Transition Room 2

Monday: The letter of the week is S!

What is the difference between upper- and lower-case letters? What does the uppercase and lowercase S look like? What sound does it make? Talk about what words start with the letter S?

• Using your pointer finger, practice writing the letter S in the air.
• Using paper and pencil, practice writing the upper S and lower-case s by tracing.

Letter Activity

To begin, you will need the following supplies:

• Shaving cream
• Large plastic cutting board (or you can us a child’s plastic table.)

Shaving cream writing has to be one of the most fun and engaging ways to practice letters. You can use this activity to also help your child practice writing their name.

Take a large amount of shaving cream and spread it around your cutting board or table. Using your finger or a plastic writing tool write the letter S in the shaving cream. When you are done have your child trace the letter a few times. After they have traced the letter a few times have them try writing it on their own.

Tuesday: Life cycle of a Bee

Continue going over the four stage of the life cycle of a Bee

A bee is a flying insect. Insects have three pairs of legs and a body with 3 main parts

1. Egg
2. Larva:
3. Pupa Stage
4. Adult Bee

Supplies Needed

• Cardboard tube- like an empty toilet paper roll
• Yellow paint and paintbrush
• Black yarn
• Scissors
• Construction paper (yellow and white)
• Black pipe cleaner
• Googly eyes
• Black marker or crayon

Paint a cardboard tube with yellow paint and let it dry completely. While the tube is drying cut a long piece of black yarn. Once your tube is dry, wrap the yarn around the tube to form stripes for your bee. After you’re done wrapping your yarn, take two small pieces of black pipe cleaner and glue them onto your bee body to make the antenna. While the pipe cleaners are drying, cut out two white wings and a yellow circle for the head. Start by gluing the wings on the back of your bee. Take the yellow circle and start gluing on the googley eyes. Then draw the mouth.

Wednesday: Sensory Day

Spaghetti Cutting - Teaching scissor skills? Make it fun with spaghetti cutting!

To begin, you will need the following supplies

• Child scissors
• Cooked spaghetti
• Plastic bin or sensory table

Scissor Holding Tip

A smiley face drawn on the thumbnail of your child’s “cutting hand” serves as a reminder to keep thumb facing upwards when cutting.

This project is pretty much self explanatory. Using the scissors have your child cut the spaghetti. You can change your spaghetti by dying it different colors.

Changing the color of your Spaghetti

To begin, you will need the following supplies

• Olive oil
• Cooked spaghetti
• Food coloring
• Hand sanitizer
• Plastic bags

You want to cook your spaghetti for half the recommended time. Make sure not to rinse it as the spaghetti often breaks up into small pieces. Then put the cooked spaghetti in a bag, adding olive oil, a few squirts of hand sanitizer, and a several drops of food coloring. Now for the fun part--shake the bag to mix the color into the spaghetti.

Thursday - Art Day

Painting with kitchen items

Items that always work well are:

• Spatulas
• Sponges or pot scrubbers
• Potato mashers
• Whisks
• Plastic forks
• Bottle brushes

You will also need:

• Paint
• Paper plate (or something flat works.)
• Drop cloth or table cover

This is pretty straight forward! Use the kitchen items to stamp, scrape, make patterns and create!

Friday - Smoothie Popsicles

Ingredients:

• Fresh strawberries (or frozen)
• Fresh or frozen banana
• Vanilla or strawberry yogurt
• Reusable plastic Popsicle trays

Take all the ingredients and blend them in a blender. After the ingredients are blended smooth, poor them into the plastic Popsicle trays. Carefully put the trays inside the freezer for up to 2 hours or longer. Enjoy when frozen.

Monday - Learning about the letter "R"

The letter of the week is R

Discuss the difference between the upper-case R and the lower-case r.

What sound does the letter R make?

What words starts with the letter R?

• Using your pointer finger, practice writing the letter R in the air.
• Take playdough and make the letter R.
• Find things in your home that start with the letter R
• Using paper and pencil, practice writing the upper-case R. Do the same with the lower case r.

Tuesday - learning about Bees

What is a bee?

A bee is a flying insect. Insect have three pairs of legs and a body with three main parts.

