Wild Animal Adventures

I heard a lot of roaring, hissing, braying and howling at preschool this week. The children played a spirited game of Animal Memory giving a loud "hip, hip, hooray" when a match was found, kept us guessing during animal charades, listened to zebra and hippo tell stores (puppet show) and then made their own puppets and even took a journey to Africa in the safari bus. Their exuberance for all things animals was apparent as they delved into a lot animal play during free play.

Searching for animals near the pond. Sometimes I forget how literal children are and talked about hippos drinking at watering holes like this. Avah then went on a serious hippo hunt and kept asking where they were. I'm afraid she was quite disappointed on the realization that there are no hippos in my backyard.

Searching for animals on the safari.

Working together to plan a fantastic block zoo.

Getting the tools ready to build the zoo.

Lining up some animals for a walk.

Watching the fascinating builders next door. They watched a forklift deliver pallets of bricks and watched the bathtub man deliver his goods. It gave me an opportunity to talk more about the process of home building with them.

Resting in between dancing songs. At the end of each song I encourage them to lay down till the next song starts-gives them a chance to catch their breath after all those crazy moves.

Slithering snakes.

Counting out bananas to feed the monkeys.

Sierra got the camera and took this pictures (one of many surprises I found on my camera). Sometimes I have the children practice writing their numerals on top of mine with different colored chalk. This is a great activity to help reinforce writing their names. Try it with crayons, markers, chalk or even paint- so fun!