Preschool Alphabet Activities - Circle Time, Letter Hunt and Hopscotch

Many of my days with preschoolers include teaching letters of the alphabet. Here are some of my favorite preschool alphabet activities using the entire alphabet.

Once they are familiar with the idea of the alphabet, the focus will turn to mastery of individual letters.

Circle Time Letters
Have a set of wooden or plastic letters. Hand each child a letter and tell the name of the letter. Tell them to trace the letter with their finger with their eyes open and then with their eyes closed. Next ask them to place the letter in their lap and try to trace the outline of the letter in the palm of their hand from memory.

Letter Hunt
Have the alphabet posted on the white board or on a table. Next hide the letters throughout the classroom and ask the children to find them. When they find a letter ask them if they know the name of the letter and to place it on the letter that matches that you have posted. This will let them know if they have found all of the letters.

An alternative to hiding them in the classroom is to hide the letters in the sand table if you have one available.

Alphabet Hopscotch
Tape large poster board squares with the letters on each board on to the floor in a hopscotch pattern. Next let the children hop on a letter and call out the name of the letter. This is always a hit and uses up some of their energy! Incorporating gross motor movements with learning is always a good idea when teaching preschool age children.


If you like these preschool alphabet activities, check out the other ideas in the Preschool Planner.

http://www.preschoolplanner.com/thefullstory.html

There are Two Editions now for the Preschool Planner: Basic or Platinum.


Send me any ideas you would like to share and I will post them on my Blog.

Mary
marys.plans@gmail.com


P.S. If you would like to receive my free newsletters for ideas for your preschool class, enter your name and address at the site below:

http://preschoolplanner.com/preschool-activities.html

Calendar Preschool Activities - Months & Days of the Week

Preschool is an excellent time to introduce children to the concepts of the calendar, days of the week and months of the year. What better way to learn about these concepts than through calendar preschool activities!

The most common and simple of these preschool calendar activities is to start with the month’s progress on a large paper calendar posted on the wall. Preschoolers have begun to know some months and the correlation with a special holiday or birthday.

Month by Month
At the beginning of every month, gather everyone around the large paper calendar on the wall to label it with the important days of the month, such as any special holidays or birthdays occurring within the month. At the end of the day, one special child gets the important job of crossing the day off to get ready for the next day. This can be a reward for cleaning up fastest after a craft, winning a game, or anything else that seems fit.

Days of the Week
Another preschool calendar activity can focus on learning the days of the week. Designate one special activity, game, or song for each day of the week. This will help children get accustomed to a routine, which in turn helps them to learn about the weekly routines that will prevail throughout the remainder of their lives. These activities can change monthly so that children don’t get too bored with them.

The calendar is one of the key concepts that can be introduced to preschoolers since it’s something they’ll be working without throughout the remainder of their lives. Use these preschool calendar activities to familiarize the children with the concepts of days, weeks, months, and years, as well as to highlight some of the important, and lesser-known holidays that occur each month.

If you like these calendar preschool activities, check out the other ideas in the Preschool Planner.

http://www.preschoolplanner.com/thefullstory.html

There are Two Editions now for the Preschool Planner: Basic or Platinum.


Send me any ideas you would like to share and I will post them on my Blog.

Mary
marys.plans@gmail.com


P.S. If you would like to receive my free newsletters for ideas for your preschool class, enter your name and address at the site below:

http://preschoolplanner.com/preschool-activities.html

Preschool Activities - Magic Wands & Relaxation

I thought all of us could use some ideas for preschool activities that focus on relaxation and listening skills. With Halloween at our doorsteps, my preschoolers are wound up like a spring! Listening skills are beginning to wane as well.

Here are two creative preschool ideas that one of my readers sent in recently. They are simple and so effective.

Keep these in your repertoire of preschool relaxation ideas


Magic Wands
This works really well for the preschoolers who do not want to sleep at rest time.

Buy some liquid glitter wands, ask them to lie on the floor or a mat, put on some quiet, relaxing music and ask them to follow your slow movements with the wand. When finished all the movements you can think of, ask them to sit up and do some movements with the wand. Then ask them to roll on each side and move with their wand sticks. Lastly ask them to stand up and ask them to follow some different slow relaxing movements.