Four stage life cycle of a Bee

1. Egg: The queen bee lays a single long egg in a small cell or what is called a honeycomb hole. In three days the egg will hatch.
2. Larva: Once the larva hatches, they stay in the cell or what is called a honeycomb. A larva looks like a small white worm. Larva are like hungry babies, they need to be cared for day and night. They are fed special food made by the worker bees. After a few days of feeding the larva, the worker bee puts a cap, or what is like a closed door, on the cell. This allows the bee to go into the next stage of its life.
3. Pupa Stage: Once the bee is locked into the cell, or what’s called a honeycomb, the larva makes what looks like a cocoon and begins to change slowly into a bee. The bee will stay in the pupa stage for 15 days.
4. Adult Bee: After staying in the pupa stage for 15 days it leaves the honeycomb as an adult bee.

Book suggestion: “Bee” by Britta Teckentrup

Life Cycle of a Bee Project

Supplies Needed

• Paper plate
• Beans: Using small beans to represent the eggs
• Curly pasta to represent the pupa
• A pasta shell (past medium size) to represent the body of the Bee
• Black pen to draw the wings of the bee.
• White glue.
• The four stages of the life cycle typed and printed out or written on the paper plate

Wednesday - Sensory Day

Cloud Dough Sensory

Ingredients: To make just one batch of cloud dough you’ll need the following ingredients. If you’d like to fill a large sensory table with cloud dough, I suggest doubling or even tripling the recipe so you’ll have enough.

• 8 cups of flour
• 1 1/2 cups of vegetable oil
• Oil-based food coloring of your choice

Mix all ingredients together.

Here are a few fun tools to have at your sensory table.

• Cookie Cutters
• Silicone Cupcake Liners
• Measuring Spoons
• Measuring Cup
• Wooden Spoon
• Bowls
• Muffin Tin

Thursday - Art Day

Book suggestion: “Mixed” A colorful story by Arree Chung

Book Suggestion: “Mix it up,” by Herve Tullet or “Little Blue and Little Yellow,” by Leo Lionni

Begin by going over what are primary colors: Red, yellow and blue.

When mixing primary colors together you make other colors.

HOW TO PAINT WITH BUBBLES

To begin, you will need the following supplies:

• small plastic containers to hold the paint mixture
• tempera paint in a variety of colors
• liquid dish soap
• water
• straws
• small pieces of thick paper (construction, card stock, watercolor paper)

To make the paint solution, add paint (using primary colors) to the bottom of a plastic container.

Then added a squirt of dish soap and fill the container with a couple of inches of water. You might have to play a little bit to get the best ratio of paint to water to soap.

The solution should be thin enough so that when the children blow bubbles into the liquid, the bubbles expand over the top of the container.

The children can lightly press a small piece of paper over the bubbles. This leaves an interesting print on the paper. Add a variety of colors of bubbles to one piece of paper.

Children will enjoy looking at how the colors mix together and make new colors.

Friday

Dirt Cup Recipe

• 2 cups milk
• 1 small box instant chocolate pudding
• 1 package Oreos
• 1 small tub Cool Whip
• Gummy Worms
• Clear cups (preferably)

Place 1/2 a package of Oreos in a Ziploc baggie. If your children are helping you, you may want to put a few Oreos each in several bags so they can all participate! Crush them up with your hands or with a rolling pin.

We leave the cream filling in, but you can scrape it out if you don't want the white in there.

Crush them until they are in small pieces or crumbs. Small chunks of the cookies are okay.

In a bowl, whisk together the pudding, milk, and about 2/3 to one whole tub of Cool Whip. Allow it to set for about 2 minutes to thicken a bit. Stir again.

Now, in your clear cups, have your little helpers help you in layering pudding and Oreos until you run out. Typically you are able to make 2 layers in each cup.

Finally, top it all off with some gummy worms or any kind of bug candy.

Refrigerate until you're ready to eat them. Note: The Oreos will get soft if these sit for a long time.

Monday: The Letter of the week is Q

What is the difference between the upper case Q and the lower case q? What sound does it make? What words starts with the letter Q?

• Using your pointer finger practice writing the letters Q and q in the air.
• You can also do this with sand in a flat box along with stick, practice writing the letter Qq.
• Using paper and pencil practice writing the upper Q and the lower q.

Tuesday: Life Cycle of a Butterfly

What is a butterfly? A butterfly is an insect. An insect with three pairs of legs a body with 3 main parts.

