Exploring our sense of Sight

Exploring our sense of Sight:
Here's a recap of the activities that I did with my preschool class and my own personal children at home. Thanks for stopping by! 

Outdoor Activity - Each child received their very own Binoculars. I made these ahead of time by using hot glue to attach two toilet paper tubes together.


Winter Scavenger Hunt using pictures of things we can find outside in our courtyard we used our sense of SIGHT to find: squirrel, bird, snow, ice, icicle, tree, fence

Eye Themed Snack - a fun little snack one of the parents came up with-- dehydrated apple ring with an apricot and raisin!

Art - Self Portraits using a 3 sided mirror



Guided Activity - "Secret Message Hearts" - ahead of time I cut out heart shapes and with a white crayon wrote each child's name onto them. Then they used water colors to reveal the hidden message. I had extra heart cut-outs and crayons available for them to design their own too!


Puzzles / Games - several different I Spy books & games available; Kaleidoscopes; Sunglasses, 3D glasses,  glasses with no lenses for pretend play, View-Master

Science Center: “Sight Station”- illuminated magnifying glass and I-Spy pictures; microscope with simple slides, Paint chip book to view various shades of color, unbreakable mirror, hand-held magnifying glasses.

I was planning on having the children make their own "red vision tubes" but somehow have run out of toilet paper and paper towel tubes. How can that be?!?  I made just one to share by covering a paper towel tube with red cellophane over one end.
Water Table - rainbow colors using several plastic containers filled with water & liquid water colors. What do we SEE when the colors mix together?

Sensory Table- an "I Spy" sensory bin for the kids to play with each other. "I see something yellow and small." I also added the bingo cards from an "I Spy ABC Bingo Game" and foam alphabet letters from a puzzle. I thought kids might like to LOOK for matching pairs or to sort by color!


Writing Center - Valentine Card Making using Cookie Cutter Prints - pour a small amount of pink and red paints into pie tins. Offer a variety of heart cookie cutters. Show the kids how to dip the cookie cutter and press onto a paper. Remind them this is not finger painting, but encourage conversation "What do you SEE with your eyes after you press the cookie cutter down?" 

Closing Circle- pass around the red vision tube. What part of our body helps us to see? When we look through the tube why do we see red? Why do people wear glasses?

Read aloud: Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you See?


Home Connection:  a fun at home activity that reinforces our "Sight" would be to print this Dora themed vision chart. It's like the test a doctor gives but instead of the letter E it's the Dora characters in varying sizes. http://www.nickjr.com/printables/dora-eye-chart.jhtml


Books for the sense of sight:

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you See? by Bill Martin & Eric Carle
The Eye Book by Dr. Suess
Seeing by Sharon Gordon
I Spy Books
My Very First Book of Colors by Eric Carle (ties into our author study, matching color to an object uses the sense of SIGHT)
My Very First Book of Numbers by Eric Carle (ties into our author study, matching fruit to a number uses the sense of SIGHT & sort of TASTE)


Other on-line inspiration for teaching about the sense of sight:
http://www.myoatmealkisses.com/2012/02/sense-of-sight.html

Exploring Our Sense of Taste

We explored our sense of TASTE!

Outdoor - Begin our discussion about our sense of taste. What part of our body helps us taste? Explain that on our tongue we have taste buds. Talk about how different foods have different flavors - salty, sweet, sour, & bitter. Talk about how our tongue has different areas that taste these different flavors.

Since I teach in a nature based preschool, I always begin my lesson outdoors. Sometimes it is a stretch but asked the kids, "What are some things that we find outdoors that have flavors?" And even in the middle of winter in Vermont those kiddos had some good ideas!


Active Game: Play “Simon Says Flavor Game” If you like the flavor of -- jump up and down. If you don’t like the flavor cross your arms.
(No on gets out- it’s more just a survey of what kids think they like and dislike.)

Art - Pizza Pies - children paint a paper plate with red colored glue and then sprinkle on a variety of herbs and spices. This was the first time we made these and the garlic salt made the whole room smell like a pizza shop! YUM!


Math Activity: Apple Jacks Pattern Necklaces - Tape one end of a piece of yarn to the table and wrap the other end so it's easier to thread. Provide each child with a measured amount of cereal, which they can finish their necklace with or TASTE. I added a photocopy of a tongue about mid-way of their threading. The kids thought the tongues were really silly - next year I would like to draw on a picture to go with the flavor word!

