These acorn dot number coloring worksheets are perfect for fall! My son doesn’t like coloring very much, but he does like using his dot pens! I made these fun worksheets for him to practice identifying numbers 1-10.
Using dot pens (or color with crayons), spot and dot all numbers 1-10. There are two pages of worksheets. They are divided into groups 1-5 and 6-10. Spot the numbers and dot (or color) accordingly. Download your free PDF worksheet: Acorn Number Coloring
Pumpkin Counting and Coloring
This is a fun math skills worksheet to help your preschooler visualize quantities. You can use your dot markers again for this pumpkin coloring worksheet or color in the pumpkins with crayons. Look at the number on the left and then color the same number of pumpkins. Download and print your free PDF: Pumpkin Coloring
Fall Counting
Get in the fall-spirit with this math worksheet full of cute fall shapes. Count how many of each picture are shown in the box on the left. Then write your answer. Download and print your free PDF: Fall Counting
My son loves numbers and counting! I made “I Spy” worksheets for him to practice counting and writing his numbers. There are lots to choose from, including a super cute Fall I Spy worksheet to go along with these acorn dot number coloring worksheets.
Apple Counting Activity
For a more hands-on counting experience, I made an Apple Counting game with flashcards and pompom apples. Download these free flashcards and apple tree picture for your preschooler to practice apple counting too!
Check out my MATH SKILLS page for more math worksheets and ideas.
Add some spooky fun to your learning activities with these preschool Halloween worksheets! Download these free worksheets and practice writing letters, phonetic sounds, counting, and writing numbers 1-25 in numerical order. Read some Halloween bookstoo and make it a spooky day!
ABCs
It’s almost Halloween and the alphabet has never been this spooky!
Science Experiment: make this fall-themed Pumpkin Fizz and watch as the fizz forms when the vinegar mixes with the baking soda!
I Spy Counting Worksheets: my son loves the “I Spy” challenges, so I have made a lot of them. Try the Bat I Spy,Fall I Spy, and Owl I Spy worksheets too.
There are so many great fall-themed books for preschoolers that it is hard to narrow down a list. Here are some preschooler-approved books that I have read to my own son, as well as to the library’s preschool storytime group over the years. After checking out fall-themed books, try the fall activities for preschool.
Preschool Books
Fall Books:
1. Hedgehugs: Autumn Hide-and-Squeakby Steve Wilson — The Hedgehugs are two absolutely adorable hedgehogs who happen to be best friends! My son and I love all of their stories. In this adventure, the Hedgehugs make a new bat friend. The friends play a game of hide-and-seek, hiding in cute, fall-themed things, such as leaf piles and pumpkins.
2. The Squirrels Who Squabbled by Rachel Bright — Rachel Bright is a fantastic author! My son and I love her books, and I have read several of her stories to the library’s preschool storytime group, who agree that she rocks! In this book, squirrels, Cyril and Bruce, get in a fight over the last acorn. In a story similar to the Ant and the Grasshopper, one unprepared-for-winter squirrel is ready to do battle for the last acorn. The squirrels’ squabbles lead them on a hilarious adventure!
3. Aaron Loves Apples and Pumpkinsby PD Eastman — Fall is here and Aaron the alligator loves everything about it. He loves the yummy apples, pumpkins, football, Halloween costumes, and spending time with his friends. When his friends go apple picking, Aaron tells them that he knows a better was to get the apples down; he shakes the tree so hard, that all of the apples fall down on Aaron! Oops 🙂 Now all of the apples are down and Aaron and his friends can enjoy them together. This book is part of the beginning reader series, I Can Read. It has short sentences with not a lot of words per page. It is a good choice for kids who are learning to read.
4. Ouch by Ragnhild Scamell — In this story, an adorable hedgehog gets an apple stuck on its back. Now hedgehog can’t fit into its den and winter is coming. The hedgehog’s animal friends try to help and get the apple off, however each attempt ends up with more things getting stuck to the poor hedgehog. After squeezing, and swimming, and rolling around, hedgehog and friends are running out of ideas. Fortunately, along comes a goat with a big appetite and eats all of the things that are stuck on hedgehog!
5. A Unicorn Named Sparkle and the Pumpkin Monsterby Amy Young — Lucy and Sparkle have fun doing autumn things together. They visit a pumpkin patch, explore a corn maze, and play games. Things get a little too spooky for Sparkle, who is afraid of a pumpkin monster. Lucy, who enjoys being scared, learns that not everyone likes to be a little scared. This is a sweet story about two friends who learn to respect one another’s feelings. Plus it ends with an awesome rainbow from Sparkle’s magic horn and yummy treats for the friends to enjoy together.
