Activities you can do to extend learning
We are always connecting our learning to the seasons: Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring.Changes or transformations happen in every season. We discuss and learn the changes that happen around us during the different seasons.Observe these changes by doing some of these activities with your child. Record your observations by taking pictures, making drawings, talking about them and writing what you have observed.Please, use your senses to discover the world around you. Use your own language and/or English. Remember this is funwork!
Language tip: the words in bold are academic words you want your child to know in your language. Teach the concept of what the word means by discussing and showing things related to the word.
Fall Activities.
Talk about the drop in temperature, the shorter days. After a snowstorm, go out with your child to shovel, make a snowman or a snowfamily, have a snowball fight and make snow angels. Catch a snowflake with your tongue, roll a snowball and bring it inside, put it in the freezer so you can play with snow inside!
Read The Snowy Day, by Ezra Jack Keats. Talk about character and setting in the story and make a connection with your child's life.
Go for a walk by the Hackensack river near the school and observe how parts of the river are frozen, how the tide comes in and out. Have your child tell you about the bare trees, hibernation and what bears do in the winter.
This is a good time to do some indoor activities:
bake, drink hot cocoa or chocolate, sit by a fireplace and enjoy being together as a family.
Spring Activities:
Take a walk and look for signs of spring. Look at the buds and blossoms in the trees as they go from bare to leafy. Look for daffodils, tulips and other flowers that grow from bulbs, we planted some last fall in school! Talk about the change in temperature and about how much longer the days are now. Point out how the light has changed, how the grass has turned green and how many birds have come back north! Discuss how much easier it is to get dressed for school, no more boots, heavy jackets, gloves and hats! Most of all, go outside and enjoy the weather, have a picnic, go for a bike ride, visit the zoo and learn as a family. You might want to plant some seeds in soil and watch them grow.
Summer Activities
Go to the town pool, the beach, the zoo. Take a drive along the Hudson river, stop for a picnic. Set up a lemonade stand. Go camping or set up a tent outside and have a sleepover! Go out in the evening to watch fireflies as they light up the sky! Make ice cream and write down the recipe to share with us in school. If you go back to your home country, keep a journal and take lots of pictures that you can share with us on your return. Email me your travels or comments about a book you are reading. AND... read, read and read!
You may highlight the text and then paste it to any of the translating sites so you can have it in your own language.
Language tip: the words in bold are academic words you want your child to know in your language. Teach the concept of what the word means by discussing and showing things related to the word.
Fall Activities.
- Take a walk and observe the trees
- Talk about the changes or transformations in the trees
- Watch what squirrels and birds are doing during this season
- Pick leaves and encourage your child to discuss what they look like, how the feel, how they smell
- If possible, rake leaves with your child and make a big pile to jump in
- Go apple picking or take your child to the store and look at all the different kinds of apples to compare them. Visit Demarest Farms for apple of pumpkin picking and hay rides. Visit http://www.pickyourown.org/
- Go pumpkin picking or take your child to the store and look at all the different kinds of pumpkins to compare size and weight. DePiero's farm is not too far and it is fun. Visit http://www.depieros.com/ for directions.
- Go to the store and do "an apple investigation": look for all the different kinds of apples, apple juice, apple sauce, apple pie, apple cider. If you can, buy these products and taste them at home.
- Buy a variety of different apples and taste each one with your child. Ask him/her to describe how each one tastes
Practice math by counting, looking at shapes in the objects, comparing sizes, weight and height.
Practice language by asking your child what sounds -in your language- he hears, what other words she knows that begin with that sound.
Talk about the drop in temperature, the shorter days. After a snowstorm, go out with your child to shovel, make a snowman or a snowfamily, have a snowball fight and make snow angels. Catch a snowflake with your tongue, roll a snowball and bring it inside, put it in the freezer so you can play with snow inside!
Read The Snowy Day, by Ezra Jack Keats. Talk about character and setting in the story and make a connection with your child's life.
Go for a walk by the Hackensack river near the school and observe how parts of the river are frozen, how the tide comes in and out. Have your child tell you about the bare trees, hibernation and what bears do in the winter.
This is a good time to do some indoor activities:
bake, drink hot cocoa or chocolate, sit by a fireplace and enjoy being together as a family.
Spring Activities:
Take a walk and look for signs of spring. Look at the buds and blossoms in the trees as they go from bare to leafy. Look for daffodils, tulips and other flowers that grow from bulbs, we planted some last fall in school! Talk about the change in temperature and about how much longer the days are now. Point out how the light has changed, how the grass has turned green and how many birds have come back north! Discuss how much easier it is to get dressed for school, no more boots, heavy jackets, gloves and hats! Most of all, go outside and enjoy the weather, have a picnic, go for a bike ride, visit the zoo and learn as a family. You might want to plant some seeds in soil and watch them grow.
Summer Activities
Go to the town pool, the beach, the zoo. Take a drive along the Hudson river, stop for a picnic. Set up a lemonade stand. Go camping or set up a tent outside and have a sleepover! Go out in the evening to watch fireflies as they light up the sky! Make ice cream and write down the recipe to share with us in school. If you go back to your home country, keep a journal and take lots of pictures that you can share with us on your return. Email me your travels or comments about a book you are reading. AND... read, read and read!
You may highlight the text and then paste it to any of the translating sites so you can have it in your own language.