B is for Buttons

• Button sorting
1. With a bunch of colorful buttons of different sizes, put them in a sensory bin (bin filled with uncooked rice, beans, oatmeal, sand, etc) for the preschoolers to play with and find. Use tweezers to pick them out!
2. After they have been sorted by color, sort by size.

• Stinging buttons
1. With the same buttons used above and a pipe cleaner, string the buttons! They can string them:
• randomly
• patterns
• by color
• by size
• etc.

• Make a button tree
1. Gather your supplies. We used:
• empty toilet paper roll (filled with newsprint) and a base of cardboard glued to the bottom
• sticks from outside
• hot glue gun and extra glue
• BUTTONS!
2. Arrange the sticks and add dots of glue to the branches, applying a button to each one before it dries.
3. Another option is to glue the branches to a piece of paper so it is flat instead of 3D.

**Find more BUTTON inspired preschool activities HERE**

B is for Balloons

• Read: A Balloon for Isabel by Deborah Underwood
1. Experiment – after reading the book use playdoh, toothpicks, and balloons.
• Put a ball of playdoh on the table and add toothpicks all over it (as in a porcupine like in the book).
• Test 1: Use a balloon and hit it against the toothpicks (make sure it pops!).
• Add balls of playdoh to the ends of the toothpicks (like the gumdrops in the book).
• Test 2: Use a balloon and hit it against the covered toothpicks.
• Compare what happened. Why did the gumdrops work in the story to prevent the balloons from popping?

**Find more BALLOON inspired preschool activities HERE**

B is for Berries

• Exploring Berries
1. Buy different kinds of berries at the store (or pick them if you have that ability near you). We used Blueberries, Strawberries, Blackberries, and Huckleberries. 
2. Explore the berries through the 5 senses
• Sight – what color are they, what shape are they, are they big or smal
• Hear – Say the name of the berry. When you say “berry” in the name (ie: StrawBERRY) say it loud or clap.
• Smell – Smell it. Does it smell good or yucky
• Touch – is it bumpy, smooth, rough, slimy, soft, etc.
• Taste! – is it sour, sweet, salty, etc.

• Pom pom Berries
1. Using craft pom poms (we used blue, pink and black, big and small sizes) put them in a pile on the table, thrown out on the floor, in a sensory bin, or on a piece of green paper to look like a bush.
2. Have your preschooler “pick” the berries and sort them by color. We put them on matching colored paper.
3. Then sort by size for each color.

• Water bead Berries
1. Sensory bins are always a win, even if you don’t put anything else in but water beads! Again I used black, blue and pink (and clear) water beads.
2. They then sorted by color and played with them in the water.
• I like water beads for this one because they are round and small like a lot of berries.

• Berry Math
1. Pick a color (or many colors) of playdoh to make “berries” – small round balls of playdoh.
2. Cut out a piece of green paper, felt, foam, etc to resemble a bush.
3. Berry Math – (Berry picking [subtration] or berry growing [addition])
• Put all the berries on the bush and roll a die/dice.
• Count the dots and “pick” that many berries.
• Repeat until all the berries are picked.
• Roll the die/dice again.
• Count the dots and add that many berries to the bush (they’re growing).
• Repeat until all the berries you made have grown.

• Cheerio Box Blueberry activities
1. Cheerios had a perfect activity on the back of their Blueberry Cheerio's box and I saved it for today. They had:
• Blueberry memory match
• Berry Rhyming questions

**For more BERRY inspired preschool activities, click HERE**

B is for Bees

• Bee Eraser activities
1. First, use Bee erasers in a sensory bin (a container filled with rice, oatmeal, beans, sand, etc for playing with and searching through), for the preschoolers to find and sort (write a capital B on some and a lowercase B on others).
   ***We used tweezers to pinch them out, and dollar store veggie trays for sorting.
2. After they find and sort them by Capital B and lowercase B you can do lots of fun activities with them:
• Stack them the matching B or b
• Lay out patterns with the B and b’s (ie: BBbBBb…)
• Make shape outlines by lining up the bee erasers

• Wap-a-Bee
1. You’ll need a fly swatter (we got ours from the dollar store, or discount school supply has some really cute ones too) 
2. You’ll also need some paper bees with numbers 1-6 on them (or 2-12 if you use 2 dice). You can lay them on the floor, the table, or tape them on the wall!
• Roll a die/dice. Count the dots. Wap that bee with the fly swatter.