Science Center: Tongue Mapping - I read about a family doing a tongue mapping activity and thought I would give it a go at preschool. Not all the kids got the idea that they were to touch a specific part of their tongue but they all enjoyed trying out a variety to flavors.  Each child got their own tray: salty= salt, sweet = sugar, sour = lemon, bitter = unsweetened cocoa. I planned on giving a fresh q-tip for each flavor but the kids just started dipping away! If I do this again, I would do it in small groups instead of all together!
This link has more info and printable to use with this activity -  http://www.raisingthecameronclan.com/2012/01/30/tongue-mapping/


Dramatic Play - kitchen set up with a large variety of foods!

Water Table - plastic foods to wash in water table along with a variety of spoons, cups, strainers, scoops, etc.

Sensory Table- beans, various cups, funnels, spoons, etc.

Writing Center - provide grocery store circulars and food magazines for kids to cut. Encourage them to glue pictures of foods that they like the taste of to a paper plate.
 
Closing Circle- “What is something you learned about TASTE today?” Pass around the Surprise Box with a fresh orange inside!



Books for the sense of taste:
(Need to find more flavor related books!)

The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle
Food Alphabet by David Drew
 

Other Taste Test Ideas for future lessons:

Taste bud Taste Test: salty - pretzels, sweet - honey, sour- lemon, bitter- unsweetened cocoa. Talk about which of the foods they like the best.
 
Tasting Party - have each child bring in a food to share. Serve small portions of each food. (The teacher could assign foods instead so a wider variety of foods would be sampled.) Suggest that families bring a food that is sweet, salty or sour such as fruits, vegetables, pickles, crackers, flavored cereal, etc. Children could sort them by taste or by texture (soft, chewy, crispy). Graph foods that the children liked the most.

"Bring two foods that look similar but taste very different (orange and lemon, sugar and salt, yogurt and sour cream, etc.) Put them in plates next to each other. Let your children use their 5 senses to try to determine which is which. Asked the children to describe how the substances smell, feel, look, sound (as you gently shake the plate) and finally taste." idea from http://www.everythingpreschool.com/themes/fivesenses/science.htm

3 different clear liquids - sweet sugar water, salty salt water, and sour lemon juice!

Popcorn Varieties: Make three types of popcorn - one with brown sugar, one with salt, and one with lemon. The children taste each of the popcorn flavors and decide which their favorite is. Make a chart to show which is the favorite flavor.
 
If combining 5 Senses with an Eric Carle author study - read Pancake, Pancake and have a taste test of a variety of toppings.


On-line resources & ideas for teaching about TASTE:

The tongue mapping activity here - http://www.raisingthecameronclan.com/2012/01/30/tongue-mapping/

Exploring our Sense of Hearing

We explored our sense of hearing!

Outdoor - Sound Walk - guide the children in becoming still, closing their eyes, and listening for sounds for 30 seconds. Then try for 1 minute. Go longer if they are attentive. My two year old daughter loves this game. We will walk through our woods and stop and listen for sounds. She loves to be the first to point out a woodpecker or identify another sound in nature!

Before going on the sound walk, read aloud the wonderful book The Listening Walk by Paul Showers.


Active Game - Bells on Boots - tie a jingle bell onto each child's boot laces. Then have the children dance, hop, stomp, and walk around the courtyard. Try a game of hide-and-seek with the bells on and talk about why it's easy to find other kids when their bells shake.
An easy way to make these is to use small jingle bells, thread a twist tie through the whole on top, and then twist onto shoe laces. I find if you put the bell on the child's zipper pull they will hold it and muffle the sound...which could be a whole other type of learning.

Art: Rain Sticks using paper towel tubes that have tape on one end, let the children fill their tube with dried beans using a wide mouth funnel. Then the adult helps close the other end with tape. Paint, collage, or draw onto the paper tubes. Later add mod podge to make them more durable.
Smaller ones could be made using toilet paper tubes but they have less of a 'rain stick' feel.
If you are making these with just one or two children, you might consider poking toothpicks or popsicle sticks into the sides of the tube so that the 'rainfall' is even more pronounced! Just be sure to cover with felt or card stock so the sticks don't pop back out.


