5 a Day Books: Week 9

We read these 5 books last week:

1.  Rodgers & Hammerstein’s My Favorite Things (illustrated by Renée Graef)—The Sound of Music has always been one of my favorite movies, so when I found this book in a Scholastic book order (several years ago), I had to buy it.  The illustrations are beautifully done, and they fit the words perfectly.  I mostly sang it to Gabriela, and she was very attentive and smiled at all the pictures, so I know she loved it as much as me!  The last day we read it, I showed Gabriela the part of the movie where Maria and the children sing this song.  She ended up watching most of the movie with me!

2.  Zin! Zin! Zin a Violin (by Lloyd Moss)—This is a Caldecott Honor Book (awarded for illustrations); however, the illustrations are not what I like about this book (they’re brightly colored, but not my style).  What I like is the musical teaching it gives and also the rhymes—the whole book is a poem.  Ten different orchestra instruments are presented.  Beginning with one (a trombone) and adding one more instrument each turn of the page until you have ten, the author tells what each number of instruments is called.  For example, two instruments make a duo, while eight instruments form an octet.  Gabriela didn’t really understand all that, but she did enjoy counting the instruments each time we turned the page.  Oh, and she also liked the cats in the pictures…of course.

3.  I Won’t Share! (by Hans Wilhelm)—Isaac picked this book out for Gabriela, and it was her favorite this week.  It’s a very simple story about a dog who doesn’t want to share his toy at first, but then he realizes it’s more fun to share.  By the end of the week, Gabriela had it memorized and was able to tell ME the story!

4.  Hop on Pop (by Dr. Seuss)—I have so many Dr. Seuss books, and they’re all perfect for the 5 a Day Book challenge.  I like that this book is full of simple rhymes, and the pictures are always funny.  Gabriela enjoyed finishing each line for me.  Today, she pointed to the picture on the cover and said, “They’re not supposed to hop on pop!”

5.  Fox on a Box (by Phil Roxbee Cox)—This week I threw in another Usborne book (they’re just so awesome).  Just like the Dr. Seuss books, these Usborne phonics readers are perfect for 5 a Day.  This book also has the small yellow duck to find on every page, which Gabriela never gets tired of doing.  With fold-out pages, cute illustrations, and lots of rhyming, I can’t say enough about Usborne’s books for smaller children.

I'm linking this post to "5 a Day Books" at The Imagination Tree.

5 a Day Books: Weeks 7 and 8

The past few weeks have been VERY busy, and I didn’t end up posting week 7’s books, so I’m posting the last 2 weeks’ books together in this post.

Week 7 Books:  For our week 7 books, I went with a 4th of July/patriotic theme.  I chose the books I had at hand, and they weren’t necessarily the best choices to read to a 3-year-old, but I think she was okay with them…not excited, but okay.  Here’s what we read:

1.  America the Beautiful (Scholastic, pub.)

2.  My Country ‘Tis of Thee (Scholastic, pub.)

3.  The Pledge of Allegiance (Scholastic, pub.)

4.  Parade (Donald Crews)

5.  Captain Cat (Syd Hoff)

The first 2 books are simply the lyrics to patriotic songs.  The first day, I actually sang the books to Gabriela.  I tried just to read them the other days, but she insisted on me singing them.  I also know how to sing The Pledge of Allegiance.  The problem with using these books for the 5 a Day challenge is that they contain long words which Gabriela doesn’t understand.  Although I don’t think it’s too early to introduce her to the songs and the pledge, since they’re part of our American heritage, she didn’t get into them as much.  She did enjoy the singing and the beautiful photos.

Parade is more in line with the 5 a Day idea.  It’s very simple for a young child.  Donald Crews also wrote Freight Train, which I used a few weeks ago, and Sail Away, which I did for week 8 (as you’ll see below).

As I was looking through possible books to read, Gabriela saw Captain Cat and wanted me to read it to her.  I mentioned a few weeks ago, with Drummer Hoff, that Gabriela wasn’t really into a military sort of book.  Even though Captain Cat takes place in the army, she really enjoyed it simply because it had a cat!

 Week 8 Books:  When I went to my book shelves to choose the 5 for this week, I didn’t necessarily have a theme in mind, but that’s what I ended up with.  The books this week were related to transportation.  Gabriela LOVED them!  I can’t even tell you which was her favorite—she was thrilled with all of them.

1.  Go, Dog, Go! (P.D. Eastman)—We love this book!  Written in a Dr. Seuss style, this book has lots of repeated and rhyming words.  You can use this book for counting, colors, opposites, prepositions, sizes, and more.  Gabriela can “read” several parts all by herself. 

2.  Sail Away (Donald Crews)—This is the third Donald Crews book we’ve read since starting the 5 a Day challenge.  Gabriela really liked reading the “putt, putt, putt” parts.

3.  Terrific Trains (Tony Mitton and Ant Parker)—This rhyming book has so much rhythm that you could almost rap it!  It tells all about trains, which Gabriela likes.

