PeeWees: Frosty the Snowman

[So last week it was Julia's turn to teach, but one of her kids became sick, so Shaunel stepped in seriously last minute, and gave the PeeWees a Frosty-the-Snowman experience they'll not soon forget.  Poppy is now crazy about Frosty!  Here is the summary, in Shaunel's words.]

Last night as I looked through my Christmas books to decide which one to do, I felt a little guilty to be picking Frosty the Snowman instead of the quality Grinch, 12 days, or Night Before X-mas books we could have gone with. But, after planning out the activities I couldn't believe everything that Frosty had to offer! The concept of something inanimate coming to life; how to create snowmen; snow melting into water; etc. Such hidden learning fun.

 

Arrival: We played make-believe with the plastic animals, stuffed animals, and little people nativity-->bringing these inanimate objects to life. When Henry and Poppy arrived we went and cut our biscuits dough into circles for our snowman snack. The leftover biscuits became the letter for each kid's name so we could distinguish who's was who's.

Circle:  They LOVE the standup song. How fun to watch how good they've become at it. We counted 12 snowmen. I think in January we should move up to 20. These kids have 1-12 totally down (but Jackson at least has issues with the teens). We sang the alphabet and stopped on S for snowman--Bodie was able to pick out S when i asked what sssssssnowman started with. Go Bodie!

Poppy had brought her little dog "Harry" with her. Coincidentally, I was also going to be using a "Harry" dog puppet to reinforce inanimate coming to life. The kids loved Harry. He read the book to them, which was a nice thing, but probably unnecessary since they were so riveted by the book, Harry didn't need to help.

I kept Bodie and Jackson separate again to try and reduce distractions, but boy! Those two were totally class clowns and just encouraged each other on. I think I'm just going to have to get over it and enjoy their silliness.

Snack: I tried to encourage the kids to decorate their snowmen with the raisins, pretzels and carrots, but it took a lot of coaxing to get them to stop eating--Poppy was the only one who attempted it. Henry was very diligent at finishing all his pretzels and raisins--eating clear into the next activity. So adorable. Poppy was also very adamant that she wanted to take her uneaten carrots home.  Hilarious.

We was able to acquire some "snow" from the frost that develops around the edges of our ancient freezer. It was AWESOME! We touched the "snow" and then watched it "melt away" into water. I was amazed at how much the kids knew about this process already.

 Dance Break:  Frosty the Snowman dance party. Culminating in Bodie jammin' on the piano as the others ran around.

 Art:  Each child chose their paper, and three different snowballs. I loved how each child positioned them so differently. They then got to decorate it with crayons--which I stopped after 10 min, b/c we needed to move on. They loved just drawing together.

We then went to collect rocks and sticks from outside. Brought them in and glued them onto our snowmen. Good ol' Jackson picked out one rock and then went to run around. Bodie and Henry got a few on before they left for better times. Poppy diligently stuck many on. Love their personalities.

Dance Break: Frosty again

Activity:  Sidewalk chalk group snowman on driveway. Interesting for 5 min--and then it was time to run around.

Play-dough snowmen in the basement--turned into making pancakes and bunnies of course.

Closing:  Reread frosty, and mom's joined us for some King Kong fun.

All in all a great day!