Guided Activity -- Matching Sound Eggs Game: Make two each of the sound eggs (plastic Easter eggs) before the children arrive. Children shake them and try to find the two that match. Contents include: dry beans, coins, corn kernels, salt, cotton balls, and paper clips.
Another option would be to use one container that was see-through and one that was not. Then the kids would have to match the sound but wouldn't have to open the containers. This year I had salt spilled everywhere and the some of the coins disappeared, so this second option may have worked better.


Water Table: add objects that make noise. I took a variety of clear plastic containers and filled them with various objects (dice, sand, rice, mini jingle bells, beans, and cotton balls). Then I sealed them with bright orange electrical tape and asked the kids to keep them sealed. The kids had fun scooping them out of the water and shaking them. Making matching pairs would have been another idea!

Sensory Table- dried beans as base, small container (plastic & tin) for the kids to scoop and fill, and then close to make shakers.
One another day try adding a variety of crunchy & noisy objects - cellophane, wax paper, bubble wrap, painted paper.


Writing Center - my class didn't have the dexterity to do this but at home my son used my paper crimper to make textured papers. I have a set of three crimpers and he discovered that each one makes a different sound! What other ideas could I use for incorporating SOUND into the writing center?

Science Center = “Sound Station” - set of hand bells, clear rain stick, toy cell phone, cat “meow” toy, wooden xylophone, wind chimes, jingle bells of various sizes. This station was highly engaging for the preschoolers. Just this activity alone would have been enough for exploring our sense of hearing!


Closing Circle - Show a picture of the inside of the ear & explain briefly how our ears work.
One important thing about our sense of hearing is learning how to change the volume of our voice, especially when we are indoors. Can you show me your indoor voice, how about your whisper voice, and your outdoor voice?

Read aloud, Listening Time by Elizabeth Verdick (explains how to be a good listener at rug time) and reinforce how our sense of hearing is important in being a good listener, especially at circle time! 



Books for the sense of hearing:
Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear? by Bil Martin & Eric Carle
The Ear Book by Al Perkins
Listening Time by Elizabeth Verdick (explains how to be a good listener at rug time)
The Listening Walk by Paul Showers

Additional Activities:

Follow that Noise- the adults in the room each have some sort of noise maker in their pocket. The adults spread out, kids close their eyes, and one adult makes a noise. The kids are told to open their eyes and walk to the adult who they think made the sound. Once there they guess the sound. (Try: cricket clicker, jingle bell, ring tone on a cell phone)

Guess My Sound - With their eyes closed, the adult makes a sound and the child guesses what made the noise. Try: clap, stomp, pretend sneeze, snap, whistle, cough. Instead of guessing the sound the kids could mimic the sound.

CD or recording of common sounds - play the recording and have the kids guess the sound.

Bubble Wrap Walk

Repeat my beat - using claps and taps create a variety of rhythms.

If doing an Eric Carle author study --- Read Aloud: Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What do you Hear? 



On-line inspiration for teaching about Sound & Hearing

Sound cups activity & kids making their own sound cups:  http://www.playbasedlearning.com.au/2010/08/sound-cups/


Water & Music Play 
http://childsplaymusic.com.au/2012/01/17/water-play-music-play-children-a-natural-combination/


5 Listening Games - http://childhood101.com/2011/02/literacy-spot-7-five-simple-listening-games/

Exploring our Sense of Smell

Try to convince a six year old boy to only use his sense of smell and this is what you get! ;0)

Exploring our Sense of Smell

 Outdoor - To get the kids thinking about what we will learn about today, I wore a clown nose as they arrived. Actually I popped it on once all the kids were there and the parents were gone!

Once we were all gathered for circle time I asked "What part of body helps us to smell?" and then led a lively discussion of things that smell good and things that smell bad. You know we entered the potty-talk department but I quickly brought the conversation back to other more appropriate topics!

"Smelling Walk" would be fun but since it's mid-winter there really weren't any aromas to find, so we'll save that for spring when there are flowers and freshly cut grass!


Active Game - Smell and Go Seek Game - I put peppermint essential oil on small "leaves" made from felt. I had our intern hide the 8 leaves and the children and I used our noses to try to find the hidden cloths. It was fun hunting for the smells with the kids since I didn't know where they were located. Though the cloths were saturated with the oil the fragrance wasn't strong enough. In the future I would use a spray bottle with additional peppermint essential oil in it to spray the areas that the cloths are hidden so the children would be more successful finding them. Doing this activity indoors would make the aroma easy to detect as well.