6.Otis and the Scarecrow by Loren Long — Otis the tractor has several wonderful stories for preschoolers to enjoy, In this fall-themed one, the farmer introduces a new scarecrow to the farm. Everyone is excited to meet the scarecrow! But when they see him, the scarecrow’s frown drives them all away. Otis worries about the friendless scarecrow and in an act of compassion, Otis includes the scarecrow in the animals’ quiet game.
Fall Leaves Books:
Fall Leaves Stories
1. We’re Going on a Leaf Huntby Steve Metzger — This rhyming story is a fun leaf-hunting adventure. Preschoolers love Steve Metzger’s books and the silly sound effects that he skillfully incorporates into the story. This one will become a fall-favorite! Have your own leaf hunt after the story to continue the fun 🙂
2. Leaf Manby Lois Ehlert: This book is a visual treat! The pictures are actual leaves and Lois Ehlert’s signature die-cut pages are fantastic. Leaf Man is beautiful tribute to nature and preschoolers will delight in Leaf Man’s wind-blown adventures.
3. Fletcher and the Falling Leaves by Julia Rawlinson: In this beautifully illustrated book, we meet a young fox named Fletcher who is unaware that some trees lose their leaves in the fall. Fletcher is determined to save the leaves from falling off of his favorite tree. Unfortunately each one of his ideas fail to keep the leaves on the tree. After the last leaf falls off the tree, Fletcher carries the little leaf home to his den. He puts it into a nice cozy bed for the night. When he returns to his tree in the early morning, a beautiful sight is waiting for him. His tree is covered in sparkling icicles! His tree reassures him that all is fine and that Fletcher is free to enjoy the beauty in front of him without worry for his tree.
4. Leaf Trouble by Jonathan Emmett: Learn about the changing of seasons with two cute little squirrels in this story. Worried about the falling leaves, a brother and sister squirrel unsuccessfully try to put the leaves back on the tree. Mommy squirrel teaches them all about fall and reassures them that new leaves will grow in the springtime.
5. There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed Some Leavesby Lucille Collandro: The silly old lady is back in this fall-themed story. She goes on a stomach-filling journey, gobbling up fall items (a pumpkin, a rope, and some leaves). Preschoolers will laugh away at all of the silliness going on in this book!
6. When the Leaf Blew Inby Steve Metzger: This fun picture book is about an autumn leaf blows that into a barn causing a cow to sneeze. The sneeze sets off a series of barnyard events in this silly tale that will have preschoolers asking you to reread it over and over again!
For more fall-themed books and activities for preschool, check out my APPLE post.
Fall Activities for Preschool:
Crafts:
Leaf Stick Puppets–Go on a leaf hunt and collect leaves to make stick puppets.
Coffee Filter Leaves — Make your own beautiful fall leaves out of coffee filters, markers, and water. This is a fun and simple craft for kids to make to usher in the fall season.
Pumpkin Handprint Craft — I love handprint crafts! They preserve your little one’s prints and you get to look back at them years later and ooh and ahh over how tiny they were. Plus, this craft is a great way to personalize the fall season.
STEM:
Pumpkin Fizz —
Incorporate fun, seasonal STEM activities into your preschooler’s education with this fun, fall-themed science experiment — Pumpkin Fizz.
Apple Counting–
Check out my preschool Apple Counting Activity for an interactive, hands-on way to practice counting! I made numbered flashcards and an apple tree for you to print off and use for your little one; all you will need is to add some pompoms (to be apples) or some other small objects to use for counting.
I Spy–
Have fun counting all of the pictures in the this fall themed I Spy game. After you count how many of each picture you find, write the number in the box.
Enjoy 10 preschool pirate books and a fun, pirate activity that will surely get your preschooler saying “Arrr!”
Preschool Pirate Books
September 19th is Talk Like a Pirate Day! Here are some fun pirate stories to enjoy and a pirate-themed Find the Differences worksheet to try 🙂
10 Preschool Pirate Books
1. Pirate Boy by Eve Bunting. — In this sweet, reassuring story, a mother’s love will follow her son anywhere, even onboard a pirate ship. No distance, no sea monsters, and no unruly pirates will be able to stop Mom.
2. Charlotte Jane Battles Bedtime by Myra Wolfe. — I love this book! It is the cutest story about a young pirate named Charlotte Jane who refuses to go to bed. She has important pirate things to do and sleep just gets in the way. Charlotte Jane loses her “oomph” and her parents form a search party to find the missing oomph. The missing oomph is nowhere to be found. How is she going to have sword fights and engage in other pirate activities without any oomph? Charlotte Jane falls asleep and awakes full of oomph and ready to be a pirate!
3. How I Became a Pirate by Melinda Long. — This is a funny story filled with fantastic illustrations by David Shannon. In this book, Jeremy Jacob joins a pirate crew and learns all about being a pirate. He’s enjoying not eating vegetables and having gross table manners. It’s all fun until he learns that pirates don’t do any of the loving things that his mom does, such as read bedtime stories and tuck him in at night.
