Tag Archives: Helper

Don’t Spill The Milk! By Stephen Davies

Materials

  • Paper plates , one for each child and 10 extra for transitions

Vocabulary

  • Grasslands (Park lands with tall grass)
  • Dunes (giant hills made of sand)
  • Desert jinn’s (genies)
  • Looming (approaching)
  • Absorb (to soak into something)
  • Chore (to do a task or job for someone)

Introducing the Book

Ask the children if they ever help their parent/s at home. What kinds of things do you do to help? (I helped my Daddy wash his car, I make my bed, I play with my baby when Grandma is cooking supper) Hold up the cover of the book and tell the children that this is the story about a little girl who helps her Mother. Explain that in the bowl is milk that she is to carry to her Father. Ask the children if they have ever carried anything on their heads. Tell them in parts of the world people carry things on their heads and they get SO good at it that they do not even have to hold onto the item/bowl. Introduce the story.

Social & Emotional Development/Knowledge of Families & Communities; develops growing awareness of jobs and what is required to perform them.

Reading the Book

On the pages where Penda is talking to herself, read a little slower so the children can feel her determination to get the milk on top of her head to her father without spilling a drop.

Language Development/Listening & Understanding; understands an increasingly complex and varied vocabulary.  

When you get to the page where the milk spills and Penda says, “It’s all gone!” ask the children what they think will happen next. 

Approaches to Learning/Reasoning & Problem Solving; develops increasing ability to find more than one solution to a question, task, or problem AND LIteracy/Book Knowledge & Appreciation; demonstrates abilities to retell and dictate stories from book sna experiences; to act out stories in dramatic play; and to predict what will happen next in a story.

After Reading the Book

When you get to the page that says, “Tell her it comes with all my love”, see if the children can look at the picture and recall some of the places that Penda carried the milk.

Literacy/Book Knowledge & Appreciation; demonstrates progress in abilities to retell and dictate stories from books and experiences; to act out stories in dramatic play; and to predict what will happen next in a story.

Music and Movement

Get out the beanbags and tell the children to put a beanbag on top of their head. Can they walk forward without the beanbag falling? Backwards? Can they bend down slowly and touch the ground? What other ways can they think of to carry the beanbag (on their foot, on their bent over back, on their shoulder). Let them practice doing different walks and movements without dropping the beanbag.

Physical Health & Development/Gross Motor Skills; shows increasing levels of proficiency, control, and balance in walking, climbing, running, jumping, hopping, skipping, marching, and galloping.

Discovery

Put a tray or cookie sheet onto the science center table. On the tray put a variety of objects that will absorb water and some that will not. (Cotton ball, paper towel, part of a clean-unused diaper, a scarf, and a piece of construction paper. Also include items such as a crayon, a Lego, and a plastic animal). Give the children a small cup of water and an eyedropper. Let them experiment filling the dropper with water and squirting it onto the object. What happens to the water? Talk with them as they experiment asking, “Do you think that paper towel will absorb the water”? Have them sort the items by those that absorb water and those that do not.

Science/Scientific Skills & Methods; begins to use senses and a variety of tools and simple measuring devices to gather information, investigate materials, and observe processes and relationships.

Art

Open the book to the mask dance page and tell the children that they are going to make their own masks. Put out markers and collage materials. When the children have completed their masks they can be attached to a sentence strip to be worn, or to a popsicle stick to be held in front of their face.

Creative Arts/Art; develops growing abilities to plan, work independently, and demonstrates care and persistence in a variety of art project.

Sand and Water

Put water in the table today and add plastic lids of various sizes and small manipulatives such a counting bears. Challenge the children to put different amounts of bears onto the plastic lid that is floating in the water. Do certain lids hold more bears? Does the shape of the lid matter? Let the children explore floating and buoyancy (the ability to stay afloat).

Science/Scientific Knowledge; begins to describe and discuss predictions, explanations, and generalizations based on past experiences. AND       Mathematics/Number & Operation; begins to use language to compare numbers of objects with terms such as more, less, greater than, fewer, and equal to.

