Today was a great day to be a preschooler! This week we started our Garden Treasures unit with Experience Curriculum. Lesson Five of Week One was Worms, and this week we have been talking all about planting gardens. We have planted grass seeds, played math games, introduced the letter Y, started our journals, and made seed mosaics. We learned that roots absorb water and nutrients from the soil and then deliver them to the rest of the plant (and this is just some of what we have done). It has been a fun week of learning!
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Back to the topic of Worms... this was a fun one! There was a lot of dirt and rubber worms involved with today's activities. As soon as the children saw that dirt was involved they couldn't wait to get started. What child doesn't love to put their hands in the dirt? Today we played a math game, dug for worms, and made worm art. It was a good day!
In our Experience Preschool Curriculum box we received worm outlines and rubber worms. I gave them a bowl of dirt, sat out some paint and glue and they had fun completing their art process. They had their own worm to paint with and got to take a worm home too (which they were very excited about). I asked them how they would use their worm for a painting tool. Have you ever painted with a rubber worm before? I love giving them different tools to paint with and seeing how they decide to use them. It's all about the process!
During circle time today everyone shared what they knew about worms and then we practiced moving our bodies like them. This was a fun movement activity for my preschoolers! We thought about when we see worms above ground and learned that earthworms come above ground when it rains because they need oxygen to breathe. They used tweezers to dig the worms out of the dirt, which exercise the small muscles in their hand that they use for holding their writing utensils and cutting with scissors. They had a lot of fun at this center!
Towards the end of class we played a math game. I strongly believe that at this age, one-on-one time in the classroom is so important. With smaller class sizes I love being able to work with each child independently and in small groups. I get to know the individual child and their strengths this way. The math games included in our curriculum are great for doing in small groups, one-on-one, or as a class. Today we did this activity in groups of three. This math game also involved literacy as we used our three letters this month, Y, F, and A. I put a letter on each bag and then I filled them with varying amounts of connecting cubes.
This was a Worm Race. They each had a bag and had to connect the cubes that were inside to make a worm. We compared the lengths of the cubes and figured out who had the largest worm. The person who had the largest worm (more connecting cubes) got to move their worm on the game board one space. We did this until someone got to the end. This math activity was great for preschoolers. They worked on measurement, fine motor skills, letter identification, and counting.
Garden Treasures is off to a fun start!
