Fall! A Very Colorful Season

Fall is my favorite time of year! I love when the weather turns cooler (not cold here in South Texas, unfortunately...I grew up in Colorado so I miss that!) and the leaves on the trees begin to turn to pretty colors. I love the holidays, too! Halloween is so much fun, Thanksgiving is such a wonderful celebration, and my wedding anniversary and birthday is in Fall, also. In a nutshell, fall is awesome!

CIRCLE TIME

Fall (or Autumn) is the season which comes after summer and before winter. It is the time of year, for those of us in the northern hemisphere, when hot, sunny days give way to cooler, rainy, windy ones. The plants, trees and flowers that were growing so nicely will begin to change colors and go to "sleep". Birds and squirrels that were so busy during the summer will begin to store up food so they can make it through the winter. It is also the time when many farmers begin the Harvest. This means that the fruits and vegetables that have been growing all summer are now ready to be picked!

Fall Poem:

Red and yellow, green and brown.
count off colors on fingers
Leaves are falling to the ground.
simulate falling leaves with hands
We pile them up OH SO HIGH:
'pile' leaves with hands
Then we JUMP in!
pretend to jump in
 My friends and I!

BOOKS



http://www.amazon.com/Now-Fall-Lois-Lenski-Books/dp/0375810692

A sweet book that talks about the changes that come during fall!



http://www.amazon.com/Let-It-Fall-Maryann-Cocca-Leffler/dp/0545208793/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_y

The rhymes in this book help to keep the kid's attention as you read about all the fall awesome-ness!

SCRIPTURE



Harvest Puzzle
Print out the puzzle and cut on the dotted lines, or make this a scissor practice activity. Glue the puzzle to another piece of paper for display! This is a simple 6 piece puzzle for young children!

Define Harvest Time:  Show the children several different kinds of vegetable or fruit seeds, then explain that they need soil, sun, and rain to grow. Explain to children that the next time it rains, they can thank God for giving plants something they need in order to provide us with food. Explain that when fruits and vegetables are fully grown, they're harvested or picked. This is a time for thanking God for taking care of us.

Psalms 126:6 He that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him.

SCIENCE
 

Exploring Acorns!

Acorns are abundant around my house this time of year. I have some huge oak trees on my property. If you do not have them available to pick up off the ground, you can buy them at craft stores!

          You will need:

Lots of acorns

A small kitchen scale

One large and several smaller bowls

A mallet

Magnifying glass

Container with water

We are going to find out as much as we can about these little acorns! Acorns are a nut that grows on Oak trees. Squirrels love to eat them! During the Autumn months, the oak trees will drop all of their acorns onto the ground. Many of them will be dug up and eaten by animals, but some will get buried in the dirt and begin to sprout! This is how new oak trees are born.

Engaging in Scientific Discovery is even more fun if you dress the kids up in little aprons!

Set up a low table with all of the above items. Place the whole lot of acorns in the big bowl. Have the kiddos perform these experiments:

1. Weigh Them:  first weigh one, then a couple of them. Are they heavy or light?

2. Sort Them: you probably have some that are very small, some that are medium, and some that are really big! Sort them into the 3 little bowls.

3. Use the mallet to crush a couple of them. Poke around inside and see what is in there.

4. Use a magnifying glass to examine a whole one and also one that is broken. What do you see?

5. Do you think they will float? Put some in the water and find out!

MATH

Fall Object Sorting

Gather actual fall objects from your yard or a park. OR, if you don't have access to any, you can use pictures printed off the internet!

Collect:
leaves
twigs
acorns
pine needles
pine cones
mini pumpkins (I don't have these in my yard, but my grocer has them)
Indian corn (same as above)

Make picture cards with the item name on it (to help them begin to recognize the written words with the objects) and place them around the table.
Place all objects in a large tub. Explain that we are going to sort the objects into groups. All of the twigs go in a group, all of the acorns in a group, etc. Allow the kids to sort together. Once they are done, discuss the characteristics that make the items different. What kinds of things could make them the same?

Sorting and classifying objects helps children become aware of how items are alike and different and creates awareness that is vital for math learning - according to Education.com.

