April lesson

Monkey didn’t learn a lot in April, I blame Pascha :) but we did do some cute some things with blue paint and stickers!

I don't think I will ever throw away this Easter egg wreath

March’s Monkey Lesson

We learned all about cars, which is something Monkey already liked so this was an easy month.

We had a car wash with his little cars~ I provided plastic tub of water, soap, and towels. Then Monkey had a car wash by having them wash and dry their cars, all done outside of course!  I tried to point out the tires and door, but he really didn’t care all he wanted to do was make a mess.

We also made a steering wheel using paper plate and a little construction paper.  I had Monkey paint the entire paper plate (green for the month’s color) then once dried I just cut out the inside of the plate.  The next day I had Monkey glue two strips of black paper, he wasn’t happy that he had to wait another day to play with it, for the rest of the week he pretend to drive all around the house…until he ripped his plate.

I usually don’t have time to take pictures while Monkey is painting, I’m usually making he doesn’t paint any chairs or walls, so this is a rare photo of Monkey actually painting his wood car (that I got at the dollar store)

We also learned about the letter M and the color Green.  I found letter shape post-it’s at CVS so we had an M hunt, which he loved.  He enjoyed the fact that he could reuse them well in monkey terms; he enjoyed sticking Ms all over the walls lol

We also made M sugar cookies but for the next few weeks he was calling all cookies “M” so I don’t know how well that worked but he did enjoy them.

For April we will focus on bunnies, the color blue, the letter E, and I’ll be doing a lot of counting to 4.  I’ll post of success next month ;)

Bear Theme

We had alot of fun with teddy bears last month

SONGS
ONE LITTLE TEDDY BEAR

Each time you read the following rhyme, invite five children to act it out by holding up their Teddy Bear Puppets, above, one by one. Or have them pretend to be teddy bears and act out the rhyme.

One little teddy bear smiling for you,

Here comes another bear, and that makes two.

Two little teddy bears just for you and me,

Here comes another bear, and that makes three.

Three little teddy bears sitting on the floor,

Here comes another bear, and that makes four.

Four little teddy bears looking so alive,

Here comes another bear, and that makes five.

Five little teddy bears all in a row,

Watch them dance and twirl around as off they go!

Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear

Grab a teddy bear

Teddy bear, teddy bear, turn around

Teddy bear, teddy bear, touch the ground

Teddy bear, teddy bear, reach up high

Teddy bear, teddy bear, touch the sky

Teddy bear, teddy bear, bend down low

Teddy bear, teddy bear, touch your toes

Teddy bear, teddy bear, go upstairs

Teddy bear, teddy bear, say your prayers

Teddy bear, teddy bear, turn out the light

Teddy bear, teddy bear, say goodnight

The bear went over the mountain,

The bear went over the mountain,

The bear went over the mountain,

To see what he could see

To see what he could see,

To see what he could see

The other side of the mountain,

The other side of the mountain,

The other side of the mountain,

Was all that he could see

Was all that he could see,

Was all that he could see,

The other side of the mountain,

Was all that he could see!

ARTCoffee Bear

What You Need:

Paint

Coffee Grounds

Construction Paper

Googly Eyes

What You Do:

Have the children paint bears with paint that has coffee grounds mixed in it.

Multicolored Bear

What You Need:

Tissue Paper, Cloth Samples, or Construction Paper

Googly Eyes

Poster Board or Construction Paper

What You Do:

Have the kids put the different colored tissue paper (or alternatives) on the bear shaped poster board however they want. You'll end up with multicolored interesting animals

GAMES

Teddy Bear Hunt

Hide Teddy Bears (either students or classes) all over the classroom and let the children try to find them.

Bear Snacks

Using bear shaped cookie cutters make Jell-O, sandwich, toast, or cookie snacks for the kids.

