Monday Homeschool Coop Preschool

We celebrated St. Patricks Day a wee-bit early in coop. First we read, St. Patrick's Day by Gail Gibbons and I paused during the reading to introduced various activities that went with the book.

Play dough and the British Isle

I printed out an outline copy of and placed it into a protective sleeve, so that the green play dough would not stick. I told the kids to "build" the British Isle.

Sink or Float

For this activity, you need a plastic container filled with water (used spinach container), a rimmed plastic tray, objects to sink or float (We used broccoli, grape, plastic shamrock, green ring, and several animals.), and a sink or float chart placed into a plastic sheet protector.

This is Caroline and her Leprechaun ears.

We pinned the Shamrock on St. Patrick, too.

More Shamrocks

Using a plastic tray (dollar store) we sorted various sizes of shamrocks. We also made shamrock decorations with glitter and glue.

Science Fair

The Science Fair was hosted by SERC. We have taken several classes from SERC this year and enjoyed everyone of them.

Devon wanted to drop eggs for her science experiment. We bought cage free eggs from Whole Foods, as I could not use our yummy eggs. From the science fair we walk away wanted a worm compost bin and an ant farm.

WaterColors

In our home, we have trays and baskets set up for activities. This is our watercolor tray and it includes paint brush, glass jar for water, plain paper, and prepared watercolor paper. Cutting the watercolor paper into several smaller pieces and then using watercolor pencils I drew several designs. Caroline using only water was able to paint the designs. This is really similar to the paint watercolor books that used to be widely available in the 1980's.

Valentine's Day Hearts

Materials

• Contact paper
• Heavy Red paper cut into a heart and then another heart cut into that heart, thus creating an outline heart
• Tissue paper cut into dime and quarter size pieces

Cut the contact paper to fit the outline of the heart and peel off 1/2 of the white paper off the contact paper leaving 1/2 covered. Place the heart onto the sticky part of the contact paper and then place the pieces inside of the heart. Once the child is finished placing the tissue paper inside the heart, take off the other 1/2 of the white paper off the sticky and then stick the sticky to sticky. Trim the extra off and place your heart in a window to act as a stain glass.

Homeschooling Coop on Monday Mornings

Our family began going to the coop for Devon this year. She is able to do science, PE, and art and then lunch with children her age. Caroline and I are in the preschool room where I plan the activities for children ranging from 2 1/2 - 5 years old. There are several moma's who stay and help with the organized chaos :) Before the friends come into the room, I have each activity on a cafeteria type tray with all the supplies that are needed to complete the activity.

We begin the day in the church sanctuary with opening and then we go to a SUPER music class with our Kindergarden Friends and then we return to our classroom.

This week I centered the activities around "Lots of Dots" and "The Napping House." First we read "Lots of Dots" and the children named the objects that were made from lots of dots. Then I demonstrated how to do a dot craft using dot stickers and a picture from our book.

Next, we read "The Napping House" and used cut outs for sequencing the napping characters. These cut out were sent home and the children were asked to cut it out and retell the story at home. We discussed the word "napping" and we all decided that it was something that you do doing the day. This lead to the topic of animals that sleep in the day or at night. We did a chart together and then children did this activity back at a tray station. Other stations were flower arranging, button (dot) sorting, and doughnut (dot) matching. We also were treated to green eggs and ham cupcakes.