4. Pirates Don’t Change Diapers by Melinda Long. — In this follow-up to How I Became a Pirate, the pirates return to Jeremy Jacob’s house to look for treasure, but an upset baby stalls their plans. Nobody is able to get anything done until Bonny Anne is happy. In this silly turn of events, the pirates become babysitters and learn that an upset kiddo is even more terrifying then their pirate adventures!
5. Pirates Love Underpantsby Claire Freedman. — Preschoolers love books about underwear! Get ready to laugh your way through this silly book as the pirates go in search of the fabled golden underpants.
6. Shiver Me Hook; a pirate ABC by June Sobel. — The pirate crew is embarking on an alphabet adventure. They search high and low for all of the letters from A to Z, with each letter corresponding to something piratey! This is perfect for preschoolers who are working on letter recognition and phonetic sounds!
7. Are Pirates Polite?by Corinne Demas. — In this fun rhyming story, the pirates show that they can, in fact, be polite and say “please” and “thank you.” If pirates can be polite, then preschoolers can too! This book has just the right amount of grossness to keep preschoolers giggling.
8. Pete the Cat and the Treasure Map by James Dean. — Sail along with Pete the Cat and friends aboard a pirate ship. They find a treasure map and set out on a hunt for the treasure. Uh-oh, they run into a sea monster! Is the sea monster going to cause trouble or become a new friend? Preschoolers love Pete the Cat and they will enjoy Pete’s pirate adventure!
9.Arrr, Mustache Babyby Bridget Heos — This is the cutest story about two toddlers, one who is born with a mustache and one who is born with a beard. One day at the community pool, they encounter two pirate tots and the mustache baby and the bear baby turn into pirates, determined to keep all of the loot for themselves. A whimsical battle between the kids ensues. Behaving like pirates does not make their parents happy. As their treasure filled ship sinks, the tots find themselves in a timeout. They learn that sharing is lot more fun than hoarding the treasure and behaving badly.
10. How to be a Pirate by Isaac Fitzgerald. — A young girl named Cece wants to be a pirate, but the boys tell her she can’t be one (mean!). She doesn’t let them stop her and she seeks out her grandfather for advice on being a pirate. Grandpa has tattoos (just like a pirate) and a ship in a bottle, so Cece is convinced he knows all about pirates. He guides her through all of the things pirates need to be, ending with a beautiful conclusion about believing in oneself.
Find the Differences — Pirate Edition
Can you spot differences between these two pirate-themed scenes? Look closely and see if you can find all five.
Disclaimer — this post contains affiliate links to products sold on Amazon. I joined Amazon’s Affiliates Program to help cover the costs of my site. If you buy a product through one of my links, then I get a small percentage of the sale. Thanks your support! Happy reading: )
Apple theme books, crafts, and STEM activities for preschool
Fall is just around the corner and I love to do apple-themed things this time of year. Here is a list of some of my favorite apple books for preschoolers and kindergarteners: a tissue paper craft, a yummy apple STEM activity, and a fun apple counting idea to do with pompoms. And no apple themed activities would be complete without an apple taste test — try different kinds of apples and see which one is your favorite!
Apple Books:
1.The Apple Pie that Papa Baked by Lauren Thompson — I love Lauren Thompson’s books! This is a cute story about everything that goes into making an apple pie. As the story progresses, your child will notice more and more animals after the delicious pie! Thompson creates a cumulative and lyrical text that teaches preschoolers about nature and the apple’s life cycle.
2. Apple Picking Day by Candace Ransom — Ransom’s trademark short story with great pictures makes this book a good choice for kids who can’t sit still for long stories. The family goes apple picking and the reader gets to enjoy the fun with them. Preschoolers will get caught up in the excitement as the brother and sister race against other kids in the orchard to see who can pick the most apples.
2. 10 Apples Up On Top by Dr. Seuss — in this funny, rhyming book, a lion, a tiger, and a dog compete to see who can stack apples on their head and do tricks without the apples falling! While they keep trying to outdo each other, the animals inadvertently find themselves in a bear’s home. The bear is not happy with their shenanigans and chases them out. The animals run into more bears and more trouble. The bears chase the animals (who still have apples still stacked on their heads) into an apple cart! Now everyone has 10 apples up on top 🙂 Your child laugh at this silly story and enjoy the animals’ crazy antics. Plus, this books offers a fun way to incorporate counting!
3. Ouch by Ragnhild Scamell — in this story, an adorable hedgehog gets an apple stuck its back. Now hedgehog can’t fit into its den and winter is coming. The hedgehog’s animal friends try to help and get the apple off, but each attempt ends up with more things stuck to the poor hedgehog. After squeezing, and swimming, and rolling around, hedgehog and friends are running out of ideas. Fortunately, along comes a goat with a big appetite and eats all of the things that are stuck on hedgehog!