2011 Monkey Lesson

For the past few days I have been taking a break from preparing for Christmas and working on next year’s Monkey Lesson’s.  I like to plan ahead to I can find books, stickers, craft, and toys now at the fraction of the cost. The most important part right now is picking out the “theme” and what I want to teach a two year old. We will be doing the same activities for each theme (matching, coloring, finding, outings, reading). 

January’s theme will be Snowman (clothes, snow, and cold)

February’s- Bears (Big and Small, sleeping, trees)

March’s- All about Me (Body Parts, Emotions, God Loves me)

April’s- Jesus (easter animals, flowers, church)

May’s- Farm (Farm animals, animal noises)

June’s- Cowboys (Horses, Clothes)

July’s- Noah (Animals, Rainbows, Boats)

August- Beach (Ocean, Fish, Hot)

September- Police and Fireman (Fire Safety, being safe, strangers)

October- Zoo (zoo animal, animal noises)

November- Potty Time

December- Advent/ Jesus

Our 2010 Advent Chain

I know I am a few days late, it took some time to type this up.  I made an Advent Chain for Monkey, I don't know how successful this will be since he is only 21 months old but what harm can it do.  He enjoys ripping the links off, I'm having a hard time with Monkey ripping one at a time but that's what tape is for right. 

I cut strips of violet and rose paper and wrote something that I know Monkey can do on each of them.

11/28 Light the first candle on your Advent Wreath

11/29 Color the angels picture

11/30 Give a big smile to everybody you see

12/1 Help momma clean the house

12/2 Give everyone in your family a big hug

12/3 Make 4 Candles to hang on your wall

12/4 Have a special day with your parents

12/5 Light the second candle on your Advent Wreath

12/6 Listen to momma as she reads about Saint Nicholas

12/7 Read a Christmas book

12/8 Make angel

12/9 Give everyone in your family a big kiss

12/10 Color Baby Jesus picture for grandparents

12/11 Have a special day with your daddy

12/12 Light the third candle on your Advent Wreath

12/13 Make  Christmas cards for grandparents

12/14 Give everyone in your family a big hug

12/15 Singing Happy Birthday to Uncle Michael

12/16 Say a prayer for those who falling asleep unto the Lord

12/17 Read a Christmas book

12/18 Enjoy a special day with your cousins

12/19 Light the fourth candle on your Advent Wreath

12/20 Watch Christmas movies

12/21 Listen to momma while she reads about the Nativity

12/22 Make a Birthday Card for Jesus

12/23 Help make a birthday cake for Jesus

12/24 Create a Christmas tree

12/25 Light the White Candle! Merry Christmas Monkey

The Advent Chain will be a big part of Monkey Lesson this month.

Pumpkin Head

Songs: MR. PUMPKIN HEAD   Tune: "The Muffin Man"

 

Come and meet Mr. Pumpkin Head,

Mr. Pumpkin Head, Mr. Pumpkin Head,

Come and meet Mr. Pumpkin Head.

With a red hat (or whatever color it is) on his head.

SONGS: LITTLE PUMPKINS (Sing to the tune of "Ten Little Indians")
One little, two little, three little pumpkins,
Four little, five little, six little pumpkins,
Seven little, eight little, nine little pumpkin,
All found on the farm.

PROJECT 1:Pumpkin Head

Materials: Black and Green construction paper- Glue - 1 paper plates- Orange Paint- and paint brush

DAY 1:            Mommy- Set up the night before, (plate, paint, brush, water for brush, rag for mess)

Monkey- Paint the plate orange (let dry over night)

DAY 2:         Mommy- Set up the night before, cut out black triangles and one green square

Monkey- Glue black triangles on to create a face.  Then use this pumpkin head for the pumpkin head song.

