Tot Preschool: Letter P

Last week we talked about Letter P! It was quite the exciting week for my little Sweet P, whose name, if you haven't gathered, does indeed start with a P. (I know we seemed to have skipped Letter O, but I'll post those activities later.)

So many great things start with P, but Sweet P has been fascinated with peacocks lately so we did several peacock activities.

Handprint Peacock: She painted her hands green and then placed them on a white sheet of paper. We let the paint dry, cut them out and then she decorated the feathers. She added a head, body, beak and googly eyes.

Popsicle Peacock: Sweet P painted the popsicle sticks after she did her handprints so they all dried at the same time and we came back to the peacocks after naptime. She decorated the popsicle sticks with sticky rhinestone (which she also loves to wear as earrings). I gave her a white piece of paper and we talked about patterning with green and blue. She created his feathers and then gave him a body, beak and googly eyes. 

Fanning Peacock: I have to say I love this peacock! I really wanted her to have a peacock that could fan it's feathers, but didn't love the idea of a fan peacock so I came up with this. After I cut out all the pieces, Sweet P assembled them. She also gave him eyes and a beak. Since it was cardstock it was tough to get through the brad so I poked holes and she was able to get them on a bit easier. Fold down the edges of the brad and there you have it! A fanning peacock! His body and the dots on his feathers are glittery scrapbook paper, but could very easily be made using glitter and regular paper.

We made Teach Preschool's super cute peas in a pod.

Sweet P also played with this fun Paint Brush File Folder from Confessions of a Homeschooler and we talked about how pink and purple also start with P. 

P collage with items that start with P cut from magazines: We talked about each item's name and then she glued them on while I made lunch.

Since Memorial Day was that week, we also did some Patriotic activities (yep, I'm that corny).

I don't have a picture, but we did a Letter P maze and covered all the Pp's with Pirate stickers. She likes doing this much more than dotting the letters on the maze. After all the stickers were in place, I showed her how to trace the maze with her finger.

Sweet P also had a Letter P muffin tin, full of some of her favorite "once in awhile" snacks! It also included a pickle juice popsicle...love that face!

Memorial Day Flag Craft

This craft can be done for any patriotic holiday (July 4th, Flag Day, etc.), but I set it up for Sweet P to do for Memorial Day.

We talked a little about Memorial Day and I explained that it was a day to remember those who fought in the military to protect the USA. She kept asking me when it was so I'm not sure what she's expecting on Monday!

dancing around with our flag

We live very close to a cemetery and the community places American flags on many of the graves on Saturday of Memorial Day weekend. It is an awesome sight to see. We watched people place the flags on the graves on Saturday morning and I sang the Star Spangled Banner at the top of my lungs (Baby Blue was the only one impressed).

Here is the flag craft Sweet P made:

The Craft: American Flag

What you need:

• Blue cardstock
• Red and white construction paper
• Glue
• Scissors
• Star hole punch (or regular hole punch)

Cut strips out of the red and white construction paper for the stripes. Leave a small space of blue fro the blue portion of the flag. Hole punch stars out of white construction paper. Glue all pieces to resemble the American flag. 

I cut out the strips for Sweet P and explained that some were shorter than others while showing her our flag. After showing her the flag she started with the longer strips and began gluing them to the blue cardstock. 

We talked about patterning and I'd ask "Which color comes next?" and she'd say "Red!" or "White!" She counted the long stripes and short stripes while she was gluing and then counted all 13 when she was finished.

She hole punched the stars out of white construction paper and then glued them to the blue portion (she obviously didn't do 50). 

love that look of determination!

When she was finished we compared it to our flag and then she wanted to hang it up! 

Did you do any activities to celebrate Memorial Day?