• Tanagram Bee Hives
1. We used hexagons from our tanagram set and shaped them together to make a “bee hive”
• Discuss hexagons, count the sides.
• Make hexagons using the red trapezoids (talk about trapezoids too!)
• Play with the tanagrams, let them explore and create! **patterns are always a must.
2. We talked about bees and how they make honey…and then ate some Bit-o-Honey candy!

• Read: Swarm of Bees by Lemony Snicket and Rilla Alexander
1. Talk about emotions, particularly Anger and Calm/Happy
2. Art Project (like in the book). You’ll need:
• Q-tips
• Black or White paper (depending on if they want to make angry bees or calm bees)
• Black and yellow paint
  ***Dip the q-tips in the paint and make little dots of color on the paper. The bees are suppose to be dots, just like in the book.

• Perler Beads – Bee patterns
1. Use perler beads to create black & yellow pattern bracelets/necklaces.
2. Use black and yellow perler beads on the peg boards to create melted bee creations.

**Find more BEE inspired preschool activities HERE!!

B is for Birds

• Story and Bird search
1. We read Ruby’s Birds by Mya Thompson
2. Then we went on a walk/hike to listen and watch for birds.
• I wish I would have made them keep track of how many birds we saw and how many we heard. That would have been good tally practice!

• Feather Counting
1. With laminated birds, have your preschooler tell you the number that is on it and add that many feathers.
   *(I can’t find the original of these, and can’t even remember if I made them or if I got them from someone else!) 

• Book and Rhyming
1. We read Wings by Cheryl B. Klein, it is a book written only with words that rhyme with “wings” 
2. Get some letters out and practice sounding out and rhyming “-ings” words.

• Playdoh egg counting
1. Use this bird’s nest playdoh mat
2. Make playdoh “eggs” (roll playdoh in a ball)
3. Write or put a number in the square on the bottom right of the mat (printed from above), and have your preschooler count out that many eggs to put in the nest.

***Find a lot more Birds preschool activities here or on our instagram account (saved in our highlights under “Bb”)

B is for Banana

Here are some additional Banana activities.

• Read: Baxter The Banana by Sean Sullivan 
• A friend gave me this book YEARS ago, before I was even married and had kids, but I’ve kept it around and it is perfect for banana preschool. I CANT find it anywhere online….but it’s a book about a green banana that wants to be yellow. Then after awhile, he turns yellow like all the other bananas. (see activity below)

• Green and Yellow Bananas (this goes along with Baxter the Banana board book)
             ***This is a cutting, sorting and gluing project
1. I drew some banana shapes on green paper and yellow paper (you could also draw them on white paper and have your preschooler color them!)
2. Practicing cutting skills and cut out all the bananas
• Sort them by color, and if you drew them different sizes, sort them by size too!
3. Glue the sorted bananas on another piece of paper, divided in the middle – Green and Yellow.

• Banana counting and matching
1. Print this banana worksheet and have your preschooler trace all the B’s
2. I made these banana stickers on with my Silhouette, designed just for this project, or you can buy these banana stickers.
3. Match the 1 banana stickers to the 1 banana on their worksheet, cover up a B with it. Keep going until all the B’s are covered with the matching number of bananas in their column.

• Banana Cutting
1. Get a banana and a plastic knife (or a butter knife if you trust your preschooler!) and let them practice cutting a banana into slices.

Click HERE for lots more BANANA preschool ideas on our blog!!

Back-to-School preschool

• Back-to-School Treasure Hunt
        We love doing “treasure hunts” at our house. So for this back to preschool activity, I set up a treasure hunt, with sticky note clues and lots of back-to-school related books and items that she found along the way.

1. Sticky notes (are the easiest) or paper with clues – as simple as “look under your pillow” and/or draw a picture of a bed with a pillow.
2. Stick the clue to a book or back-to-school item and have them collect them along the way
   
• Tip: the first item my preschooler found was her backpack, so she could then fill it up with all the books and items as she went along.
3. After the hunt, get a snack and sit down to read all the books they found! (see the next few ideas for more activities to go along with some of the books)

• Practice writing their name
1. Read David Goes to School by David Shannon
   
• All throughout the book it uses the writing paper. Point out to your preschooler how the book uses the writing paper with the words. Have your preschool look for letters in their name on the pages.
• Practice using writing paper, write their name (draw solid or dotted letters for them to trace if they need help with their names).
  
  
  
2. Explore different ways to write their name
   We used:
• Pencil/Crayons/Markers/Colored Pencils
• Sidewalk Chalk
• Lettered Beads
• Stamp Letters
• ABC Stickers, Magnents, Stencils
• etc…

• Crayons in Rice sensory bin

1. With the crayons they used to write their name (or from their treasure hunt), bury them in a rice/bean/wheat bin for sensory fun.
• use Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple, Pink, Black, and Brown for a coloring project below.
2. As they dig up each crayon, have your preschooler use it to color the correct items and words on this page.