Leaf Sequencing Cards

Visit makelearningfun.com through this LINK.  Depending on the age and skill level of the kids you have, print the cards you wish to work with and laminate them, or you can print them on cardstock. Mix the cards up.

Count the leaves on the Autumn trees and look at the number printed on the trunk. Put the cards in numerical order. You can have them put them in order from small to large, or large to small.  This is a great exercise in counting and order sequencing.

LETTER OF THE WEEK

          A for Ant

          We are going to work on short A again this week. Print the worksheet from first-school.com HERE. 
           The worksheet has traceable upper case and lower case A's for writing practice. It also has a few   
           short A words to practice the short A sound!

READING

Your pre-schooler can learn to read! I am a big believer in "sounding it out" so that is how I teach reading. I will be using a couple of amazing FREE websites to help me teach the kiddos...

Each week, I will post links to these sites and which parts to work on at a given time! I will also throw in some some activities as well. It is best to practice reading for about 10-15 minutes per day! Young children will end up getting bored if you try to do too much at once, so pace yourself.

Readingbear.org:  this site is amazing! The story behind it is pretty cool too. Start here...

http://www.readingbear.org/   Click on the short A lesson. Play the video and learn how the short A works in words!


Starfall.com: another awesome site! This site actually has many different lessons. Go play around with it when you have a couple of minutes!

http://www.starfall.com/n/level-a/learn-to-read/play.htm?f  Begin with the Alphabet movie under the Skills section on the right hand side. Then do the "an" and "at" lessons and finish with the "Zac the Rat" story!


Kizphonics.com:  this site has a TON of stuff! Not all of it is free. You can become a member, if you wish.

http://www.kizphonics.com/product-types/phonics-readers/  Use the Man Cat & Rat Reader for this week.



MOTOR SKILLS

Gross: Jumping in a pile of "leaves" 

Since not everyone will have piles of leaves to jump in, and if you do, you probably don't want to rake them up just to have them scattered again, we are going to make a pretend pile of leaves!

Have the kids help pile together some old pillows, blankets, towels, etc. Make the pile as big and fluffy as possible. (you will probably also want to make sure you have a large clear area for safety) Then allow the kids to jump into the pile! Each time the pile is scattered, everyone can help pile it up again.

Fine: Fall Shape Colors

I found this on Pre-kinders.com! Draw some fall shapes, such as a leaf or a pumpkin, on paper towels using a sharpie marker. Provide little dishes of food color and eye droppers.

The idea is to squirt the food color onto the shapes in order to color them. Fun! The eyedroppers make this a fine motor activity.

Go HERE to see the activity on the site!     

MUSIC

Fall Leaves Song

Five little leaves so bright and gay
(hold up 5 fingers)

Were dancing about on a tree one day
(wiggle fingers)
The wind came blowing through the town
(cup hands around mouth and make wind noise)
And one little leaf came tumbling down
(bend down one finger)

**Continue the countdown to one little leaf!



Art/Craft

Art: Fall Trees

Materials Needed -
Grey or dark blue construction paper
Brown construction paper
Red, orange, yellow and brown tissue paper
Glue
Pencil
Scissors

Trace the children's forearm and hand, with their fingers spread out, onto the brown paper. Cut these out. Have the children glue their arm "trees" to the dark paper. For scissor practice, let them go crazy on the tissue paper. You will need lots of little pieces. Once you have your autumn leaves cut out, allow the kids to glue them to their arm trees. So lovely...

Craft - Bean Leaves

Materials Needed:
Cardstock
Sharpie
Scissors
A bunch of different colored dried beans
White school glue

Free hand some simple leaves onto the cardstock. Cut them out. Provide the kids with lots of beans and glue and allow them to create beautiful fall leaves by gluing the beans to the leaf cut outs.

COOKING

Ants on a Log (or a stump!)

Ingredients-
Celery, cut into sticks or bite sized pieces
Peanut butter (you can use a substitute if someone has allergies)
Raisins

I prefer to cut my celery into small pieces. My son likes them that way. So we call them ants on a stump!
Have the kids help spread the peanut butter on the celery, then top with raisins. A healthy snack and it begins with our letter of the week - A!

