Animal Cracker Math, Handprint Zoo Animal Art & Counting Books, Oh My!

Our Zoo Theme was full of hands-on learning fun.

There are so many things I wanted to share with you.

Unfortunately, I did not capture all of our fun on film :(

Today, I will share a few fun activities that I managed to capture!

 Handprint Zoo Animal Fun:

I just can't resist a cute handprint craft opportunity!

What You Need:
yellow, brown, black & white paint
thin paint brushes
construction paper
permanent markers

What We Did:

To Make a Handprint Giraffe:

1. Paint entire hand with yellow paint & press firmly to paper

2. Using pinky dipped in brown paint add spots & hooves

3. Add tail, hair & face (we used permanent marker for face)

The Lil Divas Handprint Giraffes:

5 yr. old                           4 yr. old



To Make a Handprint Zebra:

1. paint hand white

2. press firmly onto paper

 

3. using pinky draw tail & add dot of block (hair)

4. using thin paintbrush use black paint to add stripes as desired

4. add some hair and facial features (we used black permanent marker for face)

& behold your adorable handprint zebra!

The Lil Divas Handprint Zebras

5 yr. old                               4 yr. old

A fun activity, cute craft & fabulous keepsake!

At the Zoo - An Easy Reader Conuting Book:

This was a homemade easy reader activity for my soon to be Kindergartener.
The Littlest Diva did it too & she did really well.

I kept it simple going from #1-5 and used a repetitive phrase with sight words and words that she should know. It was fun for her to make her own book and then read it to all of us!

What You Need:

3 sheets of white paper

zoo animal stickers

pencil

What We Did:

I typed out a general template for the book with a title page and then a page for 1-5 zoo animals that said "I can see (fill in number) (fill in animal) at the zoo. I had the numbers pre-done. The Lil Divas choose 5 animals to use in their book and put on the correct number of stickers for each page. I then helped them spell the animal word and they added it to each page accordingly.

Once we were all done with our books -

the Oldest Diva got to read hers to us!

The Littlest Diva needed help but she read quite a bit of it on her own too!

I am so proud of their developing reading!

Here is a full peek at what our books look like:

 Simple, straight forward and a wonderful math, writing & reading activity!

Animal Cracker Math:

We LOVE working with food! The Lil Divas get such a kick out of it.

Animal crackers are a fun manipulative so I decided to do let the Lil Divas do some basic addition with them.

What You Need:

Animal Crackers

dice

dry erase board

dry erase markers

What We Did:

1. I gave each Lil Diva a large foam dice.

2. They rolled the dice and wrote the number on their dry erase board. 

Then they put down the corresponding number of animal crackers.

3. They rolled a 2nd time and added the new number to their dry erase board forming an addition problem by putting the + sign between the numbers. Then they added the corresponding amount of crackers for the 2nd roll and added/counted them all up to determine their total!

4. They wrote down their answer (making sure to include a = sign)

and I checked it before they moved on to a new problem!

They really enjoyed practicing addition with animal crackers &

after we were all done - they got to have a yummy snack! :)

Handwriting Practice - Letter Z

In a previous post I shared that we formed the letter Z with foam and drew it on a ziploc baggie full of paint.

I noticed that the Littlest Diva was having trouble with slant/diagonal lines which you need to be able to do to properly form a letter Z. I found a great printable that her practice slant lines here.

Once she was able to make the slant lines on her own -

we worked on writing the Letter Z.

She is now able to write the Letter Z wonderfully & she makes great slant lines! Can I get a YAY!, for the Littlest Diva! She takes her handwriting so seriously - always competing with Big Sis.

Practicing Measurement & Basic Ruler Skills

Finally, I wanted to share this fun little book I found with you:

This is a thick board book that comes with a ruler attached (stores in a clear plastic pocket attached to the cover.
Each page of the book has something to measure (it tells you what to do in the text).

The Lil Divas LOVED measuring the animals & items in the book!


This was a really cute book that went great with our zoo theme
& provided some extra ruler practice.

Some Other Zoo Books We Read:

I hope you enjoyed what we shared of our Zoo Themed Fun!
Bern

Butterfly B's & 123's

Wow, I had a bunch of stuff that I did not post yet! I am trying to get it all in so I can share the rest of my Insect Themed Activties w/you! We have been up to some fun stuff around here!

Butterfly B Craft

B is a review letter for us (we did B is for Bear) but I am going over the letters for each insect as we talk about them during our Insect theme. The Lil Divas know how to write the ltter but I thought it would be fun to make a Butterfly B. So I drew and cut out a large B and then I traced it onto white paper to form butterfly wings. I added a body in the middle and the LIl Divas had a cute Letter B Butterfly sheet to design/color.

Butterfly Number Writing Review from Confessions of a Homeschooler

Butterfly Counting Mat (The Littlest Diva) from Confessions of a Homeschooler

Counting mats are too easy for my Oldest Diva at this point so I wanted to do some simple addition with her. She used little butterfly erasers I had found a while back at Target $1 Spot - I love those bins! We worked on simple addition problems but I did not get pictures this time because I was too busy working with her. 

I had her work on a white board and  we wrote out the problems together. I wrote __ +__ = for her and she would fill in the numbers based on cards she would flip over from her pile (I only had her use numbers 0-5 this time) and then she would count the butterfly to add them up and write the answer.