Smelly Art Ideas:

Kool Aid Art- make by sprinkling a small amount of dry kool-aid mix onto a coffee filter. Then the child uses eye droppers or small spray bottles filled with water to wet the filter. Use several different kool-aid scents. (Kool Aid does stain clothes, so we may want to use the smocks.)

Smelly Water Colors - Mix 1 part hot water to 2 parts jello. Make sure all of the jello is dissolved and then let the children paint.

Homemade Scratch and Sniff Pictures: Mix one Kool Aid packet to 2 Tablespoons hot water. Stir well. Let the kids paint and allow to dry. Afterwards it can be used as a scratch and sniff!


Easel Painting - I didn't get to doing this at preschool this year, but I thought it would be fun to add essential oils to tempera paint to make them smell like the color. (Such as: Purple - lavender oil, Yellow - lemon oil, Green - mint oil)


Guided Activity - Smelling Jars - we used four different jars filled with a familiar scent to the children (use - lemon, garlic, cinnamon, & soap). The child smelled the container and put it next to the picture they thought it matched. Then we opened them to see if their guesses were right. 

Instead of using jars I put the objects into a toilet paper tube that was taped shut on the bottom and partially shut on the top. These worked well and I though let more aroma come out than the jars I poked a hole in.

I did this same activity at home with my kiddos but I put one of each of the objects for them smell on the mat and then match. My almost 3 year old loved this game but decided to eat the raw garlic when I wasn't looking!
  Water Table - "Lavender Water" - add several drops of lavender essential oil & lavender flower buds. Add a variety of scoops and funnels for gathering the flower buds. This smelled wonderfully but many of the kids did not like the texture of the herbs floating in the water. It looked murk-ey and not inviting. Next time I think soapy suds and lavender essential oil would be much more pleasing!

Sensory Table- add a variety of natural materials that have strong scents - pine branches, dried herbs such as peppermint, etc.
Another smelly bin would be to dump a full can of fresh coffee grounds and put small cups, scoops, spoons, etc.

Play dough Table-
Chocolate Play dough was a huge hit and little Valentine boxes and mini candy wrappers made it great fun for the kids!
Kool-Aid Play dough with various scents would have been fun as well!

Writing Center - Mr. Sketch smelly markers, cut-outs of a nose for the kids to decorate.
At home I gave my children popcorn scented scratch and sniff stickers. They were so tickled over these stickers that I have to remember to buy them a variety of scents at holiday times!

Science Center -
Smelling Jars were added to the science center after the guided activity was done.
Make a T chart: Smells I like, Smells I dislike. Ask the children and draw their responses on the chart.
I wanted to have a collection of herbs and spices for the kids to smell and explore but need to find containers that they can sniff but not dump. (Any tips?)
Fragrant Flowers - some fresh cut flowers would be fun but mid-February in Vermont there are NO flowers outdoors and the prices at the floral shop are at Valentine premium prices! I considered using rose water to scent some silk flowers but the aroma is overpowering to me.
Scratch and sniff books would have been fun but all of mine seem worn out. (Maybe I can re-scent them?) smelling jars.

Closing Circle- I read The Nose Book and the kids just loved it. I also shared a story of how I was working at my desk at home and thought I saw a cat outside pass by the window. When I looked closer it was a skunk! The preschoolers thought I was joking but it was a true story...of course I left out the part were I jumped out of my chair and said a naughty word!

The Nose Book by Al Perkins
Smelling by K.B.Smith
Big Smelly Bear by Britta Teckentrup
Skunks! by David T. Greenburg

Additional On-line ideas for teaching SMELL:

How to present Smelling Jars - http://www.infomontessori.com/sensorial/olfactory-sense-smelling-jars.htm

Idea for making smell cups with aluminum foil tops & aromatherapy flower craft - http://blog.newhopeclc.jp/2011/04/spring-school-day-five.htmlBooks for the sense of smell:

Exploring the Sense of Touch

We explored our sense of Touch!

