"Shades of People" Handprint Wreath

For the third year in a row we are honored to be participating in a Blog Hop in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. hosted by the Multicultural Kid Blogs. Each year a group of bloggers share resources and activities in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. and the causes he stood for.

This year the boys and I reread a book we've liked for quite a while titled "Shades of People" by Shelly Rotner. Afterwards we created a paper plate handprint wreath celebrating all the ranges of skin colors in the world.

"Our Big Heart" Inspired by Martin Luther King Jr.

Last year we really enjoyed participating in the Multicultural Kid Blogs Martin Luther King series, so much so we were really glad to join in again this year. Last year we were inspired to focus on his messages of peace by reading several peace books for kids and creating peace doves.

This year we learned a little more about the man himself and his "big heart." 

A "Bad Apple" Craft & Snack

I love when we find great new books at the library! "Bad Apple" by Edward Hemingway is one of our new family favorites.

This sweet tale of friendship tells about an apple "Mac" who wakes up one day with a worm "Will." The two become fast friends, but other apples can't accept the friendship and Mac begins to doubt it. Eventually Mac decides he'd rather be a "bad apple" with his friend than a sad apple without him.

Not only do we love this friendship tale, but it inspired us to both create and snack!

TRUCK inspired Sticky Collage

This month the Virtual Book Club for Kids author is Donald Crews. We read several of his books last year as we explored our Vehicle Week as they perfectly fit our Simple Summer Theme.

The book the boys enjoyed the most was TRUCK. The book follows one tractor trailer truck as it makes its way across the delivery route. The brief text and bold, colorful illustrations make it appealing to even the littlest reader. 

A Color of His Own: Chameleon Watercolor Project

We love connecting projects to books, and we're always inspired by the amazing group of bloggers who participate in the Virtual Book Club for Kids (you can also check the club out on Facebook) as the group comes up with some great extension activities each month. This month's author was Leo Lionni. We chose to read and do a project using a book we've really been enjoying lately, A Color of His Own. 

This is the sweet tale of a little chameleon who is looking for one color to stay all the time, but keeps running into that challenge that chameleons change color. In the end, he winds up finding a friend to always be with so they can at least always be the same color together. 

Sun Mobile inspired by Gail Gibbons

We're really excited to be participating in the Booking Across the USA Project. Bloggers from across the USA all chose a different state and one author from that state to read and be inspired by. Today we're all sharing our posts

We chose our home state, Vermont. Despite living here almost all my life, and teaching here for almost ten years, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that Gail Gibbons is a Vermont author! I'm a huge fan of Gail Gibbons and own several of her books both at home and in my classroom. I love how she makes nonfiction books and information approachable for kids of many age levels. Since first becoming an author Gail Gibbons has written over 100 books for kids, almost all nonfiction. You can learn more about Gail Gibbons by visiting her website.

In the past we've done some fun activities based on the books From Seed to Plant and Tornadoes! A few of our favorite books at this time of year include From Seed to Plant, Recycle!: A Handbook for Kids, and The Reasons for Seasons.

For this post we decided to read Sun Up, Sun Down and create a sun mobile. This book made learning about the sun very approachable to Big Brother, who is at a preschool age level, but older kids could also get a lot of information from reading this book too and have even more detailed information to add to their mobile. 

Lorax Small World Play

March 2 is Read Across America Day, planned by the National Educator's Association in honor of Dr. Seuss' birthday. Today, to celebrate both occasions a group of bloggers has joined together to come up with Read + Play ideas with favorite Dr. Seuss books.

We decided to celebrate with the Lorax, which we've read several times lately. We've read it enough we decided to try creating our own small world play.

Small world play is something we don't explore often but something we're interested in creating more often. Originally I had planned to have the boys help me create the small world, but the timing worked better for me to create it first and for the boys to explore it afterwards. 

Homemade Valentine's Craft Tray

We're excited to be participating in our third Read + Play event!  This time 20 + bloggers have all connected a favorite Valentine's Day book with a great play, craft, or learning activity.

