Week of March 30

Thursday, April 2nd 
Dramatic Play 
Let's go to the Farmers Market? 
After the children have harvested their fruits have them sell it! Have your child use whatever materials you may have at home(artificial fruit, real fruit or paper made fruit) and pretend to sell fruit. The children can sort the food by color or size. They can use baskets to display the fruit. With support they can label the fruit and put prices. This is a great way to practice their letters and numbers! See some examples below.

Use the link below for free fruit and vegetables labels for your farmers market!!
https://happyplaybox.com/product/printable-farmers-market/
Block Play 
Build a Farm!
Use blocks, legos or any materials you may have at home to create your farm. If you do not, have your child draw a few farm animals and cut them out. Then, add them to the farm they created!

Literacy 

Have your child make a flower for each letter of their name. Let them print the letters in the center of each flower. When the flowers are ready have your child arrange the letters to spell their name. You may adjust the game by using other words such as the weekly vocabulary words(see Monday'a literacy activity) 

Art
Parts of a flower craft 

Science 
Compare and Contrast:
Provide several types of seeds and invite your child to compare and contrast them. This can also be done with leaves, flowers or other plant parts. 
Math 
Seeds in a strawberry: Cut out several paper strawberries. Add a number to each one and ask your child to put the appropriate number of seeds on each strawberry. This can also be implemented with another type of fruit or by putting petals on a flower, leaves on a plant etc. Encourge your child to write their own numbers.
http://youtu.be/yjzjOqNKSvo
 

Book of the Day 
Ten Red Apples 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v
=rzR57dI-7FE

Music and Movement
Dance to your favorite song and put on a mini show for your family.

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Tuesday, March 31st 

Dramatic Play 
Create a tree!  
Use any kind of materials you may have at home to make any size tree you want. Then have your child explain what a tree is and explain the different parts of it? Ask them why it is an important plant? Explain that there are different types of trees. Some that give us fruit. Have them chose what kind of tree they want to create. Example; if they want to make an apple tree, have them add apples to their tree. 

Block Play 
Container Gardens
Use a shoebox or any other box you may have handy at your home for your child to use as a container for their garden. They can use the plants they created on Monday during the Build Plants activity to create a container garden. Children can choose the focus of the garden(herbs or succulents, for example) according to their interests. If desired, children can add a name label for their garden. They can also decorate their "garden shoebox" using paint, crayons and markers.

Math 
Seed Patterns 
Ask your child to illustrate seed patterns, or you can print the picture below and have your child make patterns using the images. Explain that a pattern is made up of a core unit that repeats.( for example, red, blue.... red, blue....red, blue) 


http://You.be/OoHClaFpwSw

Science
Plant Life Cycle Book 
Provide individual pictures of the plant life cycle. Ask children to sequence the pictures. Provide pictures or diagrams for children to refer to as they play and talk with them about each stage in the life cycle. 
The children can create a book about the life cycle of a plant. 

Art
Handprint Tulips 
Materials you will need for the tulip are
white paper(we use construction or computer paper) 
green finger paint and red finger pain(or pink, white or yellow) 
Instructions: 
Dip the forearm(from elbow to the wrist) in green finger paint. If you don't have a tray big enough to accommodate this, just paint the finger paint onto the forearm with a paintbrush.
Press the arm down 3 or 4 times into a sheet of white paper(construction paper works great!) to make the stems of the tulips. 
Now dip the hand(excluding the thumb) into red finger paint and stamp on top of the stems( holding the thumb up) to make the tulips flowers. 
Keep the fingers close together. 
You can add fingerpaints green stems, thumbprint green grass, thumbprint caterpillars and thumbprint butterflies.
See the fingerprints crafts section or ideas on how to make a variety. 