4. Aaron Loves Apples and Pumpkinsby PD Eastman — Fall is here and Aaron the alligator loves everything about it. He loves the yummy apples, pumpkins, football, Halloween costumes, and spending time with his friends. When his friends go apple picking, Aaron tells them that he knows a better way to get the apples down. Aaron shakes the tree, causing all of the apples to fall down on him! Oops 🙂 Now all of the apples are down and Aaron and his friends can enjoy them together. This book is part of the beginning reader series, I Can Read. It has short sentences with few words per page, making it a good choice for kids who are learning to read, and for those who do not want to sit through long stories.
5. Apples, Apples, Applesby Nancy Wallace — in this cute story, the bunny family goes apple picking on a lovely fall day. Farmer Miller teaches the bunnies all about apples. Kids will love learning all about apples with the bunnies. The book includes a applesauce recipe too!
6. 10 Red Apples by Pat Hutchins — everyone loves apples, including all of the farm apples. The apple tree starts with 10 red apples on it. Soon, one-by-one, a farm animal comes along and eats an apple off of the tree. The farmer eats the last one, and his wife didn’t get to enjoy a yummy apple! Oh no! Not to worry, the wife knows where to find more 🙂 This story has bright pictures, large, bold numbers on each page, and makes it easy for preschoolers and kindergartners to practice counting apples.
7. Adding Apples by Nick Rebman — this nonfiction, early math book is a great choice for preschool and kindergarten apple-themes. The child in the book leads the reader through a series of age-appropriate math problems with apples 🙂 My son liked counting the counting all of the apples on the page and announcing the answer to me! Plus the pictures in the book do a great job representing different colors in the apples.
Tissue Paper Apple Craft:
Tissue Paper Preschool Apple Craft
To make this tissue paper apple craft, you will need a piece of white paper, a pencil, a glue stick, and tissue paper in red, green and brown (or orange). I drew a rough outline of an apple on a piece of paper. Next I cut red tissue paper into 1-inch squares.
My son and I both scrunched up the red tissue paper squares together — great for preschool fine motor skills. After we had a lot of of tissue balls, my kiddo covered his apple shape in glue. Then he stuck the tissue all over his apple.
After covering then entire apple in red tissue, we scrunched up green tissue. We glued the green tissue balls in a leaf shape. Even after adding the green leaf, my son still thought his apple was missing something. He decided to add an orange stem (I didn’t have brown tissue paper).
His apple turned out pretty cute! We really enjoyed doing this craft together and I love that he added his own creative ideas with the stem.
STEM Activity:
Apple STEM activity — using our 5 Senses
Activities:
Apple Counting:
Preschool Apple Counting Activity with flashcards and pompoms
Tactile counting with pompoms really helps conceptualize numbers. For this activity, preschoolers will add red and green pompoms to their apple tree to show the same number of apples as is listed on their flash cards. I made numbered cards and an apple tree that you can print. This activity can used over-and-over again as no glue is involved. Just draw a card, look at the number, and place the corresponding number of “apple” pompoms on the tree!
For this activity you will need to print off the flash cards and cut them out; print off the tree page; and have 10 pompoms in red and green. Click on the link below for your flashcards and tree:
Letter D is awesome — Dinosaurs, Dogs, Donuts, and Ducks! This was a fun week for my preschooler. We read books about his favorite animals, ate donuts, danced along to We are the Dinosaurs, and made a neat Froot Loops Tower.
Monday — D is for Dinosaur
Writing Practice: write uppercase D. For this letter, we used a worksheet from AtoZteacherstuff.com:
Book: Crunch the Shy Dinosaurby Cirocco Dunlap. This is a fun, interactive book that really engages with the reader. Young children will have a blast getting to know Crunch by saying hello, singing Happy Birthday, and introducing themselves. It also encourages the reader to take into consideration that other people (and dinosaurs) might be shy when you first meet them and to let them have some quiet space to adjust to new people.
Check your library for Crunch, the Shy Dinosaur, or buy it on Amazon.
Craft / Activity:Dinosaur Coloring Page — use your creativity and color or paint an awesome dino picture! Then, Find 5 Differences between these 2 dinosaur scenes:
Song: This was great excuse to sing along to our of my favorite preschool songs, We Are the Dinosaurs by the Laurie Berkner Band. Watch the music video on YouTube and march along!
Tuesday —
STEM: Build a Froot Loops Tower. This project is great for working on fine-motor skills!
Froot Loops Tower
Supplies needed are Play-Doh, a dry spaghetti noodle, and Froot Loops cereal.
First, make a mound out of Play-Doh to use as your tower’s base.
Second, stick a spaghetti noodle into the center of the base and make sure to really smush the Play-Doh around the bottom of the noodle so that it stands up.
Now it is time to make the tower and work on fine motor skills! Take your Froot Loops and carefully drop each down the noodle, making a tower as they stack. Have fun making color patterns. Bonus, you get to eat the cereal after your are done making towers 😉
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.