In the last few years we've discovered the character Pete the Cat and really enjoy this series. In his Valentine's Day book, Pete the Cat: Valentine's Day is Cool, he begins the book thinking Valentine's Day isn't cool. But as he makes Valentine's for his class, family, and friends he discovers Valentine's Day is cool.

Mess Free Color Mixing on the Light Table

We love participating in the Virtual Book Club for Kids, and this month the author is Ellen Stoll Walsh. We enjoy several of her books, but particularly love the story of three little color mixing mice in Mouse Paint.

A while back we did a color mixing wheel based on the book, so this time I was looking for a different idea. As we're still in the dark days of winter I decided to incorporate the light table in our play. 

It's not often these days I get any time alone with Little Brother, but last weekend Daddy and Big Brother were on their own adventure so we had some down time together. Perfect opportunity to do a toddler focused color mixing activity.

Peace Doves

We're really pleased to be participating in the Martin Luther King Day for Kids Series as hosted by Multicultural Kid Blogs. In the lead up to our post I've been enjoying reading some of the amazing ideas as posted by other bloggers on ways to talk to and teach kids about Martin Luther King Jr. and his message.

As a teacher I've always liked including the conversation about "peace" in our discussions around Martin Luther King Jr. and I decided that was the same way I wanted to go with Big Brother.

To begin our thinking and talking with we read a handful of books. 

10 Books to Read to Learn About the Year & the Four Seasons

As we head into the start of 2015, and the month of January, it's a great time to start thinking with kids about what makes a year. One of the best ways to help kids understand about the four seasons, the 12 months, and the changes we see across a whole year is to read about it. This can especially be even more meaningful if you are able to combine the reading with a kick off of a year long project. (See the bottom of our post for a few year long project ideas.)

10 Books to Read to Learn about the Year & the Four Seasons

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We've put together a list of 10 books you can read to learn about the whole year and the four seasons. Some are favorites, others are new titles for us. 
(Click on the book images for affiliate links.) 

Gingerbread Baby Playdough

There is something so magical and fun about gingerbread houses, and the boys are looking forward to decorating a real one with their Pamma later this week. But until then we've started playing with gingerbread houses in other ways and reading several gingerbread books.

Gingerbread Baby Playdough

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One of our favorite books which includes a gingerbread house is Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett.

 

This spin on the classic tale tells the story of a little gingerbread baby who runs away from everyone. But instead of being eaten by the fox at the end, the little boy who made him also makes him a beautiful gingerbread house to live in. We've been rereading the book over the last few weeks and it inspired our Gingerbread Baby Playdough.

To begin with, we tweaked our basic playdough recipe to make it smell like gingerbread by adding some yummy smelling spices. We like to make a cooked playdough. so the directions below should be done by an adult as they involve using the stove. 

Bird Feeder Ornaments (As Inspired by The Night Tree)

We're really excited to participate in the Christmas Read + Play blog hop. We participated in the Halloween Read + Play collection in October with our Halloween Sticky Collage and loved all the great ideas we gained then.

For this series, over 20 bloggers have chosen a favorite holiday book and paired it with a fun play, craft, or learning activity. There are several great books and ideas to get you through the whole season! We love seeing what great, new ideas we can gain from all these other fabulous bloggers.

Bird Feeder Ornaments (As Inspired by the Night Tree)

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Several years ago I fell in love with the Christmas story The Night Tree by Eve Bunting.  It tells the story of a family who has a special Christmas tradition: every year they head into the woods to decorate a tree with popcorn, fruit, and seed balls. This tradition not only provides them with the opportunity to be together as a family but also to practice the spirit of giving by leaving treats for the animals of the forest. 

5 Books to Read While You're Waiting for Winter

Winter is on our doorstep, the warning of snow has been in the forecast for several days. And although we've already had a little dusting it will be any day now that we get our first major storm. The coming of winter is a mixed blessing. Everyone is excited to play in the snow, and of course snow now might mean a white Christmas next month. But of course snow also means slippery roads, damp snow gear, and lots of shoveling. No matter how you're feeling, winter is coming. Here's our recommendation of 5 books you can read while you're waiting for winter.

