Thursday Toddler Theme - Bears

The theme for today is bears/Corduroy.  

We started our morning by playing bear hide and seek.  I hid the bears in the basement last night and then the girls sat on the step and I gave them clues using position words - under something, beside something, on something, etc.  Lucy went first - her bears were totally out in

 the open - I was just checking to see if she knows her position words.  Norah's were hidden very

 well so she really had to listen for her specific clues.  We may try this again tomorrow and I will let the girls give each other clues.

We read Corduroy and then did a button counting activity.  They both had a piece of construction paper that I had folded in half length-wise.  I drew 2 vertical lines on the paper making 3 squares.  I wrote a number in each square.  The girls had to cut (I still help Lucy a lot with her cutting - but she is doing really well!) on the black lines and then put the same number of buttons on the inside of the square as is written on top.  Lucy just had 1, 2, and 3.  Norah had 8, 11, 16.

Lucy sorted the bear counters - red, yellow, and blue.  Whenever anything is in a bowl, she likes to pretend to eat it.  So after she sorted, she stirred and "ate."

We read The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry and the Big Hungry Bear.  I have the felt pieces to this story - the girls loved retelling the story with these. (So here is where I was going to post a link to the website where I got them - but I can't find them so click here to see some of the other felt storytelling kits.  I also have Corduroy - but I'm going to get that out tomorrow)

The last thing the girls did was paint bears.  I gave them brown and white paint in the same tray and they mixed to paint to make a lighter brown.

For more toddler bear activities click here.