Starting in August, I came up with two weeks of themed activities for the boys. It helps me get through the day easier when I have a set of activities ready that I can grab whenever we need some structured play and learning time! Not having to "scramble" for an activity keeps me much more calm when moods begin to drop.
Throughout our two weeks we are doing tons of sensory play, crafts, and some math and literacy activities as well! We are also doing a letter a week to practice letter recognition and begin working on some handwriting. For our letter and writing practice we are using the alphabet bundles that I have created, a combination of upper and lowercase letters. You can also add in the beginning sound "Find and Color" documents I created while working on your letters.
I created a zoo theme bundle for you to download and do some or all of the activities with your littles! In the download, there is a "lesson plan" example and a template if you wish to change up your week! My plan was to follow the guide but we ended up going off track quite a bit and adding in more activities as the days went by! But like I said it helps to have a "loose" plan of what activities you can grab each day.
Here is a look at some of the activities we did (download the file to see all the activities)!
Sensory and Hands-on Play:
Animal tracks with play dough, paint, or kinetic sand
Animal matching - we used our safari/zoo animals and then used the move like animal pictures to match the toy animal with the animal on the picture. We then moved the animals to a sensory bin filled a mix black beans and pinto beans to add in some sensory play.
Use blocks or magnetic tiles to build animal cages/homes or your own little zoo :)
Animal shape line up - use painter's tape to create shapes on the floor, have your little line up the animals! A great pre-writing activity as your little manipulates small objects to form a variety of lines.
Muddy animals - we used some cornstarch, water, and cocoa powder to make some "mud". Let your little explore the mud and animals for a bit (it might get messy!) and then take the animals to bubbly water to get a little bath!
Zoo animal pattern blocks - we found some adorable pattern block print offs from Pocket of Preschool to use with our pattern blocks at home!
Crafts:
Fork painted lion - create a lion face with marker and googly eyes and then have your little use a fork to paint the lion's mane!
Letter S Snake - create an S out of construction paper. Have your little glue it down onto another piece of construction paper. Add a red tong with marker or more paper. Add some googly eyes and let your little color the "S" snake!
Letter A Alligator - draw out an A on construction paper. Have your little cut out some white triangles for teeth, white circles for eyes, and green squares to fill in the A!
Salt Dough Snakes - add equal parts salt and flour (we used 1/2 cup of each) then add half that amount of water (1/4 cup). Add more water or flour if need be! Bake at 350 degrees for 30-40 minutes. Cool and let your little one paint away!
Animal sun catchers - we found these adorable sun catchers at Walmart! Such a cute activity to do in the morning while the sun is beaming through the windows!
Learning:
Here is a little look at some of the activities you will be able to do from the zoo bundle! Letter and beginning sounds, counting, colors, pre-writing skills are all practiced :)
You can also do a few things out of the house that include a little zoo fun. Head to your local library and check out some zoo themed books. If you have a zoo nearby, go there! I created a zoo scavenger hunt to take with us. Got them thinking about where to find the animals and vocalizing the names a bit more! You can download our scavenger hunt checklist or create your own.
Supplies we used + some links!
googly eyes (included with pom pops!)
glue and kid scissors
paper fastener and paper clip to make spinner
flour, salt, and water for salt dough snakes!
cornstarch, cocoa powder, and water for "mud" or pudding mix works too!
painter's tape or craft tape
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