His Treasure Seekers

This week I planned Arianna and Nico’s preschool activities around the story of “The Three Bears.”  The kids have been going crazy with the library’s summer reading program, and among the huge stack of books Arianna picked out last week I found Paul Galdone’s version of this story. I remembered how much fun Ian had with this story a few years ago, so it seemed like an easy way to keep the little ones entertained.  We did a lot of different activities this time, so if you’re looking for ideas, be sure to check out that post as well.

In addition to reading The Three Bears, Arianna and Nico did several activities throughout the week.  One day we did a number 3 art idea I got from A Spoonful of Learning.  (First the used three colors to trace the 3.  Then they used triangles to fill in the other 3.)

Another day they colored, sorted, cut and glued pictures from smallest to largest (using one page from some coloring and sorting activity sheets I found free on Teachers Pay Teachers).  For Nico it was enough just to work on coloring and gluing (I cut his out and let him glue them any way he wanted), but Arianna did the whole thing by herself the way it was intended.

 

Arianna also used another page from that set, coloring the picture and cutting out the words to make a sentence, which she was very proud to read herself.

They both enjoyed playing with the Melissa & Doug Wooden Bear Family Dress-Up Puzzle.  This is one of those toys I keep out of reach most of the time to keep it special.  We pull it out to go with books (it’s great with Jesse Bear, What Will You Wear?), or other special occasions, which makes it extra fun.

 

At the end of the week, I let the watch the James Marshall version of the story on a Storybook Treasures DVD.  We also watched the first Salsa Spanish video from Georgia Public Broadcasting, which has puppets acting out the story in Spanish. (I used this series with Ian through Kindergarten and into first grade, but it was new for my little ones.)  The vocabulary in this video went along great with what all the kids have been learning in a different curriculum, so I thought we’d kill two birds with one stone by reinforcing the Spanish lesson and going along with our preschool theme.

I’m really glad I’ve started doing this preschool time with Arianna and Nico.  It has helped them to have something productive to do in the mornings, and they are both so proud to be doing their own “school work.”