A week on The Mitten

This week we are learning with Jan Brett's book, The Mitten.  In case you aren't familiar with this story, a boy looses one of his mittens and some animals find it.  Each animals joins the last, squeezing into the mitten until a mouse makes the bear sneeze and all the animals fly out.


Snow Cave - We were blessed with snow during Christmas break.  Yahoo!  So my hubbie was able to create a snow cave for the kiddos to enjoy.  We hope more snow will come so that he can make it bigger!

One kiddo was super excited to see that the water dripping from the gutter would quickly melt the snow on his shovel.

Circle Time - First I read our story to the kiddos, then they helped me act it out with these super cute felt animals I found on Etsy.  (Which saved me from making them!  Shwoo!)  Find the link:  Here!

Snack - Fairy Bread - This was a favorite snack in our home when my daughter was young.  We were going to cut our bread into mitten shapes, but we totally forgot.  We lightly buttered our bread and then sprinkled it with ... sprinkles!  Yum.
"It's the best thing in the entire universe!"

Contact Paper Mittens - The kiddos had a blast sticking their hands and shirts to the contact paper (it was sticky side up).  Then we retold the story and put all the animals into the mitten.  I got the cute animals as a free printable on this blog.

 

Mitten Play - I set out several pairs of mittens for the kiddos to enjoy.  This little girl LOVED the pink ones, when she tried them on she said:   "I just love them!  They're perfect!"  Then she played the rest of free time with them on.  Ha!

Circle Time - Today the kiddos acted our the story by climbing into a big mitten (a folded sheet) themselves!  They chose which animal they'd like to be, then climbing and squished in on queue, then when the bear sneezed everybody exploded out!

Sewing Mittens - On Monday the kiddos painted their hand and made a print on a piece of felt.  Today they got to try sewing around their mitten.  They did just great for their very first sewing experience!

Exploration - The kiddos had the chance to try playing in this snow scene.  Our snow is rock salt.  The kiddos enjoyed scooping the "snow" into the little carts and walking the animals through it.  It is strange stuff to play with.

Sparkly Snow Play Dough - The kiddos had a blast playing with this play dough today.  I just made homemade play dough and dumped in a ton of glitter.  A link to my favorite play dough recipe:  HERE!

I love play dough.  It is wonderful to work with.  It inspires the imagination, works on fine motor muscles, and is a wonderful venue for using manners and sharing skills.

Envelope Mitten - Toddlers - The kiddos colored the animals who squish into the mitten.  Then Ms. Sara cut them out and the kiddos got to put them in their envelope mitten.  Watch out when the bear sneezes!  

The mitten I just glued onto a smallish envelop.  When the bear sneezed, we shook the envelope out.

Animal Cracker Mittens - The kiddos enjoyed munching and gluing.  I printed this mitten pattern I think from Jan Brett's webpage.

Science - National Static Electricity Day - January 9 - Since Mr. Adam is a scientist, he helps me to know about these important celebration days.  Ha! - I chatted with the kiddos about static electricity.  They quickly realized they knew a lot about it and have had much experienced with it too!   We talked about:  slides, pulling off sweatshirts, feet on the carpet and the shocks we get.

 

Next I rubbed a balloon on each of their noggin's to lift their hair with static electricity and we stuck the balloon to the door.  Then they each got a balloon to experiment with.

 

Fold-able Mitten - The kiddos colored and cut the animals who squish into the mitten.  Watch out when the bear sneezes!

This was a bit of prep work, I basically made an accordion fold-able that tucked into an envelope.  Each animal had it's own square and we glued them on in order.   I put a pull tab on the end piece so when the bear sneezed the kiddo could simply pull the tab and all the animals pulled neatly out of the envelope.  Pretty fun.

What Else Could Fit In? - Mitten - I asked the kiddos what else they would squish into their mitten:  cat, cupcake, shark, roller coaster, peregrine falcon, and another cupcake.  Ha!

 

Learning Station - Clothes Line Names

The kiddos worked with these super tiny clothes pins to hang up their name in mittens.  It was excellent fine motor work.

 "They're cute but they're hard to do!" - That was the general assessment of the kiddos.

Learning Station - Hungry Frog

The kiddos had a blast feeding our hungry blue frog.  Some kiddos enjoyed using the tongs and others preferred their fingers.  Either way worked great, they still were working on their fine motor and hand-eye coordination skills.

The frog is a Parmesan cheese container with googly eyes glued on pom poms.  His food was craft foam beads I had on hand.

Learning Station - Rainbow Names

The kiddos (my 3 year old class) traced over their name with each color of the rainbow.

Learning Station - Paint Dot Addition

The kiddos tried out some addition today and did just great at it!  Using bingo dot painters, the kiddos put the correct number of dots above the numeral, then added (counted) up all the dots and put the total number of dots!  Super cool.

Here is the source for this fabulous idea.  HERE

Learning Station - Mitten Match with Clothes Pins

 The kiddos matched up the mittens in the box.  Once they found a match, they clipped them together with a clothes pin.  Great hand eye coordination and fine motor work.  They found the sizes of the mittens silly, they went from super large down to their size!  Some of the kiddos liked trying the mittens on.

One kiddo tried on a pink pair of mittens just her size, "I just love them!  They're perfect!"

Learning Station - Clothes Line Abc's With Mittens -

 The kiddos worked in pairs to find, put in order and clip up the whole alphabet of mittens.  It took each group some time, but they worked well together and finished it!  I was proud of each of them!

I just free hand cut mittens from scrap paper.  This was a great fine motor activity, working those clothes pins.