PROJECT 2: Pumpkin Prints

Materials: Black and Green construction paper- Orange Paint-Paper Plate- Pumpkin shaped sponge- Glue- Black Marker

Day 1: Mommy- Set up the night before, (black paper, paint, sponge (cut into pumpkin shape), paper plate for paint, rag for mess)

Monkey- Take the pumpkin sponge and dip it into the paint then stamp onto the black paper. *Let Dry over night*

Day 2: Mommy- Cut little green squares for the pumpkin prints (I also created made pumpkin faces)

Monkey- Glue green leaves onto pumpkin. Then count the pumpkin prints.

We also went pumpkin pickin and painted pumpkins but still after a month long love of pumpkins Monkey still hasn’t said the word “pumpkin”

Red Apple Lesson

Monkey loves music so having a few apple songs gets him in a good mood.

SONGS: LITTLE APPLES (Sing to the tune of "Ten Little Indians")
One little, two little, three little apples,
Four little, five little, six little apples,
Seven little, eight little, nine little apples,
All fell to the ground.

SONGS: (Sung to the tune of "Have You Ever Seen a Lassie")
Have you ever seen an apple, an apple, an apple
Have you ever seen an apple, that grows on a tree?
A red one, a yellow one, a red one, a yellow one
Have you ever seen an apple, that frowns on a tree?

PROJECT 1: APPLE COLORS

Materials: Red Green Yellow construction paper- Glue Sticks- Red Green Yellow glitter- 3 colored paper plates (need to paint in advance)

Set out several different kinds and colors of apples. Sort the apples by color and count them.

DAY 1 ART:            Me: Need to cut out different color apples

Monkey: Use the glue stick to add glitter to apples cut outs (talk about the colors)

DAY 2 SORT:         Me: Set up the plates and apples

                                Monkey: teach him to place the colored apple to the correct colored plate

DAY 3 COUNT:      Count the how many apples we have, how many red, green, yellow apples, how many in total

PROJECT 2: Lacing Projects

Materials: ribbon/shoelaces - single hole punch - scissors - pencil -old cereal box, Yellow construction paper- Red and Green Paint

DAY 1 ART:            Monkey: Paint the yellow construction paper (talk about colors)

                Me: Once dried, cut out an apple shape out of the construction paper and                                 copy on  Cereal  box

DAY 2 MOTOR:      Monkey: help glue the two pieces of paper together and glue leaf

DAY 3 MOTOR:      Me: use hole punch for lancing and cut out a green leaf

                                Monkey: help lace the apple then hang it up for display

We also read apple books and practice recognizing our A. I forgot to take pictures of our A lessons, next time ;)

Where I get idea's for Monkey Lesson

I would like to give credit to my favorite preschool websites
1. I go to preschoolexpress, first-school and alphabet-soup to help find our themes
2. Monkey loves to color so I get free coloring pages for each theme
3. dltk-kids has a lot of arts and craft ideas
4. and I love abctwiggles to get activives for his ABC's
5. and me ;)

I don't spend alot of money on Monkey Lesson either; before I thro something out I look at it twice and see if I could use it. I save toilet paper and paper towel tubes , the cardboard to a empty cereal box, egg cartons, coffee cans with lids, shoe boxes ,waxed cardboard milk cartons, mismatched socks, you get the idea.

Monkey Lesson

Once Monkey turned 18 months we started our "lessons" which I do for three reasons 1) its great Monkey and Me bonding time 2) he has a lot of energy so I try to channel it on good stuff 3) he is learning, there is no downside to that. I pick a theme that we will work on for a few weeks which also includes a letter, number, color, and church.  In each theme packet, I make sure there are coloring pages, arts and craft projects, and library books. I also try to schedule some kind of outing like apple picking or visting the chickens at the park.

In September the two theme's were Chickens (Monkey's favorite animal sound), Crosses, and we are still working on Apples. We also introduce the letter "A" and the color red.  I don't expect Monkey to write the letter or even know that apple starts with the letter A all I want is for him to recognized the letter. The most important thing is Monkey is having fun learning, once it stops being fun I put everything away and we go play.

I will post our pictures and the lesson plans at the end of the month :)