Friendly Frogs: For the Birds

Catch up time.

Check out what the Friendly Frogs did in preschool on the last Wednesday in January.

Literature:

Book: The After Christmas Tree By Linda Wagoner Tyler
Book: Usborne Discovery Birds by Dorothy Gillian
Book: Cardinals, Robins and Other Birds by Golden Books
Book: I Love My Nest by P.D. Eastman

There are so many books about birds available at the library! I picked up these listed and several others and had them available for the children to read in the Peace Center, and as our table activity while we wait for all the children to arrive in the morning. The After Christmas Tree is a favorite of mine that I read with my students as well as with my own children every year in January.

Share: Bring something that is white

Art/Science: A Bird Has...

we learned traits that are common classifiers for birds, and glued them to a poster diagram. I labeled each part for the children.

Dramatic Play: Bird Watcher prop box (bird cage, identification chart, binoculars, an assortment of bird calls, safari hat)

Sensory: feathers

Cooking: Bird Suets

Mix: 1c shortening, 1c crunchy peanut butter, 1c cornmeal, 2c rolled oats, 1c bird seed, and 1c sunflower seeds
Pack into cookie sheet or molds and freeze until ready to use

Math: Guessing Jars

I put 5 colored feathers in one jar, and 12 decorative eggs in another jar. The children sat at the table and passed them back and forth, examining, counting, and estimating how many of each item was in the jars.

Science and Dramatic Play: Puppet Shows and Bird Identification

I now have a huge collection of bird puppets (thanks Mom, Melinda, and Amy...hollah!). I set up the puppet theatre and taught the children about the birds they chose to play with while they let their imaginations do the rest. They learned to identify the owl, peacock, penguin, bluebird, hummingbird, eagle, flamingo, pelican, bluebird, parrot, cardinal, duck, woodpecker, etc.

Language Questions: What do birds eat? Where do they live? What is your favorite bird?

Snack: "bird seed" snack mix (cereal, goldfish, pretzels, mini marshmallows, teddy grahams, dried fruit, etc) and hot cocoa just like the family in The After Christmas Tree enjoyed

Music and Movement:
Way Up in the sky, the little birds fly.
Way down in the nest, the little birds rest.
With a wing on their left, and a wing on their right,
The little birds sleep all through the night.
Shhhhh…..they’re sleeeeeeeping!
The bright sun comes up, the dew falls away.
“Good Morning! Good Morning!” the little birds say



Gross Motor: Hide and Seek Egg
I borrowed this rad Egg toy from my friend, Darcie. You push a button on it and it makes funny noises to help the children find it. They loved it, and ran excitedly through the house searching for it, pausing frequently to listen for it's silly sound effect clues.

The After Christmas Party

This morning, Aaron and I pulled the kids up onto the bed with us for some extra snuggles (mostly because I was too tired after staying up waaaaay too late for a girls chick flick fest the night before, while Aaron had gone to dinner and bowling with his old team from Sam's).

Together we read, The After-Christmas Tree by Linda Wagner Tyler.

It's a cute story about a family that is sad that Christmas is over. They talk about how much fun they had during the season while they put away their decorations, and then think of a way to make the season of giving last just a little bit longer. They invite friends over for an "After Christmas Party" where they go ice skating and collect pine cones. Then they make bird feeders from the pine cones, and string popcorn and cranberries. Then they haul their dead Christmas tree outside and "redecorate" it with the bird feeders and popcorn garlands, and sprinkle nuts around the base of the tree. They go back inside for hot cocoa, and watch through the window as the "party" continues outside when the birds and squirrels come to enjoy the tree's second season of giving.

We decided to have an After Christmas party of our own today! We tried to go ice skating (horray for me, I am no longer on "pelvic rest"...at least for the time being so long as I "take it easy") but unfortunately, there was an ice hockey tournament going on at the rink! We were bummed, but we're going to reserve tickets and go a different weekend.

Instead, we decided to make an After-Christmas Tree out of the Dogwood outside our kitchen window.

Aaron and Q popped popcorn (and ate a little too) while Reese and I gathered pinecones from the backyard.

I'm sure every person in America has made these before, but just in case you haven't, all you do is roll the pinecone in peanut butter
(Quin did NOT like the feel of sticky peanut butter on her fingers, and REALLY did not like the taste of the pinecone she tried to eat.)
They did enjoy the part where you drop the sticky pinecone into a plastic cup that is 1/2 filled with bird seed and "shakey-shakey" the cup.They were sure to get bird seed ALL OVER the kitchen floor, to make sure their mother had plenty of opportunities to "just have fun and let the mess go" like she's trying really hard to do this year. (actually, Aaron made Reese Swivel Sweep (clickety) the floor when we were done, win-win.)
Aren't they cute? We only had tiny pine cones in the yard, so we made about 15 of these little "bird ornaments". Reese was pretty sad when we took down our tree, but LOVED the idea of giving an After-Christmas to the animals in our yard.
I even had a "pointless" plastic needle threaded for Q to "make" a popcorn strand with, but she was more interested in eating it.
Reese had a hard time time, at first, using a real needle and thread. She kept poking herself, and her thread kept getting tangled, but eventually got the hang of it and after that she was a popcorn-stringing machine and even came up with the idea to add a blueberry every 10 inches or so.

Camera-shy Aaron tied fishing line to the pine cones and when everyone is up from naps we are going to go decorate our very first After-Christmas Tree and come inside for hot cocoa while we enjoy the bird party in the yard. Our neighbors are quite the bird watchers and already have attracted families of cardinals, finches, woodpeckers, bluebirds, and orioles to our properties with their zillions of bird feeders, so hopefully, a few feathered friends will make their way over to our tree so we can watch them enjoy their "party".

We had a lot of fun doing this and are going to make it a January tradition.
Do something to have an After-Christmas Party of your own this week, and 'enjoy a second season of giving'.