Make a Scarecrow

My son loves to collect leaves, acorns, pineneedles, and other outdoor items. Our bucket-o-outdoor stuff was full so we decided to make a scarecrow with it. Stevie and I were inspired by the scarecrow in the book, Up, Down and Around (Katherine Ayres). This one requires real glue, no gluestick, because of the pine needles.

Chicka Chicka Activity

My son really likes Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, by Bill Martin Jr. It's one of those library books that I should have bought already. Christmas. There are so many things you can do with this book. Here's just one. Get some magnetic letters (lower case are best) and make a coconut tree with construction paper. Once your tot gets familiar with the book, they'll be recreating the book on your refrigerator. It comes in handy when you're trying to make dinner.

A Good Rhyming Book About Cars

Red Light, Green Light, by Anastasia Suen. This is the kind of book that can kick start your kid's imagination. In the story, a little boy uses his toys to create a busy rush hour scene filled with cars, trucks, buses, trolleys, fire engines, and pedestrians. Stevie and I usually make our own highways and parking lots with his cars. We play a game where he puts all the like-colored vehicles in parking lots (on a piece of construction paper). You can also use painter's tape to mark the roads on the floor/carpet. Your toddler will love making "road construction zones" with tape too.

Another good activity following this book is playing "Red light, Green light."

Intro to kid gardening

I'm currently devising a plan for starting a garden with the boy. I found a great, great, great, book to introduce gardening. The book is Up, Down, and Around, by Katherine Ayers. It's the total package. It's got rhyme, short descriptive sentences, and the illustrations are exciting (without being overwhelming). Perfection. The details in the illustrations are awesome too. This is the kind of book that allows the young reader to make new discoveries about gardening each time they read the book. The author does an excellent job of explaining how some veggies grow underground, some climb, some twine around. Stevie is now getting more excited about our Fall garden.

Books in Rhyme

If you can't tell already, I'm a big fan of predictable text and rhyme. So, here's one for the rhyme fans out there. It's Mrs.McNosh and the Great Big Squash, by Sara Weeks. It's an exciting story about a woman, Mrs. Nelly McNosh who plants and grows an enormous squash. The illustrator, Nadine Bernard Westcott, does a good job of creating the silly scenes without making the pages look to busy and cluttered. This would be a good book to read with the kiddos before starting a Fall garden. Maybe I'll post something about gardening with kids. I'm hoping I can talk my husband into building me a raised bed for fruits and veggies.

Good Rhyming Books

I found some good books at library yesterday with lots of rhyming words. I remember how a kiddo's ability to rhyme in Kindergarten was a good predictor of his/her confidence in reading. If a child is aware of the predictable patterns in writing (rhythm and rhyme), then it just makes reading text that much easier. If text is only 50% phonics (letters and letter sounds. . . . sounding words out), then the other 50% comes from "reading tricks" like using rhyme to predict text. Also, rhyming books are fun! My kindergarten classes always loved them and Stevie loves them too. The predictable text helps develop confidence in a reader. That's important. Here are some goodies:

Low Song by Eve Merriam (My new favorite. This one is so mellow. Good for a pre-naptime read. Illustrations are dreamy).

Look at the Moon by May Garelick (Long book. But if you just read chunks of it, skipping some pages . . . . . it is awesome. It has this cool theme. . . we're all united under the same moon. Different creatures, different people, settings, all under the same moon. Beauty.)

Time for Bed by Mem Fox (Perfect rhyming book before bed. Uses lots of repetition. Your toddler will be "reading" this one with you by the 2nd night.