4.  Peek-a-Boo! Boats ()—This is a pop-up book about different kinds of boats.  In each pop-up, you can peek through windows to see inside the boat.  Each page tells about the boat and gives you things to hunt for inside the boat.  I bought this book here in England.

5.  The Train to Glasgow (Wilma Horsbrugh)—This rhyming story is a cumulative poem, written in the style of The House That Jack Built and There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly.  Gabriela especially liked the fact that the train looks like Thomas…only without a face.

I’m linking this post to “5 a Day Books” at The Imagination Tree.

Garden Sensory Tub and Fairy Garden

I’ve finally had the opportunity to make a new sensory tub—the garden one most people do in the spring.  Also, I took the opportunity to fix up a sort of fairy garden for the girls.  This is an idea I’ve seen on several websites and blogs, and I’ve been wanting to make one.  This post will cover both of these garden ideas.

 Sensory Tub:  We are somewhat late on our garden sensory tub; however, our spring was not really warm enough to make this tub, which really needs to be used outdoors.  In fact, we’ve only had a few summer days that were warm and dry enough for outdoor play!  I was waiting for a day when we didn’t have company, weren’t traveling, and had decent weather.  Therefore, the tub most of you sensory tub people did in the spring, we are doing now!  Now I’m just hoping that we’ll have enough nice days for Gabriela to enjoy it!

This tub contains:  potting soil, 2 pinwheels, several wooden flower shapes, a variety of toy bugs, lizards, and frogs, 2 mini flower pots, a variety of fake flowers, and child-size garden trowel and hand fork

Gabriela loves this tub and begs for it, so hopefully the weather will cooperate.  Otherwise, I guess I could have her play in the kitchen and sweep up any mess…

Fairy Garden:  I didn’t have the extra money to buy a huge planter, so I used the biggest we already had to make our fairy garden.  Greg had already planted sunflowers in it, but he said we could use it.  While it doesn’t look exactly like I had envisioned it, the kids love it!  In fact, I just gave the kids some things to use, and they made it.  Isaac put in the stones, and Moriah brought out some extra stuff to use.  It ended up looking really cute, and even though they used things I wouldn’t have, it’s really about THEM using THEIR creativity, so I let them create the garden themselves.  I think they did a great job, and I’m going to be on the look-out at charity shops for things they can use in the future if they want.

 

Here are a few other blogs I found that feature fairy gardens (I’ll add to the list if I find more):

Let the Children Play

Pink and Green Mama

I’m linking this post to “Sensory Tubs” at Our Worldwide Classroom.

5 a Day Books: Week 6

Our 5 a Day books for this week are:

1.  Little Cloud (by Eric Carle)—A simple story about a little cloud and all the shapes it changes into.  Gabriela really liked this one.

2.  Red Light, Green Light (by Margaret Wise Brown)—I love this book because it has a lot of repetition, wonderful illustrations, and because Gabriela now knows that red means stop and green means go.  The pictures, though not overly colorful, are still really lovely (in my opinion).  Gabriela loved looking at the pictures and finding the horse, dog, cat, and mouse.  She liked pointing out the traffic light in each picture, and she “read” a lot of the story herself after the first few days.

3.  Put Me in the Zoo (by Robert Lopshire)—I grew up with this book, and it was one of my favorites as a child.  Gabriela loved it, too.  Every time we read it, she had to point out that the main character looked sad or mad in a few of the pictures.  She noticed a lot of details in the pictures and was able to connect them to what I was reading.  The book reads much like a Dr. Seuss book, so there is a lot of rhyme and repetition.  In fact, it was part of a series of books called “Beginner Books,” which was co-founded by Dr. Seuss.  The Cat in the Hat himself is hidden on a page in this book, which Gabriela always likes to find.  Gabriela found this book very easy to read along with me.

4.  If You Give a Cat a Cupcake (by Laura Numeroff)—This was probably Gabriela’s favorite this week.  I didn’t notice until one of my older kids pointed it out, but the little mouse from If You Give a Mouse a Cookie is cleverly placed in a few of the pictures.  Of course it’s a very cute story, just like all of Numeroff’s books!

 

5.  Drummer Hoff (by  Barbara Emberley)—I chose this book because of its repetition and rhyme.  I really like the pictures, too.  In fact, it won the 1968 Caldecott Medal for its illustrations.  However, I think this was Gabriela’s least favorite.  Maybe it’s because the military theme is not her thing.  The last few days I read it, as soon as I picked it up, she’d say, “I don’t like this one!”  That said, once I would begin reading it, she seemed to enjoy it.  She liked finishing some of the lines for me.  For instance, I’d read “Major Scott brought…”  She’d finish, “the shot!”  She also always remembered that Sergeant Chowder brought the powder.  Each section ends with, “but Drummer Hoff fired it off!” which she liked to say for me.  The last page shows the abandoned cannon with flowers all around it and birds building a nest in it.  She always likes to point out the spider on it, too.  So, although a boy might enjoy this book more, Gabriela still did really well with finishing lines and noticing things in the pictures.

I’m linking this post to “5 a Day Books” at The Imagination Tree.