Letter O

We were home a lot last week, so I decided to do a few lessons with Sawyer. I didn't have much computer access, since Justin was working on it most days, so I just thought of a few things to do with the letter O. I had to be spontaneous to give us some things to do. First I cut out a letter O and let Sawyer color it and cover it with cheerios. This was their snack time, too.
I let Jax glue Os onto an oval. He didn't realize you can't eat the cherios once they had glue on them. That is glue under his nose.
Another day we read a book and watched a video about Oswald the Octopus. I helped Sawyer make this Octopus. He painted it orange and glued on the 8 tentacles. He likes counting them and saying the word tentacle.
One of the tentacles tore, so our octopus actually has 7 and a half legs.
We also talked a lot about opposites this week. Sawyer really enjoys reading books about opposites, so I jumped on the opportunity to teach him more about them. We played a game with his musical instruments. We played the instruments fast then slow, loud then soft, high then low, etc. Lulu gave them the Melissa and Doug band in a box for Christmas. It is great for music time. My guys love music, so any lesson I can incorporate with music is perfect for them.

Numbers and Noise

Today we talked about numbers. During circle time I filled a net with magnetic numbers. I let the boys choose a number and tell me the name. Then I let Sawyer help me make these number cards. Yesterday I cut out pictures and glued them to index cards. Sawyer counted the objects and put the corresponding number sticker on the cards.
He did pretty well with this activity. I had to help him count the pictures with objects of more than five.

I also helped the boys make noisemakers. Sawyer filled sour cream cartons with dried beans and noodles. Then they covered them with stickers and shook away. I could have covered them with paper and tried to make them cuter.


Other activities we may do for N week are play with the nativity set, read nursery rhymes, and talk about names. Justin will be home the next two week, so we will take a little break and enjoy our time with Daddy.

Noel

We are talking about the letter N this week, so I had Sawyer paint the letters Noel with green and red paint. I told him that the work Noel means Christmas.

He said, "Mommy, see the l, it says yesel not noel."

Noodles

This week we are learning about the letter N. Today we did activities with noodles. Sawyer enjoyed painting with cooked noodles.
It was messy, but lots of fun.
Next, I had Sawyer count and sort different types of noodles.
Even Jax enjoyed putting noodles in the ramekins. He liked the noise it made.

Then Sawyer glued his noodles on a letter N.

Still Learning

We have been busy, but we haven't stopped learning. Last week I was busy trying to get things back in order from being gone, so we didn't do a letter. We did decorate a very cute card holder, but I haven't hung it yet. I will take a picture once I hang it.

I had a hard time deciding if we should just do Christmas crafts or work on letters this week. We are doing a little of both. I traced the boys' hands and feet to make this reindeer. Sawyer insisted Mickey do one too.


We talked about the letter M and thought of as many words as we could that start with M. I cut out pictures and words that started with M and Sawyer made a collage. He did a good job and filled up the whole paper. I also talked about the manger and read a book about baby Jesus. We played with the toy nativity scene. Sawyer thinks it is fun to throw the characters and say "Super Mary" and "Super Joseph."

Today I let the boys decorate Christmas trees with markers, stickers, pom poms, and glitter glue. They had a good time! If you look closely you will see that Jax took a bite out of his star.

More fun with leaves

Here are a couple of crafts we did yesterday. I took a couple of different ideas I had seen and created this turkey. Sawyer colored the paper plate, but he wasn't able to do much else. I had to do the cutting and the gluing. I had to use a glue gun to get the leaves to stay. He thought it was pretty fun when it was finished.

The next thing we made was a group project. Sawyer colored the green part and the orange leaves. Jaxon colored the red leaves and I cut everything out and glued it together.

I have it hanging in the hallway and the boys love it. I taught them a song about falling leaves and dropped leaves as I sang it. We did this over and over and over.

L for Leaves

This week we are learning about the letter L. Our theme for the week is leaves. I am also incorporating fall and Thanksgiving crafts, since Thanksgiving is a week away. I have found so many cute ideas. It has been hard to decide what I want to do. I keep reminding myself that we have many more years to do fun crafts together. I don't have to teach them everything this year. Sunday I took the boys to the park to collect leaves. Sawyer kept picking up leaves and saying, "this is a great one" or "look mom, this one is perfect." We talked about the colors of the leaves and the sound they make when we walk on them.
Monday we went to the zoo in the morning and did a fall craft with our friends in the afternoon. We decorated corn with glitter. Actually, I decorated the corn. Sawyer was too distracted by the snack and his friends. He helped a little, but I did most of the work. Tuesday he decorated a letter L with leaves.

Then I had both boys decorate place mats for Thanksgiving. I let them decorate a paper towel with markers. Then I covered it with contact paper. Sawyer wants to eat on his all the time now.
Yesterday Sawyer painted leaves that I had drawn. After they dried I cut them out. I glued clothes pins and the leaves to make a Thanksgiving garland. I saw this idea on notimeforflashcards.com. I also cut out other paper leaves and asked Sawyer to name some things he was Thankful for. Then we clipped them to the clothes pins. I hung it by the dinner table, so that we could do this every evening before dinner. I probably should have done this earlier in the month. Oh well! I will save it and hopefully bring it out next year.

I really haven't talked to Sawyer much about the details of Thanksgiving such as pilgrims, indians, and turkeys. I wish I had a good book or play set to teach him about it. We will probably talk about it a little, but I am focusing on being Thankful. He likes to thank God for things and it makes me so happy to hear him talk about God. The other night when I was tucking him in bed, he told me "God's word is true." So sweet! Then he told me "God made me" and he sang the song.