“Dog I Spy” Worksheet: practice counting with this cute dog-themed I Spy picture.
Books — We read dog stories! My son loves Karma Wilson’s book, A Dog Named Doug. Doug the dog is a digging machine. He digs a holes to everywhere and gets into a bit of trouble along the way. The book ends happily with Doug digging a hole into his family’s bedroom for a bedtime cuddle. My son loves this book and he laughs every single time we read it. We have checked this out from our library numerous times, and we hope you will check it from yours too! It is also available on Amazon if you want to buy it.
We also read Laura Numeroff’s If You Give a Dog a Donut. Turns out if you give a dog a donut, a great story ensues! This cute story is a fun read-aloud and good introduction to sequencing. Find a copy at your library, or buy on Amazon.
Craft — Paper Plate Donut. Supplies needed are paper plate, light brown watercolor paint and paintbrush, construction paper (we used pink), scissors, white glue, and sprinkles.
1. First my son painted the entire plate light brown.
2. While it was drying, we picked our construction paper for the donut icing. We went with the classic pink for our donut, but also strongly considered brown for a chocolate icing. I cut out a wavy shape in the pink paper.
3. After the donut plate was dry, I cut out the center to give it the donut shape.
4. My son used white, school glue to attach the icing to the plate.
5. Last, he glued on sprinkles to complete his paper plate donut 🙂
Songs — For letter D, we sang the “Donut Song.” If you don’t know this song, you can check it out on YouTube. My son loves this song and he sings it all of the time!
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. Make bother uppercase D and lowercase d.
Worksheet: Draw a line from the lowercase d to all of the uppercase D letters.
Book:Little Quack’s New Friendby Lauren Thompson. The whole Little Quack series is adorable, but I am partial to this one because I love the new froggy friend. This Little Quack story embodies preschooler’s shyness about meeting new people, but children’s innate playfulness and curiosity wins over and everyone has fun playing together. Plus, this story is full of fun sound words to say!
There are many cute stories in the Little Quack series. Hopefully your library has this one and others. It is available for purchase on Amazon.
Craft: Color and Feathers Duck Craft — supplies needed are duck coloring sheet, crayons, white school feathers, and glue.
Here’s the coloring page we used. I found on getcoloringpages.com. Feel free to draw your own duck or cut out a duck shape from construction paper if you don’t like this one.
We used crayons to color our duck. My son worked hard to color within the lines!
Then we picked out feathers for our duck and attached them with white, school glue.
Song: Raffi’s Five Little Ducks. I really enjoy doing hand movements to this song. We hold up fingers on one hand for the five little ducks, folding down fingers as the ducks go over the hill. The other is our mama duck and we keep our fingers together and move them up and down to touch the thumb to make a mouth movement for the quacking parts. If you don’t know this song, it’s available on YouTube.
Whether your child is doing preschool (or kindergarten) at home or at a school, or just getting into the back-to-school excitement with an older sibling, here is a list of 14 fun, school-themed books to enjoy together. I’m also including a cute school-themed I Spy game that makes counting lots of fun!
School Stories:
1. The Night Before Preschoolby Natasha Wing — written in a rhyming style similar to Clement Moore’s The Night Before Christmas, this is a cute read for those who want to know what to expect at preschool. The little boy in the story is too nervous to sleep, but he learns that preschool is tons of fun and he can’t wait to go back the next day 🙂
2. Click, Clack, Quack to Schoolby Doreen Cronin — for those who are nervous that school isn’t going to be much fun, the farm animals show that school is lots of fun and everyone has great time. The animals’ antics as they prepare to visit the school will have your child giggling.
3. The Pigeon Has to Go Schoolby Mo Willems — Even pigeons get worried about starting school (who knew?). The pigeon worries about everything, including worrying about learning too much! Kids will find themselves laughing at the pigeon’s over-the-top reactions and will subtly find that, just like the pigeon, they might not need to worry so much themselves. All around great read, even for those who aren’t worried about school.
4. King of Kindergartenby Derrick Barnes — This story is a great confidence booster. No need to worry about the first day of school; you got this, because you are the king of kindergarten! In this book, the parents help build up their child’s self-confidence and ease school worries away.
5. Time for School,Little Blue Truckby Alice Schertle — this is a new book in the Little Blue Truck series and this time, Little Blue gets to help a young piggy who missed the bus. Preschoolers will love Little Blue’s kindness in this beautifully illustrated, rhyming book.
6. Froggy Goes to School by Jonathan London — Froggy is adorable. These books are always a fun read, with vibrant pictures, a lot of fun sounds to make, and an enthusiastic story. I have always enjoyed reading Froggy to my preschool storytime group at the library and to my own son because the stories lend themselves so well to movement activities.
