Is it possible to favorite letter? If so, mine might be letter R. I love rainbows, so I had to incorporate rainbow activities into this week.
Monday — R is for Rainbow
- Writing Practice: write uppercase R and lowercase r. Check out this worksheet I found on https://www.k5learning.com/worksheets/kindergarten/tracing-letters-r.pdf.
- Book: We read What Makes a Rainbow by Betty Ann Schwartz. This is such a cool book — not only does it devote a page to each color, it has a matching color ribbon that stretches across each page. As you turn the page, you accumulate more colored ribbons until you end up with a rainbow! It is truly amazing to see the rainbow at the end of the book. I read this one everyone year to my library preschool storytime group, so I knew my son would love it too. I ended up buying this book because it a great story, fantastic color teaching tool, and the ribbon rainbow is an awesome concept.
This book is available for purchase on Amazon. So even though, I am a huge advocate of libraries and you should definitely check out your local library, we did end up buying this book. This is one my son wanted to look at over-and-over again. If you do buy this book through my link, I get a small percentage of the sale to help cover the cost of my website.
- Craft: We made a tissue paper rainbow craft to go with the story.
Supplies needed are construction paper, tissue paper in the colors of the rainbow, white cotton balls, and white school glue.
If your tissue paper is not already in small squares, cut your tissue into 1″ x 1″ squares.
Squish your tissue paper into small balls.*
On your construction paper, make 6 arches with your glue. Make sure to leave a gap in between each arch.
Glue the tissue paper balls along the arches, making your rainbow.
After gluing all of the tissue balls onto your rainbow, take a couple cotton balls and stretch them out to make clouds.
Glue your cotton ball clouds to the bottom of your rainbow. Let your craft dry before showing it off.
*For a simpler version of this craft, leave the tissue in squares and glue the squares along the glue arches.
- Songs: For Letter R, we sang Rain, Rain Go Away and It’s Raining, It’s Pouring. My son got out his rainboots and umbrella and wanted to play in the rain. Only problem, it was a bright sunny day. So we went outside and got out the hose and I made rain for him. It turned into a water battle and my son used his umbrella as a shield to block the water. It was tons of fun 🙂
Tuesday — Rainbow Colors
- Air Writing: Ask your child to hold up a hand and trace letter shapes with their finger in the air. I was skeptical of this at first, but my son really got into it and I found him air writing his letters all on his own.
- STEM: primary color mixing — use the primary colors to make the other colors in the rainbow. Use nontoxic, washable paints in red, blue, and yellow. Get out 3 paper plates. On one plate, add some red paint. Mix in some blue paint. What color did it make? Now on the second plate, add blue paint. Mix in yellow paint. What color did it make? On the third plate, add yellow paint. Mix in red paint. What color did it turn?
- Color Walk — we took a walk through our neighborhood, hunting for all of the colors in the rainbow. To make it more of a challenge, we had to find them in order, beginning with red. This was lots of fun and helped cement the rainbow color order.
Wednesday — R is for Rock
- Writing Practice: write uppercase R. Get your free, downloadable worksheet from atozteacherstuff HERE.
- Book: We absolutely recommend that you read Old Rock (is not boring) by Deb Pilutti. It looks like Old Rock leads a dull life, sitting in the same spot day after day. However, Old Rock has been around a long time and recounts all of the cool things it has seen (including dinosaurs and wooly mammoths!). This book is great introduction to earth science for preschoolers.
- Craft: try rock painting — go outside and find a rock to paint.
We picked rocks with semi-flat surfaces. Once you pick your rocks, wash off the dirt and let the rocks dry.
Using non-toxic, washable paints, paint your rocks. Be creative! You can paint a face, or make polka dots, or whatever you want.
Another idea is to make a pet rock! Add googly eyes, a mouth, and add felt or glue on feathers.
- Song: sing along with Super Simple Songs to Rock, Scissors, Paper. It’s available on YouTube.
Thursday —
- Salt Tray Writing: cover the bottom of a shallow tray or pie tin with a layer of table salt. Your child can take one finger to trace letter shapes in the salt.
- Worksheet: find and circle all of the r letters in this free worksheet.
Friday — R is for Racecar
- Writing Practice: practice writing lowercase r. I got this free downloadable worksheet from AtoZteacherstuff.com — they let you customize worksheets for your preschooler.
- Book : We read Race Car Count by Rebecca Kai Dotlich. This is a board book that I bought for my son when he was a year old. We have read this book countless times since then and he still really likes it. It is rhyming, which preschoolers love, has really bright and energetic pictures, incorporates counting, and you get to make car sounds!
- Craft / Activity: Red Light, Green Light Beanbag Toss— this is a fun game that you and your preschooler can make and play together.
Supplies needed are 2 paper plates, washable red and green paint, paintbrush, and bean bags. If you don’t have bean bags, you can make your own with dry rice or beans and sandwich bags.
First, paint one plate red and paint the other plate green. These are going to be your traffic lights.
While the plates are drying, you can make your sandwich bag beanbags.
Once your plates are dry, put them on the ground and take a few steps back from the plates. Adults, call out red light or green light so that your preschooler can throw their bean bag at the traffic light. See how many bean bags they can toss on the plate. Take turns calling out colors and tossing.