Weather and Seasons (Jan 21-25)

We have talked about winter and cold weather, now we should step it up and discuss all the seasons and the basic weather that goes with them! This lesson will go hand in hand with your daily calendar discussions!

In South Texas the seasons are a little fuzzy. What I mean is, we really only have 2 seasons, hot and cold. I think it is important for our kiddos to understand what is happening in the rest of the country and to try to pinpoint the various seasons here as best we can!



SPRING:
Spring is when it begins to get warmer outside, snow on the ground will melt away. The flowers will begin to grow again and the leaves on the trees will begin to show up. You will hear birds singing much more! It rains often in the spring to help the flowers and trees grow. Easter, Memorial Day and Mother's Day are in spring.

SUMMER:
In the summer the weather is warm or hot. You can go swimming, go to the park, go on vacation, and go to the beach during the summer. We wear shorts and tank tops and sandals to help keep us cool. It is fun to eat ice cream and popsicles. The flowers are pretty, the grass and trees are green and the birds have lots of fun playing.  Independance Day and Father's Day are in summer.

FALL:
Fall is when the weather becomes cooler. The leaves on the trees begin to change color and fall off the trees. Flowers will begin to disappear and the grass will start to turn brown. The birds are now storing food for the winter.  Labor Day, Halloween and Thanksgiving are in fall.

WINTER:
Winter is the coldest part of the year. The trees will not have any leaves on them. There are no flowers. The grass will be brown. The birds will be sleeping or have flown to a place that is warmer for them. We get to drink hot chocolate to keep us warm. We wear long sleeved shirts and pants, and even coats, hats and mittens to keep us warm. Christmas, New Year and Valentine's Day are in winter.


SEASON MATCHING

Print out the cards and cut out the pieces at the bottom. I suggest doing two seasons at a time so you don't overwhelm the kiddos. Pick 2 that are opposites, like summer and winter. To make it harder, pick 2 that are close, like spring and summer. Lay out the cards and give them the pictures. Ask them to decide where each picture falls in the seasons. Talk about their answers.

If you are having trouble printing the above matching activity, you can print the below worksheets and use them in the same way. Cut out each item and have the children match them by placing them together. I am working on the link for the matching activity now...
http://www.tlsbooks.com/allkindsofweather.pdf
http://www.education.com/files/95001_95100/95099/weather-wear-matching.pdf



WEATHER CHART

If your calendar does not have a weather piece, this chart can be used with your daily circle time discussions. Cut out a large circle, you can use a paper plate!  Either draw or cut out and paste on the 2 lines to bi-sect the circle, making 4 equal parts. Use a brad to attach the arrow so that you can easily point the arrow at the weather of the day. Attach the 4 different types of weather using a picture and the word in each of the 4 spaces. We do not use the snow, since we only rarely get any here. I used wind instead, since we do have some very windy days! Make it work for your class!

MATH

Raindrop Counting and Sequencing:
Cut out the 10 numbered rain drops. The second page will be where the children will place their drops. Begin by counting the numbered rain drops with the kids. Make sure they can see the numbers on them. Once you have counted them, ask the children to tell you which number comes first. You can give the numbered drops to the kids to place on the second page if they are ready for that, or you can hold them while you do this. When a child has given you the correct answer, let that child place the drop in its place on the second page. Go through each of the numbers. If they get any out of order, you can use your fingers to count and discover which number should actually come next.   raindrop sequencing sheets

 

 

 

GROSS MOTOR

Tornado in a Bottle

Make one of these for each child! Use a 2 liter bottle or use an individual water sized bottle, whichever you want. Clean out and fill with water. Add blue food coloring or glitter. Screw the caps on really well! You can even use duct tape to make sure they won't open. Talk to the kids about what a tornado is. Tornadoes are really fast wind which swirls around and around in a circle. They cause what is called a "vortex" or a tornado. Allow the children to spin around and around in circles. Be careful that they do not make themselves sick! Now demonstrate the vortex you can make with the bottle. Swirl the bottle around and around until they can see the tornado! Let them try to make one too.




