Together We Read – Oct 2010

October 2010 Together We Read

 

 

This our very much “loved” Hungry Caterpillar board book. I had originally planned on a different book. However keeping in mind the purpose of Together We Read program I wanted to choose a book that was way more accessible. Also there are tons of resources that are already out there based on this book.

Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle is definitely a classic. Simple words, classic Eric Carle style illustrations and absolutely has kid appeal.

Insya-Allah, if you do not have the book, you can print out a copy of the story from the link below.

View this document on Scribd

Insya-Allah below are some of the activities that we have done so far.

Story Sequencing

These story sequencing cards were from DLTK’s.

This was a different type of sequencing. It incorporates counting as well. You can find this at Sparkle Box Insya-Allah.

Days of the Week Activities

I made these cards using pictures I found at Making Learning Fun. I also doubled them as lacing cards for some fun. This will make it real for the child as far as the caterpillar munching the food. I pasted the Arabic equivalent on the back. You can find the Arabic days of the week on Umm An-Numan’s website. It is in the Arabic calender set.

Pattern Card

I made this pattern sequencing card also using resources from Making Learning Fun.

Rhyme – teaching names of Allah

Allah Made the Caterpillar

This book presents many opportunity to reinforce that Allah is so merciful and “takes care ” of this caterpillar and makes it into a butterfly. I made this rhyme up to go with the book.

Insya-Allah there are other activities we have done based on this book. Will be updating as time permits.

 

Muslim Rhyme – I’m a Little Muslim (Salaat)

I’m a little muslim2

 

Muslim Rhyme – Adhaan

Adhaan Rhyme

 

Autumn Leaf Baking

More on leaves. This time edible.

 

Cutting out leaf shapes

 

I used rolled puff pastry for this. I unrolled the pastry sheet and left it in the freezer until its hard but still soft enough to cut. Alhamdulillah, this step makes it easier for the child to handle the pastry as puff pastry become gooey too quickly at room temperature. We used some fall themed shape cutter.

 

Brushing egg wash

 

DS2 brushing on some egg on to the cut pastry shapes. At this stage I used a toothpick to draw some pattern on the pastry shapes. Bake as per package instructions.

 

Yummy dessert

 

Scoop some cream on strawberries and throw in some “leaves” for a delicious dessert.

 

Autumn Leaf Activities

 

Golden leaves outside our home

 

Autumn is a beautiful time of the year. We get to witness another phase of the cycle of life Subhanallah. I have been doing preschool activities centered around leaves with DS2. Some of the activities we did.

 

Leaf rubbing

 

We placed the leaf on the wrong side below the white paper to get a bolder tracing of the leaf. Using a thicker crayon or using the sides rather than the tip of the crayon also helps.

 

Leaf sorting

 

We sorted the leaves based on colour. The one leaf sitting on the side had all the colours on it and DS2 just didn’t want to group it with anything else

Both these activities and other extension of them are in the book Teach Me To Do It Myself by Maja Pitamic.

 

Together We Read – September 2010

A simple board book that shows creatures and their homes using shapes. In the process it reinforces how Allah is Ar-Rahman, the most compassionate and that He provides us shelter.

On the very first page there is a picture of all the shapes that will be explored throughout the book. Each shape is actually a lift-a-flap which makes this book an interesting one for little ones.

I have had to reinforce my “circle” and “spiral” page several times as this is a popular book in our home

We did this button sorting activity for this book. You will be able to find huge shaped buttons at Scholars Choice. Star and heart were two shapes not mentioned in the book. I used them as my son was familiar with them. As for rectangle, I have never seen one and I hope to find one, Insya-Allah.

 

Lacing buttons

 

 

DS2 busy lacing

 

 

Laced buttons

 

 

 

 

 

We also did some lacing activity using the buttons. These were the buttons I found at a dollar store years ago for DS1. Alhamdulillah, now they are being reused by DS2.

I made this tracing worksheet that shows some of the homes that are shown in the book. Insya-Allah you can download it by clicking below.

Where is my home

 

Hopping colours.

Further to the activities we did through Brown Bear, Brown Bear, we have been reading other books with colour as the main theme.

This is a simple book that introduces colours. It is also a great book for older children when learning about colour mixing.

Below is what we did for DS2. Colour hopping . . . keeping with the theme of the bunny and the colour pots.

These were circles cut out from foams (foam is less slippery and do last jumping). I first used about 4 colours and gradually added on. We also had the Arabic colour names on each circle to practice colours in Arabic. We spread the circles around and DS2 enjoyed hopping on to the colour pads when a colour was called out.

As for the older child learning about mixing colours . . .

We used bath fizzies. Kids love these. So we did yellow bath days, red bath days . . . then went on to mixing and making purple bath days an so on. You’ll have to drop 2 to 3 tablets to really make the colour show especially when mixing two colours.

 

Baking Colours

We made these pretty crayons as part of our colour learning, sorting activity. I got this idea from Mad in Craft. It is a good way to recycle broken crayons.

Yo can use a regular muffin pan if you don’t have a silicone one. I however chose to use a star mold. Reason, I figures it’ll be easier for a child to hold the crayon (as in picture) plus I can use the mold for Ramadan/Eid themes baking.

I purchased this mold from Michaels.

Alhamdulillah the children are feeling like “Stars” doodling away.

 

Muslim Rhyme – I’m a little Muslim

I’m a little Muslim – Rhyme

I made up this rhyme for my oldest son when he was about 2 and 1/2. We have sung this over and over and now I am singing it with my second son.

The rhyme is a makeover of I’m a Little Teapot of course. However I never knew how strong these words would be when I penned them. As my child was growing day by day, we started hearing more of “But why can I do that ?”. This simple rhyme was always there to help me answer those questions and not to mention keeping it short and sweet as well.

The words here are meant to focus on us; the believer, the Muslims. I am not a fan of pointing out to my children that the other party is a “kuffar” even though they very well might be a disbeliever. Everyone is a potential Muslim and the onus is on us; the Muslims to pass the message of the Prophet (SAW).

Then arises the other question “But he is a Muslim!”. Again using this simple rhyme I was always able reinforce that believing in Allah and loving the Prophet (SAW) requires one to give up certain things and be in a certain way.

Alhamdulillah by now my oldest son has gotten over it and in fact sometimes repeats this rhyme to answer his own questions. Insya-Allah it is my hope that other families will be able to benefit from this as well.