Letter knowledge
Children will strengthen their understanding of the name and sound of selected letters.
Review:
Be Prepared: Select six letters that would be helpful for children to review. Use results of the Week 43 letter assessments and your understanding of children’s letter knowledge to inform your letter selections. Write the letters (uppercase) on the provided blank cube (one per side).
Assemble children in a circle on the floor. Display the cube. Review each letter on the cube by saying its name, the sound the letter makes, and a word that starts with the letter. Invite all children to make the letter with their hand in the air.
Explain that we will take turns rolling our cube and telling about the letter that lands on top. Initiate the activity with a child who volunteers to go first. Offer support as needed. Lead children in writing the letter in the air if a child seems unclear about how to do this. Continue until all children have an opportunity to roll the cube and describe the letter that lands on top.
Pattern knowledge
Children will deepen their understanding of how to make patterns.
Review:
Offer the Week 15, Day 4 activity to review duplicating and extending a simple (ABAB) pattern.
Support children in individually making an AABAAB pattern with rubber stamps.
Open the session by reminding children that yesterday we made bracelets with beads. Remind children of the pattern by describing the bead order. Example: blue, blue, red, blue, blue, red. Explain that today we will use rubber stamps to make a pattern.
Display two rubber stamps and paper. Use the two stamps to begin an AABAAB pattern. Make three stamp imprints (AAB) on your paper. Name and point to each stamp imprint on your paper. Ask children what stamp to use next to continue your pattern. (A stamp)
Invite each child to select two different kinds of stamps and to make a pattern on the piece of paper that you provide to each. Encourage children to say aloud the patterns as they make. Provide assistance as needed. Children may wish to exchange rubber stamps with each other.
Knowledge of living things
Children will strengthen their understanding of characteristics of meat-eating dinosaurs.
New:
Be Prepared: Today’s activity includes reading excerpts of Tyrannosaurus Rex by A. L. Wegwerth. To make it easier to turn to the specific pages to be read, you may wish to paper clip together pages 5–12, pages 13–16, and pages 21–32.
Today we will learn about dinosaurs that ate meat. Meat eating dinosaurs ate other dinosaurs and other types of animals.
Let’s think about the mouths of dinosaurs that ate meat.
[Encourage children to put fingers on the skin of their face that is next to their jaws. Invite children to open and close their mouths while holding one to two fingers on each side of their jaws. Demonstrate how to do this.]
We are feeling our jaws move in our mouths. Jaws are the upper and lower bony parts of a mouth. Teeth are fixed to our jaws. Jaws work like scissors. They open and close when something is being chewed.
[Demonstrate opening and closing child-friendly scissors to show how a jaw opens and closes.]
Dinosaurs used their jaws to bite down on an animal and to pull off part of the animal. Then they chewed the meat with their jaws.
[Display picture of a tooth from a dinosaur that ate meat.]
The teeth of a dinosaur that ate meat came to a point at the top. They were very sharp. The teeth had jagged edges that helped the dinosaur to bite into meat and chew it.
Sometimes the jagged edge of a tooth would get smooth, or a dinosaur would lose a tooth. A new tooth would grow in its place.
Dinosaurs that ate meat had to run fast.
Why do you think these dinosaurs had to run fast? (to catch dinosaurs and other animals they wanted to eat)
[Display book cover.]
Today we will read a book that will help us learn more about dinosaurs that ate meat. Our book is called Tyrannosaurus Rex. Sometimes the Tyrannosaurus Rex’s name is shortened to T-Rex.
The author of the book is A.L Wegwerth.
[Read pages 4–5, 12–13, and 16–21 of the book without inviting talk until you have finished reading. Do not elaborate on book information unless children seem confused about what you are reading. Point to and describe illustrations directly related to the text.]
Today we learned that dinosaurs that ate meat had strong jaws with sharp teeth. We read a book about T-Rexes and learned more about them.
Extra support
Enrichment
Today’s book says that the T-Rex was 15-feet tall. Place a piece of tape across the room that measures 15-feet long. Encourage children to lie on top of the piece of tape and compare their size to the size of a T-Rex. Provide a nonstandard unit of measure, such as Unifix® cubes, for children to do further comparisons.
School-age children may like to show where they have lost a tooth. Explain that a new tooth will take its place. Encourage children of different ages to use their tongue to feel differences in their teeth. Teeth in our mouths are shaped differently and feel different. Our teeth do different things to the food we eat. School-age children may wish to explain how we use our front teeth when we bite into a carrot, and we use our back teeth to crush it into smaller pieces so it can be swallowed. Infants in your setting may not have teeth yet. Explain that teeth grow into our mouths as we get older.
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Understanding Feelings
Social-Emotional
Skill and Goal
Emotion knowledge
Children will strengthen their understanding of ways to feel better when they are sad, including when a family member or loved one is away for a while.
Materials
Needed
Key
Concepts
Review:
Offer the Week 11, Day 3 activity to review ways to feel better when we are sad.
Remind children that one of the times we may feel sad is when a parent is away. Show the book cover, read the book title and names of the author and illustrator, and ask children whether the boy looks happy or sad. Why is the boy in a suitcase with a teddy bear?
Read the book text with pauses so children can look closely at the rich illustrations. Draw attention to interesting details of book illustrations, such as the boy removing some of his dad’s clothing from the suitcase (so he can fit in) and the sad looks of the boy and the dog when he says “I don’t want Daddy to go!” Remind children that a globe is a map.
After reading the book, discuss with children some of the things the boy did to feel better while his dad was on a trip. Focus on actions that you anticipate will be of particular interest to children in your group. Show pertinent book illustrations. Encourage children to talk about whether they have done some of the things described in the story. There are many possibilities to explore:
You may wish to share with interested parents the “Four Ways to Countdown” information at the end of the book.