Scales and Hooves

Last year I did a large letter cut-out art project to go with each of our alphabet letters.  This year, instead, I'm being a little more flexible and doing various projects that focus on the letter or animal that we are learning about. 

"F" is for Felt Fish

This was a fun, colorful, project with a sensory aspect to it.  

Here's what you need:

*Printed fish pattern (Google "Fish Pattern" and you have all sorts of choices)

*Scissors

*Large sheets of construction paper

*Various colors of felt, cut into scale shapes

*White glue

*Googly eyes

*Markers

 

We cut out the fish pattern and the students were given the choice to glue it to a larger sheet of construction paper.  Then they added the felt fish scales and googly eye.  Some of the students who glued their fish to the paper used markers to draw other things that might be under the water with their fish.  

The felt was a different type of texture for us to work with on an art project.  The kiddos liked picking out what colors they wanted.  We also had good practice squeezing white glue out of the bottle to make dots.

Hoof Print/Foot Print

Our animal for letter "G" is a goat.  I was racking my brain and the internet for ideas with no luck, (there really aren't that many goat art project ideas out there) so I got creative with a science/art project.

I prompted my kiddos with the question: "Do goats have toes?"  Then we discussed how goat feet are different from our feet.  

To help visualize what a hoof print looks like I decided to make my own hoof print stamp.  

First, I printed out a pattern of a goat hoof print (gotta love Google images!).  I cut the pattern out and traced the shape onto craft foam.  (I had pretty thin foam, so I tripled the foam up so it was thicker.)  Next, I glued the foam onto a plastic lid to form my stamp (note: if I do this again I will make the stamp a little smaller so it will be more relative to the size of the kids feet - this print is from one giant goat!).

 

 

For the project I showed the kiddos a picture of goat hooves and what it looked like when the goat left a print.  Then I had them use the stamp and a large stamp pad to make their own prints on a piece of paper.  

My adventurous students went one "step" further (ha, ha I made a punny!) - they let me paint their foot so they could make their own foot print next to the goat hoof print.

When the project was done we could compare and contrast the differences!

 

got your goat?

Anyone out there have any good goat activities?  Our animal friend for letter "Gg" is "Gomer Goat".  I had plenty to do this week so I wasn't able to dig very deeply into more activities, but I'd like to find more in the future.  I think I might need to invest in a copy of "The Three Billy Goat's Gruff" for next year.  

Letter "G" activities...

"G" Goats (I think these are pretty hilarious) I found the idea here.

• Cut outs of the letter "G", horns, ears, and beard
• Large wiggle eye (you might want to do two - I can never get the preschoolers to understand the concept of putting one eye on an animal art project - ha!)
• Glue

I give the students the pieces, show them an example, and let them glue as they choose. 

For an alphabet review game we played  "Throw it in the Garbage" (great mix of fine and gross motor skills!).

• Garbage Can
• Paper scraps with alphabet letters written on them

To play:

• Pass out the letters written on the paper to the students.  
• Take turns naming the letter
• Crumple and toss into the garbage can.  

When we all had a turn, I dumped the can and students chose a piece of paper again.  

• Uncrumple the paper to find out what letter is hiding inside!
• Crumple it back up again.
• Toss into the garbage.  

(This was in my lesson plans from last year, but I know I just saw it on a blog recently too - can't remember where!)

Other activities this week:

Craft sticks (letter recognition, math, fine motor skills):  I put craft sticks and flash cards out at a center area for students to use to make shapes and letters.  I saw a lot of really neat designs/letters from my older students and my youngest students thought it was great fun to grab them all in their hands and drop them (they do make a cool sound... as well as a mess).

Table Setting (one-to-one correspondence, social studies):  During the month of November I add place mats to our housekeeping area.  To make the place mats, I traced the toy dishes (as they would go on a set table) on a large piece of card stock.  Then I decorated and laminated the mat.  Looks like a healthy meal!.