Alternatively you can start with standing and slowly work to lying down and then ask them to place their wand on their chest, close their eyes and finish with a story on a tape. Preschoolers love this!

Listening Ball
When children are learning about listening and talking you can have a ball or special decorated box. Only the person with the ball or box is allowed to talk and gives some the confidence to speak. It works!


If you like these preschool activities, check out the other ideas in the Preschool Planner.

http://www.preschoolplanner.com/thefullstory.html

There are Two Editions now for the Preschool Planner: Basic or Platinum.


Send me any ideas you would like to share and I will post them on my Blog.

Mary
marys.plans@gmail.com


P.S. If you would like to receive my free newsletters for ideas for your preschool class, enter your name and address at the site below:

http://preschoolplanner.com/preschool-activities.html

Halloween Activities for Preschool - Black Cats & Trunk or Treat

Well the momentum is building and the preschoolers are so excited! Here are a couple of Halloween activities for preschool to help put some of that extra energy into a creative learning experience.

My mission is to tone down as much of thes scary aspects of the holiday and focus on the fun times that can be had together.

These ideas are ones I've used in the past; some were sent to me and others were introduced by parents. Give them a try. Send me any others you may have and they will be shared for sure.


Black Cat Hand Print
Paint the child's hand black. Make sure their fingers are spread open, put on white paper. The thumb is the neck of the black cat, cut out circles the size of about a big Gatorade bottle top. The fingers are the legs for the cat. We cut small triangle black ears, use goolie eyes and a tiny small red pom-pom for the nose. I hole punch white paper to glue two dots right under the nose. The kids glue the head at the end of the thumb, ears, eyes and nose on. We did the white hole punched paper ourselves. Once that is all done we had the children make their own tail.

Next we cut around the cats leaving just a little white showing. You can either trace a moon on yellow paper and let the kids cut out or you can cut out a moon out of yellow paper. I bought the white fencing that you use on bulletin boards so the children would glue the moon down on dark blue paper and then glue the fencing down and then glue their cat just above the fencing. This is a long process, but turns out so cute. Decorate your room or hallways with their creations.

Trunk or Treat
This idea was suggested to me and it has become one of our annual events and it is very fun and families love this too.

We have "Trunk or Treat" - Section off a part of the parking lot with cones for safety purposes. Invite parents and families to come and park their cars with the trunks open in our parking lot. They are invited to also come in costumes and to bring treats for the children. Most of them also decorate their trunks. We bring the children out with special treat bags that they decorated with markers and stickers(they are also invited to dress in costumes) and they trick or treat from car to car. Then we meet their families back inside and sing a couple of fun songs.

This gives everyone a chance to really see everyone's costumes - especially if the weather is a little cool and the children have to wear jackets outside. We love this activity!

Happy Halloween to all.

Mary

P.S. If you like these ideas Check out my Preschool Lesson Plans here:

http://www.preschoolplanner.com/thefullstory.html

Preschool Counting Games - Number Recognition & Counting

One of the basic responsibilities of a preschool teacher is teaching numbers and counting. These are a few of the preschool counting games that I have used for years with great response from my preschoolers.

Give these a try and also use your imagination to make variations on these to meet your childrens level of ability and interests.


Number Uses
Try this at circle time when you have the direct attention of your class. Make a list with the class about all the times you might use numbers. Talk to them about how numbers show up everyday, from things like telephone numbers, street addresses, prices on things in stores, radio stations, etc. Ask them when they remember seeing numbers and if they remember their own telephone numbers, house number, classroom number, etc.

Counting Items
Hold up flashcards with different amounts of items. You can have 7 hats or 3 ice cream cones, etc. Ask students how many items they see and walk them through the counting process.

You can hold up signs or book covers and ask them how many of a certain letter they see, for example: How many “A’s” do you see on this page?

Number Word Recognition
Write the numbers 1-6 on the board. Under each number, write the word for that number. You will also need each number and each word written on separate pieces of paper. Have your class say the number and point out the word to them as they say the number. Next, cover the board (or erase it) and take your individual papers out. Hold up a number and ask what the number is. Then take a word and ask them if they can remember the word or the number it represents. You can actually place these in random order on the floor and ask the children to put them in order with the correct word under the correct number.


