Family and Relatives Thematic Unit

Family and Relatives Thematic Unit

1. Shirt and tie for Daddy

We're learning about family members this month and we made a shirt out of paper bags and the children also decorated the shirt with crayons and put the stickers on the ties for daddy. They all enjoyed it and it makes a good present for daddy.

 

2. Dressing Up

My Chinese teachers in the class brought in some of her old clothes for the children to play with and I borrowed her clothes for this activity. We picked some clothes for dad, mom, brother and sister and all the children could choose who they want to dress up as. They looked really adorable!

 

 

3. Grandparents Day / Face paint

In the second week of our Family theme, we learned about our grandparents, and we drew on some wrinkles with face paint and asked the children to color in the hair for grandpa and grandma. They had a blast acting and talking like their grandparents!

 

 

4. Paper bag house

We made a house from a paper bag and it was a really easy and cute craft idea for the family theme. We painted the paper bags and I asked the kids to make a paper ball with newspaper and stuff it into the paper bag. Then I cut out the roof, windows, door and the chimney and the kids glued on the parts by themselves! :) As a result, we have our 3D house! :)

 

5. Family Tree
    We introduced the "Family Tree" to the class and asked the children to bring in their own family pictures and we made a tree with their handprints!

 

Then, I asked the children to count the members in their family and cut out red circles as apples according to that number.

Then, they glued on the apples onto the trees and I helped them cut out the pictures and glued on their own "Family Tree". It's a very cute craft and it makes a great decoration in the classroom!

Fairy Tale Thematic Unit

                   Fairy tale Thematic unit

1. Children's Story books
  I Bought so many books at the Book Fair on the last day and got some really great deals on the great story books. I spent only NT$2700 an bought 23 story books!

 

I love this book! The glove puppet is such a clever idea and the kids loved it!

2. Three Little Billy Goats Gruff

          I borrowed this felt story of “The Three Billy Goats Gruff”  from my co-worker in the school and the kids really loved the story because it's really easy to understand and they really liked the characters.

 

 

This is a follow up craft activity we did after we read the story. We made these puppets with paper plates. They turned out great!

 

 

3. Snow White

This was one of their favorite stories and this version is very cute because it has flip up pictures from each page. 

The children were fascinated by the magic mirror by the evil queen and we made our own mirror with paper plate, sequins and silver paper. They also had fun changing the phrase “Mirror, Mirror on the wall, who's the _______ of them all”

 

 

 

4.The Three Little Pigs

We introduced The Three Little Pigs felt story and the children pretended to be the Big Bad Wolf. They understood the story quite well and we made little hand puppets afterward.

I drew the shape of a pig on felt and then cut it out and glue two together to make a hand puppet. Then I cut out the snout for the children to glue on and some accessories / clothing the pigs can wear. It was my first time making a hand puppet and had to adjust the size after my first try, because it turned out too small for the kids' hand to go in. :P 

 

 

 

 

  I also made a wolf hand puppet and we acted out the Three Little Pigs story with the kids! :)

 

5. Castle Building with Foam Blocks

We played a game with foam blocks and it was a lot of fun! I figured since we're learning about fairy tales and castles seem to appear a lot in these stories, I decided to play a game building different types of castles. We have the huge blocks in the school and I split the class up into two teams. I drew a castle on the board and the kids had to make the same castle they see on the board. They all did an awesome job! :)

 

 

6. Outing

For this month's theme, we visited a traditional puppet theater in our local area. The kids had fun playing with shadow puppets and the traditional Chinese puppets! It's great to see them have so fun playing with them! :)

 

 

7. Giant's Feet Relay

We learned about the story of “Jack and the Beanstalk” and I found this cute idea online and it's a great activity for the kids' gross motor skills. I cut out Giant's feet from the cardboard box and attached the elastic band so the kids to put them on. Then we had a Giant's feet relay and it was so adorable and fun!

8. Pinocchio split pin puppet

We learned about different stories in our fairy tale theme and the kids love the character “Pinocchio”. So I decided to teach them how to make a simple Pinocchio split pin puppet. I found the print out from a website and the kids colored the pictures and I glued them onto construction paper to make the puppets stronger. Then I cut them out for the kids and the kids had to put in the split pin for themselves. It was a great activity to improve their fine motor skills.
 

9. Fire Breathing Dragon
    All kids love dragons, especially the ones that can breathe fire! This is why we made an easy fire breathing dragon craft and they had a great time making it and they spent a lot of playing with it afterwards! :) First, I cut out a hole at the bottom of the cup, then we painted the paper cups green and then glued on the googly eyes and red, orange and yellow tissue paper as fire. It's as easy as it sounds and they the children can pretend to be little fire breathing dragons!