Literacy 
Author Study: Lois Ehlert
Discuss with your child that you are going to listen to different stories by the same author. Growing Vegetable Soup, Planting a Rainbow, Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf) Encourage your child to explore the books and provide reactions to them. Which did they like best and why? What did they think about the books? What do they think about the illustrations? This activity can be spread throughout the day and week. 
Planting a Rainbow: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzuSqiFUypQ
Growing Vegtable Soup: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTCSbPgZZgM
Eating the Alphabet: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7

Book of the day: We Plant a Seed
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxl6Kiy7NPI

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Monday
Dramatic play:
Create a flower market! Have your child pretend play with the sources provided below. You can also use fake or real flowers you may have in your house. If you do not have either have the children draw some!!
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1G0zyGUXkyHT5d4jmsGHJeJnHgY4Dc18S/view

Math:
 Click on the link below to listen to, Ten Red Apples by Pat Hutchins. Cut out small apples from paper about the size of the apples in the book. Ask your child to use them as they read or retell this story. Count the apples in the story and create your very own apple tree. Write  the number of apples that are in your tree.
https://youtu.be/rzR57dI-7FE

 Literacy:
To expand language, introduce your child to the focus vocabulary words for the week. Identify the words and use them in conversations with your child. This can be an ongoing activity throughout the unit.  Your child may also try printing some of the vocabulary words.  
Vocabulary:
botany, branch, bud, bulb, dirt, flower, food, fruit, grow, leaves, nutrients, petals, plant, pollen, rain, roots, seed, seedling, soil, sprinkler, sprout, stem, sunlight, trunk, vine, water, watering can
 
Science:
Observe Seeds:
Provide an assortment of seeds from fruits and vegetables the children are familiar with. Place them in specimen jars or small, sealable plastic bags. Invite children to observe and write or draw their observations. Talk with the children about the types of seeds and children’s experiences with the fruits and vegetables throughout the activity. As the plants grow, children can draw and write about the life cycle of the plants.
 
 
Block play:
Build Plants: Wrap blocks in green and brown paper (and other colors as desired) and have your children use them to create stems, tree trunks, soil etc. You can use paper, scissors and tape for children to use to create leaves, flowers etc. to add to their plants. Use the picture provided below to give the children some inspiration for their flower creation. As children create their plants talk with them about the parts of the plants and types of plants they are creatin.

Art:
*Coffee filter flowers
The children can create flowers by using coffee filters and construction paper 

 * The dandelion Seed craft

 
  The dandelion is a color, cut and paste paper template craft with a twist.  Toothpicks and a torn up cotton ball become the dandelion seed fluffs!
The craft goes very well with the children's book The Dandelion Seed
 Materials:
* paper,
* something to color with,
* scissors,
* glue,
* flat toothpicks,
* cotton ball
* Option:  instead of toothpicks and a cotton ball you could just q-tips -- though we found the flat toothpicks easiest to glue onto the paper
Book of the day:
Up in the Garden Down in the Dirt
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5qhb1Jpow4
 

Music/Movement:
https://youtu.be/MFmr_TZLpS

Please use the following link for Early childhood: Learn at home 

https://www.schools.nyc.gov/learning/learn-at-home/early-childhood   

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES 

The San Diego Zoo has a website just for kids with amazing videos, activities, and games. Enjoy the tour! 
https://kids.sandiegozoo.org/

Play games and learn all about animals
https://switchzoo.com/

Play with fave show characters and learn too 
https://pbskids.org/

 Phonics skills
 https://www.starfall.com/h/

 Read, play games, and hang out with Dr. Seuss https://www.seussville.com/

300,000+ FREE printable worksheets from toddlers to teens https://www.123homeschool4me.com/home-school-free-printables/

Geography and animals
https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/

Fave kids books read by famous people 
https://www.storylineonline.net/

Crafts, activities, mazes, dot to dot, etc,
  https://www.allkidsnetwork.com/

Math and reading games 
https://www.abcya.com/

Fun games, recipes, crafts, activities  
https://www.highlightskids.com/

Math as a fun part of your daily family routine 
http://bedtimemath.org/

Digital learning content for preschool through high school https://www.curriki.org/

Movement and mindfulness videos created by child development experts.  https://www.gonoodle.com/
 

*CHECK YOUR CHILD’S SCHOOL BAG DAILY FOR ANY NOTES. 
 
*IF YOUR CHILD HAS AN ACCIDENT IN SCHOOL, PLEASE SEND IN REPLACEMENT CLOTHING.