Thursday, September 15, 2011

Blueberries For Sal

This week, the book we used in Peanut's Preschool was Blueberries For Sal. In case you're not familiar with the book, it's about a little girl and her mother and a little bear and it's mother that are all trying to get as many blueberries as they can before winter. I was actually quite surprised that with such simple illustrations, and so many words that this book still held Peanut attention each time I read it.

Here are a few activities we did to go along with this book, and you can also get any of the printables we used in our week by going here.

Peanut placed bear counters on any blueberry that had a "b" on it.


I used a picture of the book cover and turned it into a puzzle. Peanut had to line the numbers up in order to put the cover back together.


We looked for things that were blue in magazines and glued them to a big construction paper blueberry.


Here's a little math page I made to go along with our theme. I was planning on using it for my Kindergartner, but Peanut quickly grasped the concept of how to use the greater than/less than symbol, so we played with this for a while.

Here's a little game both Petie and Peanut loved playing. I took 10 red, and 10 blue pom-poms with magnets glued on and stuck them to our filing cabinet. Then, across the room, on our metal board I put a picture of a raspberry, and one of blueberries. The kids had to race across the room, grab one of their berries, race back and place it under the right picture, and race back for more. The first to transfer all their berries was the winner. (By the way, if you haven't seen this tip yet floating all over Pinterest, these automotive drip pans make great magnetic boards, and they're super cheap. I got mine at Wal-Mart for under 10 bucks and it's huge!)


Peanut did this berry shadow match page over, and over, and over again. For some reason she just LOVED this activity. It's funny the things they enjoy that you just don't expect.


This berry patterning page can be found with all the other printables.


We pretended these pom-poms were berries we had picked and Peanut had to sort the big berries into the big pail, and the little berries into the little pail.


I later looked over and saw Penny ever so carefully scooping and transferring the pom-poms from one pail to another with a spoon. :)


I specifically chose this book for this particular week because in our co-op, the kids picked berries, smashed them, and made them into raspberry jam.

I actually realized this evening that we completely forgot to decorate our book cut-out this week. I guess we'll be doing that tomorrow.

I somehow missed taking pictures of them playing the Blueberry Picking Game I made up, but you can find it here with the other printables along with instructions on how to play. We also watched the telling of this story on youtube. You can find the clip here.

Here are a few more links with Blueberries For Sal related ideas:
Teach Preschool has a really fun blueberry pie craft.
Lightning Bug Literacy has some fun ideas as well.
Jolanthe at Homeschool Creations has created (as always) a fantastic set of printables for this book.

Linking To:


Classified: Mom Shibley Smiles

11 comments:

  1. What wonderful activities! I love you made jam. Blueberries for Sal is a favorite on mine.

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  2. I love Blueberries for Sal too. And I had wondered if my three year old would be ready for it too. He had the same reaction, he loved it! I love your ideas and your magnet board. I hadn't seen that on pinterest yet :) Thanks for sharing!

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  3. I love all these activities! I haven't read this book with my preschooler yet, but I just put it on my library list. I've got to tell you, your blog is one of my favorites! I get so excited to come every weekend to see what you've been up to! :)

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  4. I'd say this is was one of our favorites (Before FIAR books), but I think I say that about them all. =) So FUN!! Love your printables too. Great job.

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  5. These activities are great!

    Thanks for visiting my site and commenting about our Fall Tree paintings. I'm following you along now so I don't miss out on anything! :)

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  6. Great activities. We did B is for blueberries this week and we read Blueberries for Sal. We love that book. I wish I had found those printables beforehand.

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  7. Love your activities! Blueberries for Sal is such a great book! We've added 9 blueberry bushes to our landscape and enjoyed our own blueberries this year. I may have to print these awesome activities for our next blueberry season!
    PS - I am a new follower of yours =)

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  8. This is such a fab book! You activities and printables are great - love the pom pom balls and teddy bears! Kids love using those!

    Thanks so much for sharing & linking to the Sunday Showcase! I hope to see you again this week!

    Bern
    http://momto2poshlildivas.blogspot.com/search/label/Sunday%20Showcase

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  9. What a great collection for a great book!!! I know I'll be using some of these soon!

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  10. This tired grateful teacher thanks you for sharing!!!

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  11. My daughter loved playing the blueberry bush game. She couldn't get enough. What a great way to solidify letters! Thank you!

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