Library and Writing

Put the book into the center along with any other multicultural books you may have and a globe/world map. As the children pick up a book, show them on the globe/map, where the story takes place. Always show them where your school is located also.

Social & Emotional Development/Knowledge of Families & Communities; begins to express and understand concepts and language of geography in the contexts of the classroom, home, and community.

Dramatic Play

Encourage the children to work together and clean the center. Give them damp paper towels to wipe the shelves. Tell them thank you for your good cooperation.

Social & Emotional Development/Cooperation; increases abilities to sustain interactions with peers by helping, sharing, and discussing.

Math and Manipulatives

Give children a small manipulative such as a counting bear and have them follow your verbal directions. Ask them to make their manipulative climb up their body and then back down to their knee. Have the manipulative go around their knee and hide behind. Have their manipulative now come around to the front of their body and now go beside. Ask the children if they can make their manipulative go under a body part and then over another body part. Have them put the manipulative beside them and clap their hands as they did a good listening job.

Mathematics/Geometry & Spatial Sense; builds an increasing understanding of directionality, order, and positions of objects, and words such as up, down, over, under, top, bottom, inside, outside, in front, behind.

Outdoor play

Challenge the children to work together today using shovels to dig a long river in your sandbox. Can they add some dunes to the side of the river? If the weather is not too cold, let the children help fill the river up with water. What happens to the water? Remind those who were in the science center today that this is another form of absorption!

Science/Scientific Knowledge; shows increased awareness and beginning understanding of changes in materials and cause-effect relationships.  AND    Social & Emotional Development/Cooperation; develops increasing abilities to give and take in interactions; to take turns in games or using materials; and to interact without being overly submissive or directive.

Transitions

On 1-10 paper plates, write a letter on each. These should be letters that begin with the children’s names or letters that you have been working on with the children. Scatter the letters about on the floor about a step away from each other. Tell the children that they will have to walk the path to get to the next activity. Have one child at a time stand up beside the letters. Ask them if they can name the letter as they step onto the paper plate. Or you can name the letters and then they step onto the plate. Have them walk on 3-5 letters and then send them off to the next activity.

Literacy/Alphabet Knowledge; Knows that the letters of the alphabet are a special category of visual graphics that can be individually named.

Resources

Dear Parents-Today we read a book about a little girl who helps her Mother by carrying milk to her Father who is up in the grasslands shepherding sheep. See if you can find a way that your child can be a helper to you doing something for someone else or around the house. Make sure to thank them after they have completed the chore and to tell them how much you appreciate them being a helper to you.

Be Nice to Spiders, by M. Bloy Graham

Helen the spider comes to the zoo and happily lives among the animals, until it’s time for the Mayor’s visit.  What happens when all of Helen’s webs are knocked down?  After reading the story children will be more aware of the benefit of spiders.

Materials

  • Play dough that is getting too dry for daily use.
  • Pipe cleaners in many colors cut into 3-4 inch sections.
  • Contact paper cut into 12-inch sections
  • A bag of plastic spiders or a bag of black beans to pretend to be spiders

Vocabulary

  • Matchbox (little tiny box, maybe it could hold one matchbox car or a piece of jewelry)
  • Ventilator (the vent, chimney like thing that you see on roofs)
  • Satisfied (feeling happy and contented)
  • Paradise (the perfect place for a spider to live)
  • Arachnid  (animals that have two body parts)
  • Prey (the next victim for lunch)
  • Sticky (when something gets stuck to something else upon contact)

Before Reading the Story

Ask the children if they help do chores at home?  Let them share anyway that they help out at home.  If they do not respond to your question ask if anyone is responsible for making their bed, taking care of a pet, brushing their teeth before bed?  Ask the children to help name some of the jobs you have at school to do (sweeper, plant watering, book straightener, etc.  Talk about jobs, why do we have them?  Why is it important to keep our room clean?  Do you have a custodian who comes in after hours?  Talk about their job.  Take a moment and help the children write a short note to the custodian that you can hang by the door.  (Thank you for cleaning our room, it looks pretty.  I like when our room smells good.  You wash the floor, my Mommy washes the floor at my house).  Explain to the children that today’s story is about a helper at the zoo.  Show the children the cover of the book and point to the spider.  Say this is Helen and she is the helper at the zoo.  Ask the children if they can guess how Helen helps?  Read the title and begin the story.

