The Snowy Day

Today while showing my parents some pictures of the girls I realized that I never did a review of our last two weeks. So here we go. Two weeks ago we did The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats. This book was taken from the Before Five in a Row that is for children ages 2 to 4 so I knew Sierra would be able to join. She loved every bit of it! Zoey did too. As if on cue, Monday morning we woke up to a snow covered world. We went out into our snow covered world and played and sledded and had fun until we were too cold to do anymore then we came home and had hot chocolate for the kids, tea for the grown ups.

We didn't end up starting the book of the week until Tuesday, but it sure did help to have all of Monday's memories with us as we started this adventure. Since this was a Before Five in a Row title the activities are much simpler and shorter. We discussed how Peter realizes that he is not old enough to play with the big boys in the snowball fight and how he handles that. Every time we read the book after that Sierra would say, "Not old enough" when we got to the page of the snowball fight. We discussed sharing memories. I told Zoey about the time it snowed in Florida when I was a girl. I remembered all I wanted was to see snow then one day my mom woke me up and had me look out the window. It was snowing! It was also very early in the morning. I remember being excited to see the snow but not being to happy about being woken up. Sounds like me now. I told her how my sisters and I scraped up all the snow we could from the car to make a very small snowman. I asked her if she could remember any snow story she wanted to tell me. She said, "No." Sometimes I get so much out of her and then other times, nothing. Oh well on to the next day.

Zoey reading the book to Sierra.

Zoey and Sierra loved art day. We had tissue paper cut into shapes, water color paints, and colored glue. They were the quietest they have ever been while working on their pictures. Sierra was very specific about wanting only circles. Zoey cut some of her own tissue paper and made a picture of a girl with a hat for her first picture. For her second picture she put layer upon layer upon layer upon layer of tissue paper and colored glue. She was really enjoying mixing the colored glue.

Also Sierra had to have her hair in braids like Zoey. I can't believe I was able to braid it.

We also looked at the stoplight in the book and used this as a jumping point to talk about street signs. We read a few books from the library about signs and Zoey wanted to make her own.

It says, "Caution, Watch for Children." She put it in the hall and when I walked down the hallway she would jump out and say, "Watch for children!" What a nut she is.

We also talked about different types of clothing and weather. By the end of the week the snow was almost gone. We got our new snow boots on and headed out. Sierra went down to our neighbor's tree-covered yard where there was more snow. She was walking around in it saying, "Tracks, tracks Mommy!" I asked her if she was making tracks in the snow like Peter in the book and she gave me a  big smile and said yes. I had planned on talking about making tracks in the snow but I forgot. Thanks to Sierra we still go it all done. She walked around and around for the longest time making tracks.

Both of the girls worked on making lapbooks for this story.  A lapbook is a file folder folded to open like a shutter in the front with different things glued inside. For Sierra this was her first lapbook. She was SO happy to use glue stick and "do school" like Zoey. She is so proud of it. She showed it to my mom and dad with big smiles on her face.

Last but not least we learned a new snow song this week. I used to sing this one all the time when I taught. It is sung to I'm a little teapot....

I'm a little snowman, short and fat
Here are my buttons, here is my hat
When the sun comes out I can't play
I just simply melt away.

By the way there is still snow piled up in places here or there. Crazy.