• Read If You Take a Mouse to School by Laura Numeroff

1. Collect a few items from around the house that are talked about in the book.
   Ideas are:
• Lunchbox
• Notebook and pencils
• Backpack
• Science Experiment (pictured below is THIS one)
• Soap/paper towels
• Building blocks/legos
• Clay/playdoh
• Notebook paper
• Soccer ball/Basketball/Skateboard
• Snack
2. Read the book again, and as you read, have your preschooler find the item you are reading about in the book. Put in order of sequence.
3. Play “What’s Missing”
• Lay all the items you are using for this book out on the floor or table.
• Have your preschooler close their eyes and remove an object (hide it so they dont know what you took)
• Have them open their eyes and figure out what’s missing.
• Then give them a turn to pick and item and you guess what’s missing.

• Read Albert Starts School by Eleanor May

1. Talk about the days of the week, show them on a calendar
• The Dollar store sometimes has days of the week items, or something like these, or make your own, or just write it out!
2. With your preschooler, decide (or tell them) what specific things are planned for each day of the week, just like in the book with Albert and school.
• ie: Mondays is Library day, Tuesdays is Art, etc.
• Leave the schedule up where they will look every day so your preschooler can plan and anticipate what is happening each day of the week.

Back-to-School Preschool Activities - School Bus

It’s Back-to-School time! Before we start our Alphabet Preschool program, we started this year with a some back-to-school activities. Here are our School Bus projects.

• School Bus counting

1. I was inspired by a similar activity at Kidssoup.com. I upgraded to a homemade wooden puzzle version of their activity (see my School Bus DIY on Preschool Alphabet’s Instagram story highlight).
2. Go to Kidssoup.com to get their project, or find a clipart of a school bus and children. Add a spot where you can change the number.
3. For your preschooler, change the number on the bus and have them count out that many kids that go on the school bus. *My bus only goes up to 5, you can make yours to have more or less, depending.
   **My 2 year old loved putting together my wooden puzzle as well!

• If you want to make the DIY School Bus I made, you need:
• High Density MDF 1/4” (at Home Depot or  Lowes)
• A School Bus design (or draw your own like I did)
• A scroll saw and drill press (to make the holes to cut out the windows)
• paint – yellow, grey, black and white and paint brushes
• A little square of sticker vinyl
• Perler beads - for the puzzle piece handles

• School Bus Shapes
• Cut out the following shapes out of construction paper:
• 1 Big yellow rectangle
• 1 Small yellow rectangle
• White squares
• 1 Medium White rectangle
• 2 Black circles
• 1 Long skinny black rectangle

1. Tell your preschooler to find a certain shape and glue it on their paper. [ie: find the big yellow rectangle]
2. OR – they can put together the bus however they want, but have them tell you what shape and color they are gluing down.

• Sing “Wheels on the Bus” with the actions!
1. The wheels on the bus go Round and round
2. The babies on the bus say Waaah waah waah
3. The doors on the bus go Open and close
4. The wipers on the bus go swish swish swish
5. The driver on the bus says Move on back
6. The people on the bus go Up and down
7. The mommies on the bus say Shhh shhh shhh
8. The horn on the bus goes Beep beep beep
9. ETC!

• Draw a School Bus with Art For Kids Hub! (My kids love Art For Kids!)

-Kiley

Huckleberry Preschool

It’s huckleberry season here in Montana, so we did preschool activities to go along with it.
*These activities could also be used with B is for Blueberries (or B is for Berries).

• Pick Huckleberries!
1. We went on a hike to find our huckleberries
2. Pick, and eat, as many huckleberries as you can! (at least 1 cup for the projects below)
3. Talk about the different sizes and colors of huckleberries as you pick
• be sure to also talk about different wild berries how some kinds of berries are not safe to eat, so always ask before they try a berry!

• Huckleberry Dot-Counting
• You’ll need: paper, green crayon/marker/etc, die, and a dot-stamper
  
  
1. Start with a picture of hand drawn leaves all over the page to make a big huckleberry bush (minus the huckleberries, for now).
2. Have your child roll the die and count the dots.
3. Using the dot-stamper (we used a purple color like a huckleberry!), stamp that many “huckleberries” on the bush.
4. Repeat as many times as your preschooler wants, or once the bush fills up!