SCIENCE

Rain Cloud in a Jar

In order to demonstrate how rain falls from the sky, we will use this really fun experiment.

Materials:

Glass Jar

Blue Food Color

Shaving Cream

Fill the jar with water to about an inch from the top. Squirt shaving cream on top of the water. Explain to the kiddos that they should pretend that the water is the air and the shaving cream are clouds up in the sky. Clouds are made up of water. Remember when we talked about steam rising up? Water can become vapor, which is like steam, and rise up into the sky. The water in the sky becomes clouds. When these clouds become really heavy and full of water, rain falls. Demonstrate this by squirting some blue food color onto the top of the shaving cream. The color will soak through the "clouds" and drip down into the water, or sky.

Wind in a Cup

Materials:
Large, clear cups

Tissue paper, shredded up

Straws
Tape

Make one of these for each child. Shred up some tissue paper. Put it in the cup. Place a straw in the cup and then tape over the top to make a lid. Have the kids blow into the straw in the cups to make wind. They will be able to see the effects of wind on the shredded paper! This is a really fun activity! Discuss how the wind blows the trees, the grass and the flowers.

ART

Rainbows

Materials Needed:

Coffee Filters

Markers

Q tips

Talk about rainbows and how they are made up of the colors red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple. Show the kids a picture of a rainbow. Rainbows are formed when rain drops shine through sunlight.

Tape the coffee filters to a larger piece of paper. Draw a rainbow in the correct colors on the coffee filters. Give the children a small container of water and a Qtip. Allow them to dip the Qtip in the water and then let water drip onto the rainow. The colors will spread! The end result is very pretty. Hang these around the room for the week.

 FINE MOTOR

Match the Seasons

Use this Seasons worksheet from Education.com. They will trace a line that connects the weather to the season.

CRAFT

Cloud Craft

There are 2 really fun crafts you can do with clouds! Pick the one that works best for your class. These are fun to hang from the ceiling (if you can!)

#1 - Cotton Ball Clouds

Cut out the cloud template. Provide cotton balls and a glue stick and let the kiddos make theirs as fluffy as they wish!

#2 - Puffy Paint Clouds
Cut out the cloud template OR just print it on paper. Make the puffy paint and allow the kids to paint as they like!

Directions for Puffy Paint:
1 TBSP self-rising flour
1 TBSP salt
Food coloring (blue)

Combine the flour and salt. Drop 3-4 drops of food coloring into it and add about 1-3 TBSP of water to make a smooth paste.

**Once done painting, microwave the painting for around 30 seconds or until the paint puffs up and is dry.

COMMUNITY

Meteorologist

Meteorologists are the scientists who study the weather and predict (make an informed guess) what the weather will be like a few days from now. These scientists examine the wind, rain, and temperatures and report to everyone what they think will happen. People can make plans to be outside if it will be sunny and warm or plans to stay inside if it will be rainy and cold.

MUSIC

Mr. Sun  Lyrics and Sound!

Rain, Rain, Go Away!

Rain, Rain, Go Away

Come again another day

Little _______ wants to play

Rain, Rain Go Away!

COOKING

Mud Pies

Ingredients:
Instant chocolate pudding
Oreo cookies
Milk
Gummy worms

Mix instant chocolate pudding according to the directions on the package. The children help add the “dirt” (pudding mix) and “rain” (milk) to make “mud.” To make this part extra fun, I punch holes in a styrofoam bowl and when the children pour the milk into the bowl it drips like rain into the mixing bowl. The children help mix the mud with a spoon. Put 2 Oreos in a ziplock bag for each child to crush. Put the crushed Oreos in a clear punch cup, add a gummy worm and 3-4 spoonfuls of pudding.

LETTER J j

J is for Jacket! We wear jackets when it is cold outside. Have the kids trace the letter with their finger. Then allow them to color it in. Talk about which Jackets are the same in the picture.

http://www.kidsunder7.com/2011/07/letter-j-worksheets.html