Social & Emotional Development/Knowledge of Families & Communities;develops growing awareness of jobs and what is required to perform them. AND Literacy/Early Writing; develops understanding that writing is a way of communicating for a variety of purposes.

Reading the Story

On the very first page when the zookeeper reads the note from Billy, stop and ask the children if they can guess what kind of pet might be in that little tiny box?  When Helen runs like lightning, use your hand to show how quickly.  When you get to the part that says, “the lions were annoyed but Helen was delighted”, stop and ask why they think Helen was so happy to see all those flies? (Spiders eat flies).  When the zookeeper tells the men to get rid of all the spider webs, stop and ask the children what they think is going to happen?

Literacy/Book Knowledge & Appreciation; demonstrates progress in abilities to retell and dictate stories from books and experiences; tpo act out stories on dramatic play; and to predict what will happen next in a story.

After Reading the Story

Ask the children if they remember why we should all be nice to spiders?  (They eat flies).   Talk to the children about some spider facts and safety.  1) Spiders belong to the family called Arachnids because they have two body parts.  Who knows how many body parts insects have (3)?  The world is full of many different kinds of spiders.  Some are poisonous and dangerous to people but many are not.  Spiders will bite if they are scared so please do not touch spiders.  Spiders have sticky feet that they can use to climb up trees and walls. 

Science/Science Knowledge; expands knowledge of and abilities to observe, describe, and discuss the natural world, materials, living things, and natural processes.

Discovery

Put out your old playdough today and many pipe cleaners cut in quarters.  Explain to the children that you are going to be making spiders.  Have them roll the play dough into a ball and then slightly flatten it.  Ask the children if they can remember how many legs a spider has (8)?  Have them count out eight legs and stick them into their spider.  Spiders also have 8 eyes.  The child can either poke 8 holes to represent eyes of add 8 googly eyes.  When the playdough dries, the children can paint their spiders. Or, make spiders from pinecones.

Science/Scientific Skills & Methods; develops growing abilities to collect, describe, and record information through a variety of means, including discussion, drawings, maps, and charts. AND Creative Arts/Art; progresses i abilities to create drawings, paintings, models, and other art creations that are more detailed, creative, or realistic.

Music and Movement

Sing The Eensy Weensy Spider.  Change it up by making a Teeny Tiny Spider and a Humongous Giant Spider.

Language Development/Speaking & Communicating; uses an increasingly complex and varied spoken vocabulary.

If you have a spider puppet or stuffed toy spider you can do the poem, Little Miss Muffet.

Choose a child to be Miss or Mr Muffet.  Put a pillow in the center of your group circle and have the child sit on it.  Begin the poem. At the “along came a spider”, allow another child to put the spider in front, behind, beside, on her head, in her lap.  The children must say where the spider is and the Muffit child can jump away.  The child who put the spider in a position is now the new Muffit and another child gets to place the spider.

            Little Miss/Mr Muffet

            Sat on a tuffet (another name for pillow)

            Eating her curds and whey (kind of like cottage cheese)

            Along came a spider

            Who sat down _____________her/him

            And frightened Miss/Mr Muffet away.

Mathematics/Geometry & Spatial Sense; builds an increasing understanding of directionality, order, positions of objects, and words such as up, down, over, under, top, bottom, inside, outside, in front, and behind.

Blocks

Use masking tape to make a large spider web design on the floor.  Challenge the children to use blocks to cover the spider web.  Are they able to find the correct sized blocks to fit upon the tape?  Can they make a pattern using several types of blocks?  Add any plastic insects that you might have today, or add several flies from the resource pattern.  The children can pretend to fly their insect and get caught in the web.

Mathematics/Patterns & Measurement; shows progress in using standard and non-standard measures for length and area of objects.