• Huckleberry Observations and Comparisons
  **My preschooler REALLY like this one.
• You’ll need: dixie cups (or sorter), berries of choice (we used blueberries and huckleberries), paper with observation/comparison questions (see below), crayons
1. Use the handout below, or make your own – on a piece of paper, divide it into as many sections as you have different berries (ie: we used 2 berries, so we had 2 sections – Huckleberry and Blueberry), write the berry names at the top (or have your preschooler write the names), and add things for your preschooler to observe and compare.
• Going through the paper I made:
1. (Write the names of the berries at the top) Which letters in their names are the same - match and color them
2. What color are the berrie
3. What size are the berries – small, medium, or large
4. How do they taste – good, not good, sour
5. How do they smell – good or not good
6. What shape are the berries
7. How much do you like them (color part or all of heart)

1. As you go through the questions with your preschooler, let them answer however they think, then talk about why they answered it that way.
2. After the observations are recorded, let them eat the rest of the berries in the cups!

• Make Huckleberry Muffins
1. Put an apron on your preschooler and let them help measure & pour in the ingredients, and stir the muffin batter
2. If you use liners, put those in, then have your preschooler count a certain amount of huckleberries in each cup
• Each column I told her a different number of huckleberries that she needed to put in (ie: first column is 4 huckleberries, the next is 5 huckleberries, etc.)
• It takes a while to fill up the whole pan with huckleberries, but it’s a great counting activity, especially if they get to eat some berries while they do it!

1. (I added huckleberries to the batter), spoon batter in, and bake. While you wait, you can make up a Huckleberry story!

• Make up a story about a Huckleberry
1. I recorded my preschooler as she made up a story about a huckleberry (named Huck) with question prompts from me. It’s pretty cute what their imaginations come up with.
2. Write it down word-for-word, so they always have that story
3. If they are feeling artistic, have them draw a scene from their story or you can help them draw it and they can add dot-stamp huckleberries (you could also help them make an actual book of their story).
4. Re-tell the story as you look at their picture/s, or have them re-tell it to you while you snack on huckleberry muffins.

My Preschooler’s Huckleberry Story:

-Kiley

Smokey the Bear

Smokey the Bear turns 75 on August 9, 2019!! We wanted to celebrate with some fun preschool activities. *A lot of these activities you can use again on B is for Bear day or F is for Fire day.

• Smokey the Bear size match
1. I made some Smokey the Bear stickers - big, medium and small - with my Silhouette Machine and sticker paper (or you can find some fancy, bigger ones here - these are just one size).
2. Make a simple page with different size fires - big, medium, and small
3. Have your child match and cover the small fires with the small Smokey the Bear stickers, the medium fires with the medium stickers, etc.

• Pretend play - putting fires out
1. Use chalk on a sidewalk, driveway, fence or somewhere else to draw little fires.
2. Use a squirt bottle or water gun to “put out” the fires
3. More advanced, tell your preschooler to put out the “pink” fire, or put out the fire above the F (you will have to use different colors and/or add letters for this game)

• Dress up like Smokey the Bear
1. There’s not a lot to Smokey’s outfit…my girls had to add a little extra in fact (a t-shirt, as he doesn’t wear one!). His outfit includes:
• jeans
• a ranger hat, or similar hat, with 'SMOKEY' on it
• a belt, with 'SMOKEY' on it
• a shovel
• bear (or bare 😉) feet!
2. Dressed up as Smokey, have them say out loud Smokey’s slogan – “Only YOU can prevent wildfires”!

• Make a campfire 

1. Talk about fire safety. 
• *If you know a cub scout, or have one in your family like we do, have them pass off one of their requirements and talk about fire safety.
2. Enjoy the campfire. Roast hot dogs and marshmallows while practicing good fire safety!
3. Put the fire out like Smokey has taught: using water, then a shovel, then more water

• Visit your local Forest Service
1. Or look here for local events happening to celebrate Smokey the Bear’s birthday.
2. High-five and take a picture with Smokey, if you can find him!\

• Go on a hike!! Enjoy the forest, and see if you can spot any Smokey signs!

• Look at forest fire pictures and talk about the facts
1. I was a wildland firefighter for two summers and I have some pretty neat videos of forest fires. Google 'wild land fires' and learn about wildland firefighters. 
2. Talk about how 89% of wildfires in 2018 were caused by humans (source: nifc.gov)
3. Once more, reiterate how important fire safety is!

• Smokey the Bear website activities
1. Make a coloring page
2. Make up a story with Smokey
3. Play Ask Smokey

Happy Birthday Smokey!!