Stages of a butterfly's life:

1. Egg: A butterfly starts its life as a tiny egg that a mother butterfly lays under a leaf. A sticky substance holds the egg onto the leaf.
2. Caterpillar: After three to five days the caterpillar starts to hatch from the egg. The caterpillar starts to eat by eating it own egg and then starts to feed on the plants around it. It begins to get bigger and bigger. As the caterpillar continues to grow it skin splits several times and the caterpillar crawls out of it. Once the caterpillar is fat it can’t grow any more it crawls onto a leaf making a J formation and begin to spin its chrysalis (cocoon).
3. Adult Butterfly: The process of a caterpillar changing into a butterfly is called a metamorphosis. They usually stay inside the chrysalis for up to 10 day. Inside the chrysalis the caterpillar is slowly changing into a butterfly. When they first emerge from the chrysalis their wings ar damp and need to dry. Then they begin to move their winds up and down to get all the blood flowing through their bodies.

Book Suggestion: ”The Very Hungry Caterpillar” By Eric Carle

Song: Mr. Josh Sings A Butterfly Song

Project: https://zoe.photoart360.com/life-cycle-of-butterfly-butterfly-life-cycle-using/

Wednesday: Water Sensory Play

Provide a tub of water and a cup they will fill and pour water over and over again. Add some water color or food coloring to change the color of the water. Glitter to give it some sparkle. You can even add soap. Best kind to add is Johnson and Johnson no tear shampoo safe if it gets into eyes.

Fun tools to add to water play

• Funnel
• Plastic water bottle
• Cups and spoons

Washing Dishes: Have the children bring their plastic cooking toys along with a sponge and wash the dished like mommy and daddy do.

Bath Time: Taking plastic dolls and putting them in the water tub. Provide them with a towel or sponge so they can wash and clean babies.

Another fun active is water beads. You can find them on Amazon.com. Add some shaving cream to your water beads to add a different kind of texture.

Thursday: Art Day

Book Suggestion: “Mix it up” By Herve Tullet or “Little Blue and Little Yellow” by Leo Lionni

Begin by asking what colors are primary colors? Go over the primary colors. Red, Yellow and blue. When mixing primary colors together you make other colors.

Art Activity: Mixing Colors

Here are the supplies you will need to gather to set up the color mixing colors activity.

• 3 Paper Plate
• Paint Primary colors. Red, Blue and Yellow
• 3Q Tips.
• Plastic cap of laundry soap or plastic cup.
• White paper

On each paper plate place a small amount of 2 paint colors, example blue and yellow making sure that they are separated but close enough to mix together. Start off by going over all the colors. Ask when mixing these tow colors what color do you think it will make. Taking the Q Tips have the child mix the colors together. Asking what color they have made? When finished mixing the colors to create new colors have the child take the cap or cup and dip it into the pain then pressing it on their white paper. What shape have you made?

Turkey Baster Color Mixing: Another project you can do at home:

Supplies:

• Turkey Baster
• Food Coloring
• Water
• Disposable Pans or White Dish Tubs

Fill two pans with 1-2 inches of water. Add a few drops of blue food coloring to one pan of water and a few drops of yellow food coloring to the other pan of water. Using the turkey baster invite them to place their turkey basters in the blue or yellow colored water and squeeze the bulb to fill the basters with colored water. Next, have the children place their basters over the empty pan in the middle and squeeze the bulb again to release the colored water. As the children squeeze the colored water into each pan, the two colors (blue and yellow) will mix to create green. Ask the children what they notice when they release the different colors into the empty pan.

Friday: Building a Fort

Materials Needed:

• Couches and chairs
• Playmat
• Extra big boxes and cardboard sections
• Pillows, sheets and blankets
• Clothespins and safety pins

Blanket forts are easy to build and they provide countless hours of fun for children and adults. You can make your fort with everyday household items like blankets, sheets, chairs, boxes and curtain rods. Start by building a fort frame. Then, close off your fort to the outside world by draping blankets over it. Throw in a few pillows and blankets for added coziness, for hours of fun.

Also Friday: Making Pizza

Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees. Supplies:

• Already made pizza dough
• Pizza Sauce
• Grated cheese any kind you like
• Cookie cutter butterfly or bug shape. Any will do
• Any topping you like to add. Cheese is just fine too.
• Plastic knife

First take the cooker cutter and cut out the dough. When you have cut your shape out take you plastic knife and spread the pizza sauce around your pizza dough. When you are done spreading the pizza sauce then add cheese and toppings. Bake at 400 degrease for about 5- 10 minutes or until cheese is nice and golden.