading the yarn through the pasta! Some of started their necklaces by making patterns too! We also made card stock paper masks with feathers and other decorations.

Our letters this week were Q and G. It is quite cute to see the little ones try to write the letters like the big kids do! The kids went on a letter hunt to find the letters of their names and then put them in the right order. The little ones are working on identifying the letters in their names and matching the letters to make the proper sequence, while the big kids are practicing their last names.

We have been working away in our journals this week, free drawing and letter forming.

We also baked muffins for our snack.

Pink Shirt Day and Dr.Seuss' Birthday

3/2/2019