Learning about Migration with Mother Goose Time

Last week, we continued our monthly theme Weather by learning about how animals react to different kinds of weather. We studied hibernation and migration.  The kids found these lessons really interesting, especially the activities from our Mother Goose Time curriculum.
We are blessed to receive Mother Goose Time and the Little Goose adaptation for free in exchange for sharing our journey here on our blog. We are really enjoying telling our readers all about the things we are learning, what we like best, and how we use the curriculum with three very different kiddos.

Thursday, we focused on migration with literacy activities like Moving Animals where the kids had fun with the pocket cube (one of their favorite Mother Goose Time manipulatives). They took turns tossing the pocket cube and pretending to migrate like the animal pictured on the cube. Ada Grace loved swimming like a fish and Noah's favorite was flying like a butterfly.

Ada Grace waiting to see which animal she can pretend to be next

Next, each child created their own Butterfly Wand with an activity that gave them the opportunity to practice fine motor skills and fly around the yard like butterflies. The wands were similar to the hand kites my children love, so they were a big hit!

Noah's butterfly wand "migrating" around our yard

Since everyone was really enjoying "flying" around the yard together, I decided to let them Wiggle & Giggle  outside too. We listened to Migrate from the Dancing in Every Weather CD while pretending to migrate like the birds in the song.

Elly sharing her pattern links with her mom & baby sister

Finally, we finished up the day by practicing patterns with the links from an earlier lesson and the pattern guide from the Table Top Math activity. Ada Grace loved copying the suggested patterns but Elly had lots of fun creating her own versions.
I really love the way our Mother Goose Time curriculum plays to each child's strengths and always finds a way to get them all engaged and learning, no matter how different their personalities.

Stay tuned to see what's in our November box from Mother Goose Time next week.

Learning about Hibernation with Mother Goose Time

Last week, we continued our monthly theme Weather by learning about how animals react to different kinds of weather. We studied hibernation and migration.  The kids found these lessons really interesting, especially the activities from our Mother Goose Time curriculum.
We are blessed to receive Mother Goose Time and the Little Goose adaptation for free in exchange for sharing our journey here on our blog. We are really enjoying telling our readers all about the things we are learning, what we like best, and how we use the curriculum with three very different kiddos.

On Wednesday, we studied hibernation with a focus on bears. We started our lesson by reading Bear Has a Story to Tell by Philip C. Stead. Since Nana was visiting, I let her participate in story time. The children loved all her character voices and fun facial expressions.

Next, we went outside to participate in some dramatic play with the daily STEAM Station activity. We didn't have a big enough box to make our animal home, so we used Noah's pop up tent. The children all decided to be bears! They had great fun pretending to be sleeping bears in their "cave" and then "waking up" when I announced the arrival of warm weather.

Then, everyone got a chance to make their very own Bear Den in an outdoor activity that focused on communication skills and pretend play. The children enjoyed choosing items like acorns, twigs, and leaves to complete their "dens."

When we got back inside, everyone gathered together to Wiggle & Giggle with Frere Jacques from the Circle Time CD. The kids had fun pretending to go to sleep and wake one another up.
After a few dances, we all gathered at the table to make "bear tracks" in our Tray Play activity. Noah wanted to discuss different animal tracks, so he retrieved several different animal figures from his room to "stomp" through his play dough leaving tracks.

Finally, we finished the day by playing Race to the Cave together. We played the Table Top Literacy version from the regular teacher guide rather than the adapted Little Goose version. I was worried that they wouldn't enjoy this board game as much as they had enjoyed our earlier activities, but I was wrong! Noah and Ada Grace took turns playing Race to the Cave until we had to clear the table for dinner that night.

Click here to read about how we used Mother Goose Time to study migration the next day.