Top 10 Proven Preschool Activities for Pp

Number 1: PLAY!

If you do nothing else this week, please let it be play!  Of course, almost everything I suggest is about playful learning because it is essential for children, and pretty darned important for grown-ups too.

Number 2: Pizza

See, learning about the letter P is fun AND delicious!  You already know I love to cook with children, and what's better for this week than making and eating pizza?! 

Depending upon how much time I want to spend on this, and on the age and skill level of my kiddos, I've had them help me make pizza dough (I cheat and use the bread machine), or I've used something as a pre-made crust.  Both work beautifully, are fun and fairly easy, and you end up with something delicious that your children will want to eat.  Today let's talk about letting children make their very own mini pizzas by using half an English muffin as a crust.

 I like to put out pizza toppings for the children to choose, and invite them a couple at a time to come and assemble their pizzas.  If you want to really talk about the sound of Pp, consider offering pepperoni, peppers, and pineapple along with any other toppings you want.  

It does take a few minutes for a preschooler to scoop up the ingredients they want, and to spread them on their pizza.  They're making decisions, estimating how much they want of each ingredient, and working their finger muscles as they arrange the toppings.  This is a fine motor, sensory, life-skill, healthy eating experience, and that's definitely worth the time it takes!

Make sure you know who's pizza is where on the baking sheet, because they WILL want THEIR OWN pizza!  Bake it until everything is hot and the cheese is starting to turn golden, and then.... well, your child will help you figure out what comes next!

Number 3: Pigs in a blanket

This is another fun cooking activity for your little ones, and you'll just need a can of biscuit dough and some mini sausages.

Let the children cut the pieces of biscuit dough in half, and squish each half.  Lay a sausage on the dough, then roll it up.

Lay them on a baking sheet and bake according to the directions for the dough.  YUM!

Again, if you're not sure what comes next, ask your children, they'll know it's time to eat!

Number 4: Picnic

You might be thinking a picnic takes a lot of planning and preparation, but when you're dealing with children, simply taking your meal outside to eat equals a picnic!  I like to keep a picnic blanket handy so we can make a picnic in just moments.  Have a large box from a delivery?  Instant picnic table! 

There's something magical about getting outside to eat - and of course, once they're done eating, it's time to PLAY!

Number 5: Puddle Stomping!
 

This is one of my all time favorite preschool activities, and one I think most of my former students remember well, even many years later.  I have a couple of pro-tips to help make this activity go smoothly, even with a group of children.

- Plan ahead.  Before you ever head out the door, make sure you have towels and dry clothes handy for afterwards.  Is your child wearing something that is okay to get wet, or do they need to change into play clothes first? Is the puddle in a place that's safe for bare feet? 

- Set limits.  Is splashing okay?  Are you getting full body wet, or just feet?  What space do you expect the children to stay in?  By thinking this through ahead of time you save yourself having lots of tired, wet children making a mess in your house afterwards!

I like to have the children take off their shoes and socks inside, and then head out. We run, we stomp, we splash... then we look for earthworms that have been washed out, and gently rescue them from the puddles.  We run around some more, and we notice how different everything looks when it's wet.  Take off your shoes and stomp right along with your child - I promise, it's fun!

Number 6: Penguins

Read about them (here's a post about penguin books), craft them, act like them, there are so many awesome ways to include penguins in your learning! Did you know Emperor penguin daddies keep their unhatched eggs warm on their feet? 

Penguins DO waddle, but they also like to slide on their bellies, which is called tobogganing.

They live in colonies or rookeries, and their chicks are fluffy and gray - NOT black and white.  

These are pictures of our penguin rookery - the patterns and instructions are available in my TeachersPayTeachers store here if you're interested, or for a penguin craft and games for learning letter P, check out this resource:

Number 7: Pirates

I've blogged about our pirate activities several times - check those posts out here, here and here!

Number 8: Hand prints and foot prints, of course!

As always, you can find the original inspiration for each of these, and many more ideas for similar crafts on this Pinterest board.

