S is for Snowman

Hailey loves "Once there was a Snowman", so I thought Snowman for the letter S would be a lot of fun.
We colored our Itsy Bitsy S Book with watercolors.

Then we had a couple of ideas on how to make a snowman. One idea is to use white paint. Another is to use three paper plates and attach them with brads. With that one you would focus on dressing the snowman. The one we end up doing was using cotton balls to make the snowman.

I cut out the circles and glued them onto the blue construction paper for her, so it'll be easier to see where the cotton balls go.

This is a cute file folder game from Preschool Printables. You match the snowman up by colors. Hailey did a great job at it. I also made the Number Snowflake one but I don't think Hailey is ready for it yet.

We read "The Biggest Snowman Ever" by Steven Kroll and Jeni Bassett and "All you need for a Snowman" by Alice Schertle. "The Biggest Snowman Ever" is a cute book with mice and "All you need for a Snowman" is fun and an easy read. I also got "The Tiny Snowflake" by Arthur Ginolfi but Hailey was losing interest by the end of Hailey School. "The Tiny Snowflake" is about finding why we are special and understanding that everyone is special.

And of course at the end we sang "Once there was a Snowman".

Starting the Alphabet

To start off Hailey School, we did an overview of all the letters. Frequently in the car, we repeat the alphabet and Hailey's version is: A, B, C, E, A, B, A, B and then other random letters that are hard to distinguish from each other.

I got this idea of alphabet fishes from http://www.notimeforflashcards.com/ and tried to make my own. I laminated the fishes so they will last longer. Also I couldn't find any eyelets that were magnetic but I thought the design was way cute, so I put eyelets in and put a paper clip near its tail. Hailey was excited to play with the fishes.It was hard pick the fishes up with the magnet, maybe it's because the magnet isn't strong enough, the fishes are too big, or the paper clip wasn't in the best position.

After we got a fish, I would tell her the letter and she would repeat it. She had fun putting the fishes we caught in a pile on the couch.

After we caught all the fishes, we read Dr. Seuss ABC board book together. Also, we read Brainy Baby ABC's.

I made a file folder that has the Sign Language Alphabet and little pictures of things that start with a certain letter. I got the idea from http://onelittletwolittle.wordpress.com/category/tot-school/file-folder-games/ I also had this laminated but didn't have time to put on the Velcro.

This activity was a little harder to do and I had to nurse Robert during this time so I couldn't help as much as I would like.

Another activity I made but we didn't end up doing is ABC bingo. I made four bingo boards using a table from excel and ABC stamps. I think this might be a little too advance for her right now.

At the end of school, we put the caterpillar head on the wall and each day we'll add the letter we worked on. I got the template from http://www.dltk-kids.com/CRAFTS/INSECTS/mcaterpillar-letters.htm I also laminated them after I color them.