7. Lola Goes to Schoolby Anna McQuinn — I LOVE the Lola books! They are super cute, show such positive family relationships, have great pictures, and are relatively short stories. Lola shows how much school can be in this story. She gets her own cubby to store her things, gets to choose fun activities, plays with new friends, and gets a yummy snack. Soon it’s time to go home!
8. The Kissing Hand by Audrey Penn — In this sweet story, a little raccoon is scared to start school. Little ones can relate to the racoon’s fears of being away from home. Mama racoon has a great solution; she kisses his hand so that he can bring her love with him. This story is just so touching — be prepared to get teary-eyed as you read it! It’s a reassuring story both kids and parents.
9. Llama Llama Misses Mama by Anna Dewdney — this book really tugged at my emotions. It’s also hard for us parents to be separated from our kids when school starts! Told in rhyming text, this book explores the fears many kids face on the first day of school.
10. Pete the Cat: Rocking in My School Shoes by Eric Litwin — Pete the Cat is a preschool / kindergarten fan favorite! This is one of the first Pete the Cat books and it is a fun, sing-songy story with less words than the later stories. You will get caught up in Pete’s enthusiasm for school and find yourselves singing along.
11. I Got the School Spiritby Connie Schofield-Morrison — want to get pepped up and excited for school? well then this is the book for you! The vibrant pictures and the sensory sound words will capture preschoolers’ attentions. “She hears the school spirit in the bus driving up the street–VROOM, VROOM!–and in the bell sounding in the halls–RING-A-DING!” It’s a fun, sensory experience to get excited for the new school year.
12. We Don’t Eat Our Classmatesby Ryan T. Higgins — Ryan T. Higgins is so talented as both an author and an illustrator. In this funny story, Penelope, a T. Rex, is nervous about her first day of school. Her nerves get the better of her during the day and she ends up eating a classmate — don’t worry, the student is fine! Penelope’s parents help ease her fears and she returns to school the next day, ready to try again!
13. If You Take a Mouse to School by Laura Numeroff — this is a fun book that goes through the typical school supplies/things you’d see in a classroom. Like the other books in this, it’s a silly story that little ones will enjoy. Bonus, it is a great introduction to sequencing and kids won’t even realize that they’re learning as they are so engrossed in the story.
14. School’s First Day of School by Adam Rex — A brand new elementary school is anxiously awaiting the first day of school! What will the children be like? What will they be doing at school? Will they like school? The school was filled with questions. On the first day of school, the school couldn’t believe how many children there were! The school learned what the different rooms were for and listened in on some jokes at lunch and lessons in the classroom and ended up having a fantastic day! Now the school can’t wait for everyone to back again tomorrow for more fun!
Check you library for these school-themed books! You can also purchase them on Amazon through the links provided. If you happen to purchase a book through my links, I get a small percentage of the sale to help support this site.
Activity for The Kissing Hand —
Make a hand and kiss out of Play-Doh to go along with the story!
Book:Waiting for Wings by Lois Ehlert. First off, Lois Ehlert is an amazing author and illustrator. This is a sweet, gently story about a flower garden awaiting the arrival of the beautiful butterflies. The book uses a rhyming format to teach about a butterfly’s life cycle in short, but informative text. My son and I love the pictures throughout this book. They are so bright and vibrant! This book not only uses color well, but it also utilizes paper as an artform within the book. There is a smaller book inside the book, and less wide pages that utilize the larger pages’ artwork. — this makes reading this book more of an experience. At the end, there is a section that shows each caterpillar, it’s chrysalis, and matching butterfly. My son and I love to look at this part — it’s perfect for young biologists 🙂
Lois Ehlert is a popular author and illustrator, so there is a good chance your local library will have this book. We checked it from our library and my son fell in love with it; we now own a copy. It is available for purchase on Amazon. To help cover the costs of this site, I joined Amazon’s Affiliate program, so if you purchase a book through my links, I get a small portion of the sale.
Craft: Mosaic Butterfly — Supplies needed are multiple colors of construction paper, glue stick, white school glue, scissors, a pipe cleaner, and a pencil. I have a sandwich bag filled with scraps of construction paper that we use for making mosaic crafts. So if you don’t already have small pieces of paper ready to go, cut some out in a variety of sizes and colors.
Pick a color for your butterfly. My son is obsessed with the color blue, so he chose blue paper. I folded the paper in half and drew a basic butterfly shape and then I cut it out.
2. My son glued the butterfly to the orange background. Next, he covered his butterfly in glue from his glue stick and added the mosiac paper peices.
3. Once he was happy with the mosaic look of his butterfly, he picked a pipe cleaner to make the butterfly’s antennae. He folded it in half and used white school glue to attach it to the orange paper.
