On Mother's Lap

Book Cover of "On Mother's Lap"

Hi all!  I found this treasure, On Mother's Lap by Ann Herbert Scott, among my Mother's Day books and decided to use it this week.  You may ask why it's a treasure.  Well, I think it has a great lesson, that a mother's love is all-encompassing and there is always room on her lap.  This book is especially good for any little one in your classroom who has a new baby sister or brother.  We forget sometimes, as adults, that it can be difficult for youngsters to share.

I also like this book because you can have your kids rock "back and forth, back and forth," as you say the words in the story.  It's kind of funny, because I'm talking about different movements and motions in science right now.  So I added a new graphic organizer page to my Motion and Matter set that includes a rocking chair.  The kids really made the connection between science and reading.  If you're interested in looking at this science pack, here's the TPT link.  These graphic organizers are really wonderful to use as assessments for science.

Ok, so here are some freebies.  I use these pictures to teach the lesson and to discuss different types of movement:

Graphic Organizer Science Motion Cards by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

I also used scarves to have my children simulate "around and around", "back and forth", "side to side", and "up and down."  Some of the songs that I used were "The Freeze" by Greg & Steve, "The Body Rock" by Greg & Steve, and "Spin and Stop" by Music Together.

Last, but not least, for comprehension I used this graphic organizer to see if the children could notice details by choosing which items Michael took with him on Mother's Lap:

Graphic Organizer Mothers Lap by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

I hope this post is helpful!

Simple and Sweet Birthday Ideas

"The Secret Birthday Message" by Eric Carle

Yesterday was my birthday and I started thinking about all the things I've done in past years to teach pre-k and kindergarten students about when their birthdays are and how people in America and various other cultures celebrate their birthdays.  This is the first of a series of posts that I will be writing about birthdays.

The Secret Birthday Message by Eric Carle is really special because it has that treasure-hunt-type feel to it.  Students have to look at shape clues to predict where the boy will go in the story to find his birthday surprise.  This book covers concepts such as shape identification, direction words and sequencing, and you could extend it to talk about map skills.  I really enjoy having my children guess what each shape represents in the real world.  Since we're always being told to include higher-level thinking for our pre-k and kindergarten kids, I think this is an excellent way to do it.

Throughout the year in pre-k I use the song "Happy Birthday Letters" by Dr. Jean.  I use the following book with the song, and my kids really focus on every single page.

Happy Birthday Letters

Another thing I do to work on one-to-one correspondence and number identification is to put straight candles and numeral candles in Play Doh Center so that children can put them in sculpted cakes.  It's easy, fun, and the students are learning how to match quantities with numerals.

In kindergarten, I use these birthday cakes with candles to teach months of the year, spelling, fine motor skills, and name writing.  Students write their names somewhere on the cake, cut out the appropriate number of candles, and glue them onto the cake.  You can use chalk, markers, crayons, paint, etc. to decorate these cakes.  I've also used sequins, foam shapes, and little paper flowers.  I always make a pre-made list to tell me whose birthdays are in which month.

Birthday Cakes and Candles 2

After we finish the cakes, there's a great song by Jack Hartmann called "Birthdays" where the children stand up and sit down when they hear their birthday month.  I've noticed that this song really helps children with focusing problems, because they have to listen to stand up for their birthday month.

For many years, I celebrated my birthday with the children and taught them traditions from around the world.  Here's one of my favorites:

Canada:  At birthday parties they serve homemade birthday cakes decorated with colored sugar sprinkles. Between the layers of the cake a wrapped coin might be found. Whomever finds it is the first to get a turn at all the party games. At the parties children receive colorful party favors called crackers. These are tubes wrapped in crepe paper. They pop when you pull a paper strip. Inside there is a small prize, your fortune or a hat.


I would really love to hear special birthday traditions or celebration ideas from you.  Please leave me a comment!

Eating The Alphabet

"Eating The Alphabet" by Lois Ehlert

Eating The Alphabet by Lois Ehlert is a colorful ABC book that encourages your sweeties to learn new vocabulary as well as phonics and letter identification.  Let me be completely honest when I tell you that my kids really are into this book up to about letter K.  Then the wiggles start.  You know what I mean.  Sally starts touching Sarah's hair, Billy starts poking Carole, etc.  It's a long book.

So, this year, when I was preparing to use this book with a kindergarten class, I got smart.  I went to the grocery store and bought dates, a kiwi, and peaches.  I actually wanted mangoes, but the particular store that I went to didn't have any.  I also prepared a CD with alphabet songs on it, to get the kids up and moving.  When the students came in, I started with a song by Dr. Jean called "Phonercise."  This is such a wonderful song because it has the kids stretching up to say the letter, touching their shoulders to make the letter sound, and touching their toes to say a word starting with that letter.  I paused the song at letter K so that we could read the book up to letter K.  We read each page, clapping the syllables for each word.  This really allowed the students to be involved with the story.  It also helped tremendously with the wiggles I talked about earlier.  Showing them the real fruits also piqued their interest.  This is such a great book for introducing new fruits and vegetables to your children.  The kids told me they didn't know what dates were, so it was sort of a mini-science lesson within the language lesson.  We also check any food allergies before we let the children eat anything.  So, when we got to letter K in the book, I showed them the kiwi and then we finished the rest of the Dr. Jean song.  After finishing the song, we went back to reading the book.  It went so much better than trying to read the whole book without any kind of movement in the middle.  I will always do it this way from now on!

Sample game boards for ABC BINGO

If you're interested, I have an ABC BINGO game (available on TPT) using very colorful pictures along with letters and words on the game boards and teacher cards.  I tried this out the same day as reading Eating The Alphabet, and my small group loved it.