If you like these preschool counting games, check out the other ideas in the Preschool Planner.

http://www.preschoolplanner.com/thefullstory.html

There are Two Editions now for the Preschool Planner: Basic or Platinum.


Send me any ideas you would like to share and I will post them on my Blog.

Mary
marys.plans@gmail.com


P.S. If you would like to receive my free newsletters for ideas for your preschool class, enter your name and address at the site below:

http://preschoolplanner.com/preschool-activities.html

Preschool Dinosaur Activities - Dinosaur Land

As a preschool teacher you know that a popular universal theme for preschoolers is dinosaurs. Add these preschool dinosaur activities to your list of favorites!

This idea finds a way to use playdough that is past its prime to create a fantasy land that your children will create and love. It was sent to me by one of my readers who wanted it posted for all to share.

You can use it to teach colors, textures, counting, landscape such as lakes, hills, mountains, foliage, etc. It lends itself to so many opportunities to teach using "hands-on" methods. That is my preference 100%.


Dinosaur Land

I had a large amount of homemade playdough that was past it's prime and instead of throwing it away the children and I used it to sculpt a land for our miniature dinosaurs. We started with a large plastic tray. We actually used a re-purposed diaper changing tray so it was very large. Any size would work, but the large size gave us room for many possibilities. We started pressing the playdough into the tray and playing with it creating mountains, volvanos, a depression for a pond, trails with dino footprints, dinosuars nests with effs, etc. We added plastic foiliage for trees, bushes, and flowers. When we had just the way we wanted it we let it dry for a couple of days. It dried to a hard state, with some surface cracks that made it look even better. In the depressed pond area we put glue with a little blue paint and let it dry overnight. It looked just like a little pond of water and gave the little dinos a well used watering hole. The kids played with this for weeks, and were very careful to preserve it as we made it. They were anxious to make repairs as plants would come dislodged. When it finally started to crumble it was easy to pull the plactic pieces out and get rid of the rest. This was one of my most successful impromptu activites.


If you like these preschool dinosaur activities, check out the other ideas in the Preschool Planner.

http://www.preschoolplanner.com/thefullstory.html

There are Two Editions now for the Preschool Planner: Basic or Platinum.

If you prefer lessons which have ideas for the Toddler Age, go here to the second volume of lessons. There is an entire bonus section devoted to TODDLERS.

http://www.preschoolwhiz.com/v2.html

Send me any ideas you would like to share and I will post them on my Blog.

Mary
marys.plans@gmail.com

Preschool Themes - Permission and Licenses

One of the preschool themes I like to introduce is the idea of getting permission to do things. I link this to the concept of licenses which they may be familiar with.

To begin we talk about what a license is and what it means, for example, a driver's license. Most children know that you need a drivers license to drive a car. Ask them what they think this means. Their answers give you a clue as to their understanding. Point out that this license means that the person has worked hard to learn to do the special things that the license requires.

Ask them if they can think of other things that require a license. You can help them by giving ideas of driving a school bus, working as a doctor or a dentist, flying an airplane, etc. You can even mention that you need a license to have a preschool or home day care.

Most important is to draw the comparison to your preschoolers in getting "permission" to do things. Permission is a kind of license for them. If they get permission to do something it means that they have learned about what they want to do and have shown their ability to do something correctly.

One examples of a license you can make up for your preschoolers. Make "licenses" for outside activities such as riding tricycles. They have to show you the right way to get on, the ability to steer forward and how to stop. Then you can give them their license to participate in this activity.

You can use this concept for most situations that you are teaching. Showing ability and responsibility even at this early age helps them with manners, social skills and sense of self.

If you like these preschool themes, check out the other ideas in the Preschool Planner.

http://www.preschoolplanner.com/thefullstory.html

There are Two Editions now for the Preschool Planner: Basic or Platinum.

If you prefer lessons which have ideas for the Toddler Age, go here to the second volume of lessons. There is an entire bonus section devoted to TODDLERS.

http://www.preschoolwhiz.com/v2.html

Send me any ideas you would like to share and I will post them on my Blog.

Mary
marys.plans@gmail.com