Art

Explain to the children that spider webs are sticky so that insects, like flies, get stuck in the web and cannot get out. The spider then eats the insect for lunch or dinner. Give each child a 12-inch section of contact paper that you have taken the backing off of.  Put it on the table sticky side up.  Give the children collage materials and let them make a sticky collage.  These are fun if you add small 3D items such as buttons, bottle caps, feathers, etc. 

Science/Scientific Knowledge; expands knowledge of and abilities to observe, describe, and discuss the natural world, materials, living things, and natural processes. AND Creative Arts/Art; gains ability in using different art media and materials in a variety of ways for creative expression and representation.

Sand and Water

Fill the table with sand today.  Add spiders and tongs/pincers and small containers.  The children use the tongs/pincers to dig through the sand and pickup the spiders.  How many spiders did you capture?  Who found the most spiders?  As the children dig for spiders you can review with them spider facts that you have learned.  If you do not have small plastic spiders to add to the table today, you could use of black beans. 

Physical Health & Development/Fine Motor Skills; develops growing strength, dexterity, and control needed to use tools such as scissors, paper punch, stapler, and hammer. AND Mathematics/Number & Operation; begins too use language to compare numbers of objects with terms such as more, less, greater than, fewer, and equal to.

Library and Writing

Get books or pictures of real spiders that the children can look at.  Notice how all spiders do not look the same however all have 8 legs and 8 eyes.

Literacy/Book Knowledge & Appreciation; progresses in learning how to handle and care for books; knowing to view one [page at a time in sequence from front to back; and understanding that a book has a title, author, and illustrator. AND Science/Scientific Knowledge; expands knowledge of and abilities to observe, describe, and discuss the natural world, materials, living things, and natural processes.

Dramatic Play

In the story, Helen was helping to keep the zoo clean by eating all the flies.  Give the children damp paper towels and a broom and allow them to help clean the dramatic center or any center.  Have them wipe the shelves with the damp towels and look for broken toys that should be tossed out.  If you have a non-electrical vacuum (sweeper brush), let the children use it to get the lint off the carpet.  (The children in my room loved using this piece of equipment and I had to finally put it up as a helper job).

Social & Emotional Development/Knowledge of Families & Communities; develops growing awareness of jobs and what is required to perform them.

Math and Manipulatives

Attach tape to a hula-hoop making a simple web type of design.  Turn the sticky side out and hang it against, or lean it against the wall.  Give the children puff balls (spiders) which they can throw at the hula-hoop target.  Let them count how many spiders stuck to the tape.

Physical Health & Development/Gross Motor Skills; demonstrates increasing abilities to coordinate movements in throwing, climbing, kicking, bouncing balls, and using the slide and swing. AND Mathematics/Number & Operation; begins to make use of one-to-one correspondence in counting objects and matching groups of objects.

Outdoor Play

If you have a large cemented area, draw a giant spider web with chalk.  This does not have to be fancy (see resources).  The children can then move from side to side by hopping or jumping on the triangles.  Or the children can walk the lines forward, backwards, or sliding.  This could also be done inside in your large group area using masking tape.

Physical Health & Development/Gross Motor Skills; shows increasing proficiency, control, and balance in walking, climbing, running, jumping, hopping,skipping, marching, and galloping.

Transitions

Play Bigger Than, Smaller Than.  Ask the children to tell you if something is bigger than or smaller than an object or animal. Is a cat bigger than or smaller than a cow?  Is a spider bigger than or smaller than a bead?  Is a cow bigger than or smaller than an Elephant?  Is an Elephant bigger than or smaller than an airplane?  Continue naming two objects and asking if the first is bigger or smaller than the second?

Mathematics/Geometry & Spatial Sense; shows growth in matching, sorting, putting in series, and grouping objects according to one or two attributes such as color, shape, or size.

Resources

Physical Health & Development/Gross Motor Skills; shows increasing proficiency, control, and balance in walking, climbing, running, jumping, hopping, skipping, marching, and galloping.  AND Language Development/Listening & Understanding; shows progress in understanding and following simple and multi-step directions.