Number 9: Puzzles

Do you and your littles do puzzles together?  Puzzles require children to look for similarities and differences in shape and color, to rotate pieces, to work their finger muscles, to think about what the picture is supposed to look like, and much more.  Start with puzzles with 4 or 5 pieces, and work up to more complex ones.  You can usually find puzzles at resale stores or garage sales for very little money, and your local library may also have some in the play area that you can use while you're looking for books!

Number 10: Letter crafts

Make the letter-sound connection by creating letters that go along with some of the letter Pp activities you're doing this week.  We added penguins to pink or purple lower case letter p, and turned the upper case P into a pepperoni and peppers pizza pie. 

Have a great week friends - peace!

8 Outstanding Options for Over-the-top O Activities

What's so outstanding about letter Oo?  The variety of options for learning activities!  From oceans to outside time, baking oatmeal muffins to sorting ovals to lovely hand print art, there's so much to do!

Let's start with oceans and octopi... octopuses...the octopus.  You probably have some favorite ocean themed books - and of course so do I!

If you're wanting to learn octopus facts, I love Gentle Giant Octopus by Karen Wallace, and so do my students.  Just for fun?  Octopus's Garden, by Ringo Starr.  Bonus points, it includes a sing-a-long CD, so you and your littles can learn (or relearn) the song.  While you're at it, check out the gorgeous illustrations in Inky's Amazing Escape by Sy Montgomery and Over in the Ocean by Mariann Berkes.  

I haven't get read Manfish A Story of Jacques Cousteau by Jennifer Berne, but a study of the ocean is incomplete without learning about him, and again, the illustrations look awesome!

Many years ago I made an ocean tent to go over a card table - super easy to do - and my students have had a lot of use out of it!  I found a couple of panels of ocean fabric that measured the same size as my card table, and added some plain blue fabric for the other 2 sides.  I put a cord through the top hem, and tied it onto the card table.  It takes about 2 minutes to put up or take down, and folds quite small for storage. (I was inspired by tents from https://www.etsy.com/shop/missprettypretty ).  Just add ocean stuffed animals or other toys for some fantastic pretend play!

 Your littles might also enjoy working on patterns with ocean animals - here's a fun way to do that:

and early readers will enjoy this FREE reading center - click here to download it!

If you're in the mood to do some cooking with your little ones, AND you want them to eat healthy foods, try the oatmeal muffin recipe I wrote about here. Look at all the delicious ingredients: 

Remember to let your little ones help you cook - they're spending quality time with you, learning life skills, and if they help you cook something, they're more likely to try eating it.  Want more?  They're also developing fine motor skills, counting scoops, measuring ingredients and learning vocabulary - they are learning.

If you've been reading my blog for long, you know I also love to do hand print art with my kiddos, and letter O is no exception!  Here are 3 fun ideas: otter, owl and ostrich!  

The ostrich came from CreativityTakesFlight.com, the otter was uploaded to Pinterst without credit, and I'm not sure about the owl either.  As always, you can find more hand print and foot print art ideas on this Pinterest board:

Don't forget to add outside time to your letter Oo activities!  This is so open ended, you're sure to have some favorite outdoor ideas - or brainstorm with your children and try something new!

It's always a good time to revisit shapes and other math concepts; we broke out some magnetic shapes that include ovals.  As you can see they're fun for sorting, or making patterns, or simply look for ovals and other shapes in your environment. 

Finally, here are two great picture book characters for the letter O: the giant squid from I'm The Biggest Thing in the Ocean (by Kevin Sherry) and Olivia (from the series by Ian Falconer).  I came up with both of these crafts, which encourage lots of fine motor skills (cutting, gluing, even painting).  I hope you and your little ones enjoy them!
 

Click here for a quick tutorial on how to make the squid from  I'm the Biggest Thing in the Ocean, or get everything ready made for labeling, graphing, measurement AND this activity in my TeachersPayTeachers store.

Here are the shapes your child will need to cut out and assemble to create Olivia...

... we think she's pretty adorable!  

Have an over the top outstanding week of O activities, and come back next week for penguins, polar bears and positively perfect ideas for letter Pp!  See you then, Paula