Outdoor Discovery Time- "Finding Textures in the Outdoors" - I love to take my preschoolers on walks looking for something in particular. Today we went on a texture hunt. We found lots of sort snow, a little bit of crunchy snow, hard ice, bumpy tree bark, smooth tree bark, prickly pine needles, hard frozen jugs of water, and thorny rose bushes.
Ask you children...can you find something smooth? rough? hard? soft? bumpy? cold? It's fun to see what they find!

Art - Sensory Texture Painting - put tempera paint in paint cups and add one of the following to each cup: coffee grounds, crumbled leaves, coarse salt, and sand. Paint onto card stock since the paint will be thick. While painting encourage the kids to use descriptive words for how the paint feels & what they see.

Paint in groups at the table to encourage dialogue between students!
You could also provide a variety of things to use as paintbrushes - sponges, toothbrushes, cotton balls, forks, toothpicks, pipe cleaners, and Popsicle sticks to make their own special textures.)


Guided Activity - Textured Letter Boards - give each child a small piece of corrugated card board that is cut out in the shape of their first initial. Lay out a variety of materials: sand paper, aluminum foil, lace doilies, cloth, string, curling ribbon, crinkled gift bag stuffing, cotton balls, painted paper scraps, etc. The children paint on watered down glue and select items to make their own textured board. Display them on the bulletin board. (I think we will revisit this project and make an entire alphabet to display in our classroom!)

Water Table - Warm Water vs. Cold Water Test - in the middle of water table put a medium sized bowl with very warm water. In the rest of the table, add cold water a few ice cubes and several large ice blocks.

Easel painting - open the easel after the art project at the tables is done, use the same paint cups with textured paints. Cut out the shape of an over sized hand for the kids to paint!

Sensory Texture Bin - wide selection of objects that have various textures (Soft: feathers, tulle, foam curlers, tissue paper balls. Hard: wooden bracelets, plastic curlers, rocks, popsicle sticks, plastic credit cards. Stretchy: plastic necklaces, rubber bands. (For this bin I also kept the color scheme to yellow, blue, and white since I will use the same materials for our SIGHT theme. That day we will sort objects in the bin by color.)



Science Center - Mitten Match game - each mitten contains an object. The child feels the object and matches to the picture that they think is inside. Then they self-check their answers.

Science Center -- Feeling Boxes - put empty tissue boxes and a variety of objects at the science center. Children can play with a partner to feel and guess the object. (Soft teddy bear, porcupine balls, foam triangle, wooden block)



Writing Center - Heart Rubbings- offer a variety of heart shapes that were cut from paper, paper doilies and sandpaper. Tape these shapes to the table. Show the children how to place a piece of thin white or pink paper over the heart shapes and rub with a crayon to make special Valentine cards. (offer envelopes, heart stickers, and peeled crayons)
Closing Circle - "We've been learning about our sense of Touch today. We are going to use our sense of touch to figure out what is in our Surprise Box today."

We will do the surprise box each day during the month of February. The object inside will reinforce the sense that we study for that day.  Use common objects from the classroom that would be easy to identify: ball, train car, paint brush, bell, cookie cutter, dollhouse furniture, thick crayon, mini binoculars, plush owl, and a block.

To make the Surprise Box I took a medium sized coffee can and stretched a black knee-high nylon on the top. It held on great and the kids could reach their hand all the way inside to feel the object but could not pull it out! The nylon was dark enough that they couldn't see the object either!

Other fun sensory ideas for our sense of TOUCH could be:


Cooked spaghetti!

"Mess Free Paint Bags" - sealed gallon sized Ziploc bags with different colored tempera paint. Encourage mark making, name writing, and picture drawing in the bags. (Limit 3 students, one per bag.)
Texture Tray - use a compartmented tray (like a veggie tray) - put out a variety of objects and help the kids sort the objects by similar texture (aluminum foil, sand paper, onion bag, feathers, double sided tape, salt dough ornament, sock, felt, cork, dried herbs, bark, pine cone, leaves, sponge, silk, and construction paper.)
Soft & Hard Sort Bins - using the same objects in the sensory texture bin, have students sort by soft/hard.


Books for the sense of touch:
Quack! Quack! A Touch and Feel book by Louise Rupnik
(need to find some good touch and feel books)



Online Resources & Ideas for the sense of touch:

Texture painting using rolling pins with objects attached - http://strongstart.blogspot.com/2012/01/rolling-pin-painting.html

What activities do you like to do to explore TOUCH with your children?