5 Books to Read While You're Waiting for Winter

Some these books I've enjoyed reading in my classroom over the years, and others are books we've recently been exploring. Of course, there are many more that get you in mood for winter, but these books look at either preparing for the winter, or the first snow fall.

Buttons Come and Buttons Go (A Pete the Cat Game)

We were excited when we discovered that this month's Virtual Book Club for Kids author was Eric Litwin as it meant focusing on his Pete the Cat books. We discovered Pete the Cat a few years ago and love Litwin's easygoing, rhythmic style. (Scroll down to the bottom of the post for links to a few of our favorites.) The boys love his stories and I love the messages they convey about not sweating the small stuff.

Buttons Come and Buttons Go Math Game

For this month's activity we decided to focus on the book Pete the Cat and his Four Groovy Buttons. Not only does it convey a great message about not getting upset over the loss of some buttons and finding positives in the outcome, it also builds early math skills right into the storyline. We extended the book into our "Buttons Come and Buttons Go" math game.

Room on the Broom Memory Game

This month's Virtual Book Club for Kids Author is Julia Donaldson. As she is not an author we know well we were looking forward to reading some new books and discovering a new author. Which is part of the fun of the Virtual Book Club for Kids! And of course it's also always fun to see what great project and activity ideas can come from these books.

Room on the Broom Memory Game

We decided to read Room on the Broom because it's a great fit for Halloween. 

Halloween Sticky Collage

It's October, which means it's that time of year where our family is pretty excited to be getting ready for Halloween! It's definitely a top family holiday. 

Halloween Sticky Collage

This year we were excited to participate in the Halloween Read + Play blog hop. Over 25 bloggers each picked a favorite halloween book and have paired it with a fun activity or project, there are some great ideas in this series!

For our project we chose the book Pumpkin Eye by Denise Fleming. The story is filled with fabulous rhymes, a catchy rhythm, and helps the reader imagine they're on the street trick-or-treating for the evening. 

After we read the book, we created our own halloween street using the "sticky collage" approach. We call it a sticky collage because the base is contact paper, which allows little hands to stick the items to the collage without needing glue. We've enjoyed several other types of sticky collage before. 

Tractor Sensory Bin

Little Brother has definitely been finding an interest in all things vehicle related, just like his Big Brother. But lately he's seemed really interested in tractors; whether it is the ones we read about, our toy tractors, or the ones we see out in the real world. To play off this interest, we created a tractor sensory bin.

Tractor Sensory Bin

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It's been a while since I set up a sensory bin, and as soon as I started Big Brother was eager to help. I didn't realize it had been quite a while since we had one to play with but his excitement (even though I was trying to connect this to his brother's interest) reminded me we need to get back into our bin and small world play. 

Quick Pick & Project of the Week: Going for a Nature Collection Walk

Many of our Quick Picks and Projects involve an arts or crafts component, but sometimes a quick book extension can also be as easy as going for a walk. 

I've always enjoyed reading kids the book Hannah's Collections, and going for a nature walk is a fun and active extension. After the walk there are several different ways kids could use their collection too. 

Going For A Nature Collection Walk

The book  is about a little girl named Hannah who loves collecting things and has several collections  including popsicle sticks, stamps, barrettes, and more. The problem is now she needs to bring a collection to school, except she has so many collections how will she ever choose one? What's so engaging about the book are the illustrations which are a mix of collage with images of real items. 

Five Senses Walk (with free printable)

This month's Virtual Book Club for Kids author is Aliki, who has such an amazing collection of books to chose from. We decided to use the book My Five Senses. This book and activity is one I've loved combining over the years. Recently we read the book and did the activity at the preschool nature camp I ran, so we were excited to do it again.

Five Senses Walk

In a clear, easy to understand way Aliki introduces kids to each of the five senses and gives examples of how we use them. Kids connect to the illustrations and how the examples fit their everyday lives.