It’s farm week here at the Funk residence, so get ready to dive into learning about cute animals and all things dirt! Don’t forget to take a hay ride on over to my toddler post “E-I-E-I-O!” for some fun art and sensory play activities like making scribble chicks, edible dirt and muddy tractors bath play!
–Literacy:
-“Mud” letter practice: My little LOVED this ooey gooey letter practice activity! I just used a baking spatula to smooth some chocolate pudding on a plate (use white if you have one- the letters show up better!) Then we went through a set of flashcards and I had my little identify each letter then practice writing it with his finger in the “mud”. I let him lick his finger after each correctly formed letter as a little treat then smoothed the mud back out for the next letter- and of course he ate the rest of the pudding when we were finished.
-F is for farm: The letter of the week this week was F for farm. We reviewed it each day during calendar time and one of the days my little also practiced writing it on this F is for farmer work page as his literacy activity.
-All about cows story: I printed this cute cow writing page from a farm work page pack on Teachers Pay Teachers then had my little practice his letters by tracing the words as we said each letter in them (they were pretty small, but he did a great job for his age!) Then I reread the sentence starter for him and had him finish the sentence. I wrote the last part of each sentence for him since the lines ended up printing pretty tiny.
-Animal writing practice: This page also came from the Teachers Pay Teachers farm pack I mentioned above- the words ended up printing small on this one too, so I only had my little practice tracing each one, but if your little has the fine motor skills you can have them try writing each word a few times on their own too! As we wrote we said each letter to practice letter recognition.
-Farm book list:
–Math:
-Tractor shape craft: Shape crafts are such a great way to review shapes! I cut out all the shapes we’d need to make tractors, then I used their names, sizes and colors (ie. start with the largest green rectangle) to tell my littles how to put them together to make a tractor.
-Chicken egg counting: This was a super fun hands on counting activity. I got out our stuffed chicken (just because we have one- it’s not really necessary), our large Legos, flashcards numbered 1-10, some toaster tongs, and some white pom poms. I spread the flashcards across the floor, then gave my little different combinations of upside-down Legos (ie. chicken nests), making sure that the amount of holes in the bottom matched a number we hadn’t done yet (you can combine Legos to get the larger numbers.) Then I had him add “eggs” (pom poms) to the nest with the tongs while counting. When each hole was filled, I had him find the number in the set of flashcards.
-Farm animal count and color: I printed this farm animal count and color page from Teachers Pay Teachers then had my little identify the number on each line and color that amount of farm animals. With the repetitive text and picture clues, he was able to “read” the sentences himself after a few lines of my help, which he was very pumped about!
-Farm animal tally page: This page came from the same Teachers Pay Teachers farm pack as the page above. First I showed my little how tally marks work (one tally for each number you count, and how the 5th one goes across the first 4, etc.) Then I had him identify each number and make tallies to show the number.
–Science:
-STEM build a red cow barn: I gave my little a small stuffed cow we had and told him his challenge for the day was to build the cow a barn with a roof and walls so it would stay warm and dry if it rained- the caveat- he could only use our red blocks (Legos and Picasso tiles were fine too). He built his first structure, and since this is STEM and the whole point of engineering is to make things better through trial and error, I asked him what he could do to make the structure more sturdy and the walls more…well…wall like! He had run out of Legos, so he ended up getting out the Picasso tiles and adding a V shaped back wall and moving the supporting legs of his original structure to the ends of his roof (we did have a conversation that lead him to do this- I didn’t give him the answer, but lead him to it through questioning…for example, “Where could you put the two side parts that are holding up your roof so it’s not so wobbly?” “What other building material could you use to make walls since the Legos are used up?”) I got this idea from Preschool STEAM.
-Exploring farm fresh fruits and veggies: We got out a pepper, a cucumber and an apple (I meant to do a peach as well since their seed/pit is so different but my little ate it before we had a chance to do the activity! LoL Mom life…) and we talked about how the food we eat is grown on farms. We discussed how some crops like apples and oranges come from trees, so the farmer doesn’t need to replant them every year- he or she can just care for the trees and gather the fruit when it’s ripe. We also discussed how some crops have to be planted and harvested yearly, like peppers and cucumbers. Then we cut open each piece of produce and observed what the inside looked like. All of them had seeds! We talked about the fact that when a crop needs to be planted yearly, farmers can save the seeds to plant the next year from their crop because seeds are the part of a plant that grows a new one. Then we ate the produce as a snack and planted a few of the pepper seeds outside (which was my little’s idea…we’ll see if it actually sprouts!)
-Farm animal parents and babies puzzle: I printed this cute farm animals and their babies puzzle from 1, 2, 3 Homeschool for Me– it was a great spring board for a discussion about how animal parents have different names than their babies. I started by tying it to what my little already knew- cats and kittens/dogs and puppies. Then we used the puzzle pieces to go over other animal parent/baby names (flashcard style.) Finally, I had him put the puzzles together while naming each parent and baby (we spread the parent sides out then I showed him each baby side one at a time and said, “What parent does a poult belong to?” and so on and he’d match them.) Then when we were finished, we read all the pairs one last time.
-Life Cycle of a Chicken: First we watched a YouTube video on the life cycle of a chicken done by a great Kindergarten teacher who was raising chicks in her classroom- she narrates it like a pro! I really like how she showed the progress of a chick growing inside an egg as well as video of live chicks, hens, and roosters. Then, I had my little cut out the pieces of a chicken’s life cycle from a chicken life cycle work page I printed from Teachers Pay Teachers and glue them in the correct order.
–Art:
-Paper plate cow: I got this idea from Simple Everyday Mom. First I told my little we were going to make a cow face out of a paper plate. Then I asked him what are some things cows have on their heads. He said spots first, so I asked him if he’d like to paint or color spots on his cow. He chose to color them. After adding some spots, I asked him what else a cow has- he said eyes and a mouth. I drew an oval on a piece of construction paper and had him cut it out and glue it down for the cow’s nose/mouth. Then he added some googly eyes. I asked what else the cow needed and he said ears, so I drew some long ovals on a piece of black paper and had him cut them out for ears. Finally, I had him cut out horns and glue those down and we had a cow! The whole time he was working he kept saying, “Moo Moo!” It was pretty cute!
-Popcorn sheep: We did this as a snack, but it can also totally be an art project- just have your little glue the popcorn down to a printed out sheep picture! I got this idea from Pinterest.
–Supply/shopping list:
- chocolate pudding packs
- large legos
- pom poms
- tongs
- cucumber
- pepper
- apple
- peach
- red blocks
- farm animal toy
- paper plate
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