Tigers & Turtles

A new letter!

This week we’re talking about the letter T. There are so many things that start with a T that would have been fun to work with! I had a hard time narrowing it down.

We also added tracing pages this week.

Book

I wanted to use “The Very Ticklish Tiger,” but, once again, I didn’t have it and didn’t have a chance to go to the bookstore to get it. Ugh.

Luckily, we have lots of books around here so, instead, we used another Dr. Seuss book – “Yertle the Turtle.” Lots of things to talk about as we went through the story.

What do you think the king is going to do?

How long do you think the other turtles are going to be ok with someone standing on their backs?

Would you like to have someone standing on your back?

Flashcards

A new one! Yay!

We’re getting more and more so they’re taking a little longer. The kids are enjoying them too.

Song

Today’s song was an instant favorite. Even Nixon loved it.

We did “I Had A Little Turtle.” I remember this one from when I was a kid and knew some hand motions to go with it so we did that instead of going with the video. I’ve included the video here though just in case you’re not familiar with the song. The hand motions are easy.

Make a turtle by making a fist with one hand, thumb on the outside, and turn your hand so your thumb is on top. Then use your other hand to make a sort of blanket on the first hand. That’s the turtle’s shell and your thumb poking out is the turtle’s head.

Sing, “I had a little turtle. His name was Tiny Tim. I put him in the bathtub…”

Switch to swimming. You could do freestyle, butterfly, doggy paddle… we went with the arm motions for the breaststroke.

“… to see if he could swim. He…”

Make a cup with your hand and put it to your lips.

“… drank up all the water. He…”

Pretend to be putting a bar of soap in your mouth.

“… ate up all the soap. And now he’s…”

Hold your tummy like it hurts.

“… sick in bed with a bubble in his throat. Hiccup!”

They LOVED it with the hand motions. We must’ve sung it at least six times. And them more times while we did our activity. Jared even told me later that Nixon was singing it later at home too.

New favorite!

Tracing Page

Lucy came to me over the weekend and said, “Mama? Will you show me how to draw my letters?”

After I picked my jaw up off the floor (she’s TWO), I said, “Of course I will! I’ll go get some paper, you go get your crayons.”

“Ok!”

Luckily I’d already looked up tracing pages, so I knew where to find them. I found three different pages that we’ll use on our three different days each week. I think they get a little more progressive (but remember – I’m no professional – it’s just my opinion).

I printed the B page and the S page and we worked on those. Then I decided we’d add them to our preschool curriculum and work on them with Nixon too. They loved it!

You can find the T one we used today here (it’s the one on the left).

Activity

We did our weekly coloring page today. Most of our lesson was about turtles and I could have just printed a turtle for them to color, but I loved this tiger monster coloring page I found at Education.com so we colored it instead.

All Done!

This was our first day of week three and it felt like we were finally getting into a groove of sorts. We had Monday off because of Labor Day, so that might have helped a little too, but I think the simplicity of the day and the fun hand motions were the biggest hits.

Lesson learned: Keep it simple and find more songs with hand motions!

Tigers and Turtles