She liked this activity and caught on quickly so we will be doing it again and adding in larger numbers as we move along. I will also begin doing basic subtraction with her.

Butterfly Counting Books - The Oldest Diva is still hvaing trouble identifying numbers 12, 13, and 15 so I sneak in review how I can without boring her with easy counting. She can count them & knows the order - but she has trouble identifying the written numbers since those do not sound like what they are - like fourteen, sixteen, etc....

We worked on these butterlfy couting books where I had written the numbers and number words and the Lil Divas had to count the correct number of butterfly stickers and add them to the page. Since it used stickers - she was all for doing it!

I cut out butterfly shapes from foam and paper, hole punched them and used a pipe cleaner to make a ring (I did not have binder rings).

We think Ttey came out cute! :)

Next we will share our Bee activities with you! Insects are all the rage around here right now!

Bern

Linking to STart, Childhood 101 - We Play!, Sharing Time,  Get Crafty,  Read, Explore, Learn , For the Kids Friday,  Preschool Corner, Feed Me Books Friday  , Fun for Kids Friday , It's Playtime , Made by Little Hands Monday and Creative Juice Thursday

ABC Fun C is for Caterpillar - Meet our New Houseguests

Check out our cool new houseguests (from an Insect Lore Kit):

If only all houseguests were this quiet, independent and compact - lol!

So as you've probably guessed by my little intro - this week was all about Caterpillars for the Lil Divas!

Watching caterpillars grow, change & transform always excites me - no matter how many times I have witnessed their metamorphosis - it is simply AMAZING!

I am enjoying sharing it with my Lil Divas for the first time. We hatched a butterlfy last year but we did not watch the entire process from caterpillar to butterfly as we are doing this year! An entire life cycle post is in the works - we are documenting our caterpillars journey to share with you all. :)

On to other fun stuff - What have the Lil Divas been working on this week?

ABC Fun C is for Caterpillar - Part 1 (more to come)

Books:

 Activities:

Caterpillar Letter C: What better way to review the letter Cc & celebrate that C is for Caterpillar than by making Caterpillar Letter C's!



What You Need:
Construction Paper (various colors) cut into small circles - we used
glue
scissors
markers or glitter glue (that's what we used - the Lil Divas love it!)

What To Do:

1. Give Child Tracer for Letters Cc on background paper (we used black) and have them arrange circles to form the letters on the page.



2. One all circles have been glued on to form letters C & c - have child add legs, eyes, mouth and antenna to form caterpillars! We used glitter glue for the legs but markers work just fine. You can add wiggly eyes too. The Lil Divas wanted to draw their faces with markers so taht is what we did.



They came out so cute!



Letter C Handwriting Practice <---- click for handwriting printables from Confessions of a Homeschooler - including the letter Cc pictured below that we used. I love using her printables! So much color and such cute pictures. The Lil Divas always enjoy them. What I like about her handwriting printables (and why I always use them first since we do a few over the course of the week) is that included a pre-writing activity to get the lil hands moving in the correct motion. This is great for my Littlest Diva who is still in the learning stage. My oldest knows how to write her letters at this point but the practice is good for her as well because she tends to want to go her own way in regards to formation sometimes. These types of handwriting sheets help form the letters correctly.



Caterpillar Math Fun:

Mixed-up Numbers Caterpillar <--- click for printable from Confessions of a Homeschooler. A cute & easy way to review number recognition & number order.

The Oldest Diva worked on numbers 1-20:


\

The Littlest Diva worked on numbers 1-10:



They have worked on this Caterpillar numerous times over the course of the week. There are numbers that are confusing them so I am really trying to get them to recognize & know them.

They honestly love doing it - they find the caterpillar so cute & feel so proud when he's complete and they got it right! I laminated the pieces for durability since I knew we would be using them often and have been storing them in a small baggie.

Caterpillar Dice Game <---click for a cute caterpillar game from Confessions of a Homeschooler. There are 2 versions of the game board - one with numbers and one blank. We played the blank one below using fuzzy pom pom balls as our game pieces and foam numbered dice. The Lil Divas really enjoyed it.



Craft: Colorful Thumbprint Caterpillars - I LOVE thumbprint/handprint/footprint crafts & always find a way to do them! So it should be no suprise that we made these lil critters!

Aren't they cute? :) Ok, so how can you make some too? I'll tell you!

What You Need:
White construction paper or cardstock ( I cut ours to 4x6 size since we are working with tiny thumbs)
Paint - any colors you like!
Markers

What To Do:
Pour a dab of paint onto paper plates for easy thumb access - you can even use a large plate and make a palatte

Have your child place thumb in desired paint color and press onto white construction paper where they want caterpillar to be.

Do this for as many colors as they like - you can mae small or large caterpillars - it's all up to them!

Let thumbprints dry

Once they are dry - add antenna, faces & legs

Then add scenery as you like - you can also do this before hand & use paint if you like - I opted for the less mess version on this particular day! :)

Didn't they turn out adorable? Love them!

Stay tuned for more Caterpillar Learning Fun! :)

I need to catch up on my posts now that Blogger has restored my blog.

Bern

** linking to Childhood 101 - We Play!, Sharing Time,  Get Crafty,  Read, Explore, Learn , For the Kids Friday, and Preschool Corner, Feed Me Books Friday  **