STEM: Butterfly’s Life Cycle — have your child act out a butterfly’s life cycle in 4 steps. (1) EGG: child curls up in a ball on the ground; (2) CATERPILLAR: child hatches from the egg and wriggles on the floor like a caterpillar. Baby caterpillars are hungry so pretend to munch on leaves; (3) CHRYSALIS: stand and place palms together above head to be the hanging chrysalis. Close your eyes and pretend to be asleep; (4) BUTTERFLY: emerge as a butterfly and flit your beautiful new wings.
Air Writing: Ask your child to hold up a hand and trace Letter B’s shape with their finger in the air. I was skeptical of air writing at first, but my son really got into it and I found him air writing his letters all on his own.
Wednesday —B is for Bee
Writing Practice: write lowercase b. I found this worksheet on AtoZteacherstuff.com:
Book: Read The Honeybeeby Kristen Hall. This is a truly educational book wrapped up in gorgeous pictures. In this book preschoolers will learn about the importance of bees, how honey is made, and a year in the life of a bee. In addition to all of the great things your preschooler will learn about bees, this book also provides a great look the four seasons and lends itself well to conversations about changes in weather and hibernation. The end of the book provides bee facts for further discussion.
This book got a lot of “buzz” in the library world, so your local library should have a copy. Check it out and enjoy it with your preschooler. It is available for purchase on Amazon. To help cover the costs of this site, I joined Amazon’s Affiliate program, so if you purchase a book through my links, I get a small portion of the sale.
Craft: Toilet Paper Roll Bee — supplies need are an empty toilet paper roll, marker, yellow paper, black paper, white tissue paper, pencil, scissors, glue stick, and stapler.
Measure the yellow paper so that it completely covers your toilet paper roll and then cut it out.
I stapled the yellow paper to the toilet paper roll, but you can glue it if you prefer.
I drew lines on black paper and my son cut out the stripes for his bee. He also cut out the 2 antennae from the black paper.
My son drew on a cute happy face for his bee 🙂
I cut out a rectangle from tissue paper. We scrunched in in the middle and glued it to the back of our bee. Then I trimmed the edges of the wings to make them rounded.
Song: Sing along with the Laurie Berkner Band to Bumblebee (Buzz Buzz). See it on YouTube. You can’t help but be up and buzzing around for this one 🙂 We love the Laurie Berkner Band and there is a very real possibility that if someone was to drop by unexpectedly, they’d find us dancing around the kitchen to their songs!
Thursday —
Salt Tray Writing: cover the bottom of a shallow tray or pie tin with table salt. Your child can take one finger to trace letter shapes in the salt. Try drawing both uppercase B and lowercase b. Can you make a butterfly shape in the salt tray too?
Worksheet: color all of the boxes with Letter B b.
Book : We read We’re Going on a Bear Huntby Michael Rosen. This books takes the reader on a great adventure through all sorts of obstacles in search of a bear. It is super fun to make all of the noises in the book and act out the story as the book progresses. Every time we read this, my son acts out the story on his own afterward, often using toys or pretending to have his own bear hunt outside as we walk through our neighborhood. You can substitute anything for “bear” and go on all sorts of adventures!
This book is a beloved classic and should be available at your library. My kiddo loved it so much that we bought it. It is available for purchase on Amazon.
Craft: Cardboard Bear: supplies needed are cardboard, brown yarn, googly eyes, pompom, scissors, pen/pencil, ribbon/cord for hanging, and white glue.
1. I drew a bear shape on part of a cardboard box and cut it out.
2. We taped the end of a piece of brown yarn to the back of the bear and my 3 year-old wound the yarn around the bear to make it fuzzy.
3. My kiddo picked out yellow googly eyes and a yellow pompom for a nose. The googly eyes were sticker so they were easy to attach. We used white glue to stick on the pompom nose.
4. After the glue was dry, I punched a hole in the top of the bear with a pen. My son picked out a blue cord and I tied it on so he could hang up his cute, fuzzy bear. He really wanted to give his bear to his grandpa, so it ended up being a cute present.
Song: Sing The Bear Went Over the Mountain. Super Simple Song’s version is available on YouTube.
Here’s what my son and I did for Letter A — we read about apples, ants, and anacondas; learned about our 5 senses, made fun crafts, enjoyed an apple taste test, and sang some fun songs!
Monday — A is for Apple
“The Apple Pie that Papa Baked” by Lauren Thompson
Writing Practice: Write Uppercase A and lowercase a.
Book: The Apple Pie that Papa Baked by Lauren Thompson. I love Lauren Thompson’s books! (Try her Little Quack series if you haven’t’ discovered them yet — they are too cute). In this apple pie book, the cumulative and lyrical text create a sweet story that teaches preschoolers about nature and the apple’s life cycle.
Check you local library for this book — it’s a great read 🙂 You can also buy it on Amazon. I joined Amazon’s Affiliate program, so if you buy an item through my site’s links, I get a small portion of the sale to help support this website.
Craft: Tissue Paper Apple — supplies needed are a piece of paper, pencil, glue stick, and tissue paper in red, green and brown (or orange).
Tissue Paper Apple Craft
I drew a rough outline of an apple on a piece of paper and then I cut red tissue paper into 1-inch squares.
My son and I both scrunched up the red tissue paper squares together — great for preschool fine motor skills. After we had a lot of of tissue balls, my kiddo covered his apple shape in glue and then glued the tissue all over his apple.
After covering then entire apple in red tissue, we scrunched up green tissue to make a leaf. My kiddo added the green leaf, but thought his apple was still missing something. He decided to add an orange stem (I didn’t have brown tissue paper).
His apple turned out pretty cute! We really enjoyed doing this craft together and I love that he added his own creative ideas with the stem.
Song: preschoolers love to sing! Don’t worry if your singing voice isn’t great because your child will be having too much fun with you to care. Sing Raffi’s Apples and Bananas song. It is the perfect combination of silly verses and phonetic vowel sounds for preschoolers. Find it here on YouTube. We love this song in our house and find ourselves singing it all of the time 🙂
Preschool STEM 5 Senses Apple Activity
Tuesday —
STEM: 5 Senses — we have 5 senses: sight, touch, smell, taste, and sound. Let’s use our 5 senses on an apple! (1) What color is the apple? Do you see any marks on the apple? (2) what does the apple feel like? Is it smooth or rough? (3) Take a sniff. Does the apple have a sweet smell? (4) Take a bite and taste the apple. Is it yummy? (5) What do you hear? Can you hear crunching sounds when you chew your apple?
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 periodically find him air writing his letters all on his own.
Wednesday — A is for Ant
Writing Practice: write uppercase letter A. I found a worksheet from AtoZteacherstuff.com:
Book: The Ant and the Grasshopper by Luli Gray. This book has bright, exciting pictures that will capture preschoolers’ imaginations! Based on the Aesop’s Fable of the same name, this book shows that it is important to work hard and plan ahead, but that it is also important to be a good friend and enjoy some fun! Check you library, or get it on Amazon.
Craft:Egg Carton Ant — supplies needed are a paper egg carton, washable paints, paintbrush, pipe cleaners, sharpened pencil, scissors, and googly eyes.
Egg Carton Ant Craft for Preschool and Kindergarten
Cut your egg carton down so that you only have 3 humps. (Add a quick science lesson by explaining that ants are insects and insects have three main parts: the head, the thorax, and the abdomen. Ants have 6 legs, 2 large eyes, and 2 antennae.)
Pick a paint color and then paint your egg carton. (We painted ours on top of a paper plate to catch all of the paint drips/spills/wild brush strokes!) Let your egg carton dry.
Once completely dry, add your googly eyes to your ant’s face.
Now you have to choose pipe cleaners to make 6 legs and 2 antennae. You will need 2 pipe cleaners to make the legs and 1 pipe cleaner to make the antennae. I thought it would be fun to make rainbow colored legs, but my son stuck with his favorite color, blue 🙂
We used a sharpened pencil to punch the holes for the antennae and legs. We stuck the legs through the holes, and bent the pipe cleaners slightly inside the carton to hold the legs in place. Then, we made “feet” by bending the ends of the pipe cleaners and we were excited that our ant actually stood up!
Song: Sing The Ants Go Marching. This song is a preschool favorite — it’s catchy, you get to say “boom,” and counting is involved!
Thursday —
Salt Tray Writing: cover the bottom of a shallow tray or pie tin with table salt. Your child can take one finger to trace letter shapes in the salt.
Apple Taste Test: We went to the grocery store and bought different kinds of apples and we had an apple taste test when we got home! It was fun to try to different apple flavors and compare them to each other. Our favorites were Honeycrisp and Fuji.
Friday — A is for Anaconda
Writing Practice: write lowercase letter a. We used this worksheet from AtoZteacherstuff.com:
Book — We read I Saw Anacondaby Jane Clarke with illustrations by Emma Dodd. This a cumulative, lift-the-flap book about an anaconda that eats everything around it. The snake ends up getting sick — ick!
My son says this anaconda book is awesome because it has so many flaps! Every page is interactive and he giggles as the anaconda eats everything in sight. Plus, he learned about some new animals (a stork, piranhas, and a skink).
For this craft you will use the bubble wrap as a stamp to make the snake’s scales. I am a big fan of out-of-the-box paintbrush ideas, so using bubble wrap to make the snake scales is a super cool idea.
Check out the new “Preschool Math Skills” section under the Preschool page. I finally got some math skills worksheets available for free download so your preschooler can practice their number writing, counting, and number ordering skills 🙂
I originally made them for my son to practice his math skills, and I periodically print them off for him to do again. I am so impressed with how much his handwriting has improved. He just wrote the most beautiful number 20 on his worksheet!
