Penguin Party

P is for Penguins and Pizza

Kate is starting to ask more and more about letters and the sounds they make.  I love our learning time together.  She is so much fun to be with, and she already enjoys learning.  We are currently working on the letter P.  

 Here is a short video of Kate counting the penguins; she is getting so good at counting!

 These little penguin frozen bananas are another Pinterest find.  Kate helped me make them.

 Kate made her own pizza on an Ezekiel English muffin.

 A little cheese for the pizza...

 a little cheese for Kate.

She ate every bite!

Penguin Pairs: Counting By Twos

We enjoy reading books from the Count the Critters series.  This week we are reading Penguin Pairs:  Counting  by 2s by Amanda Doering Tourville.  Emperor penguins dive into the icy cold water two at a time, and each page aids the reader in counting by twos and doing simple addition up to twenty.

We made our own penguin pairs.  C and R each made twelve fingerprint penguins following the directions from the DLTK website.  First, I folded large pieces of construction paper into twelve squares.  Then, I told them to put a white thumbprint in the middle of each square.

Once the thumbprints dried, I showed them how to make black fingerprint wings on each penguin.

I think R was daydreaming as she made her penguin wings!

Again, we waited for the paint to dry, and they added black fingerprint heads to the penguins.  Orange markers were used to add beaks and feet.  The final step was to use a toothpick to dot on white paint eyes.

Once the penguins were done, we cut out the squares and worked on counting by twos up to twenty-four.  C can count by twos much higher, but this was pretty new for R.  She did great and picked up on the concept quickly.

We also used the fingerprint penguins as we read the book to do the addition and counting by 2s.  C was a great helper; it's nice to see that he really wants his sister to understand a concept that he knows well.

On another note, I will never buy cheap paint again.  I thought I was saving money, and figured the paint would work just as well as any other paint, but I was wrong.  C redid his fingerprints several times and the black paint is still very light.  I'll keep this paint for some art activities, but I'm going to buy some better paint to use most of the time!

A Penguin Sandwich

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you know that I like to make cute food.  Sometimes, I have to admit, the cute food is not the least bit appealing to my children.  This sandwich was one of those foods.  Oh well, I'm going to share it anyway.

I began by using a circle cookie cutter to cut a piece of bread.  You could also use a glass to cut the circle shape.

I covered that circle with tiny trapeze all natural marshmallow creme.  It's like Fluff, but from Whole Foods.

Then I cut another circle out of bread, covered that in chocolate hazelnut spread (like Nutella) and cut the circle in half to make wings.

A peppermint patty became the head, and I used icing to make the eyes, beak, and feet.  Guess who ate the sandwich?  Me!  I thought it was good!  C ate the peppermint patty though!

Even though the kids didn't want to try my penguin sandwich, they were happy to listen to the book I chose.  Penguin Day by Victoria Winteringham is a fun picture book that follows a colony of penguins from dawn to dusk.  We especially like the silly illustrations of penguins doing laundry, bathing, and making art!!!

Penguin Cookies, a Penguin Book, and even some Science

 It is January and there is snow on the ground, so that means we are reading penguin books!  Penguins are so cute, aren't they?  I love to watch them at the zoo or the aquarium.

I made a super cute, super easy, no baking involved penguin cookie treat to go along with a few penguin books we have been reading.

To make these penguin cookies you need:  Oreo cookies, Junior Mints candies, and icing (I used white, orange, and blue). 

First, twist off one of the chocolate cookies from a few Oreo cookies.  Cut that cookie in half and place it back on top of the creme to make the wings.  Place a Junior Mints candy on the creme to form the head.  Use the white icing to make the eyes; I used some Oreo cookie crumbs to make the pupils.  Use the orange icing to make beaks and feet.  That's it!  It can't get any easier.

I made one penguin with blue feet because there is a blue footed penguin in one of the books we read.  Do you see him in the picture?   

On the recommendation of Almost Unschoolers, we read 365 Penguins by Jean-Luc Fromental and Joelle Jolivet.  I can't believe that I have never seen this book before; it is SO cute!  On the first day of the new year, the mailman delivers a penguin to a family.  Well, day after day the penguins keep coming and the family has no idea who is sending them or why.  The family, obviously, runs into a few problems feeding and caring for the penguins.  On New Year's Eve, the family discovers that all of the penguins were sent by their uncle, the ecologist.  He explains that the planet is heating up and the penguins territory is getting smaller, so he was hoping to introduce them to the North Pole, but due to exporting restrictions, he was forced to send one penguin a day to the family.  This is a great book for some math practice for kids a bit older than C and R. 

So, why are we linking this post to Science Sunday this week?  Well, we learned a few new science words/terms from 365 Penguins:  ecologist, endangered species, ice caps, and the theory that the planet is heating up and shrinking the South Pole.  We also learned a little about where penguins live.   C and R had a great time!

Find more fun science ideas at Science Sunday!

Penguins

We have been enjoying a few penguin books this week and we made the cutest paper plate penguins to sit and read with us.

If you would like to make your own paper plate penguin, click on the link above for directions.  I like this craft because you only need two paper plates and paint.  We used googly eyes but they aren't necessary. 

Here are the penguin books we are enjoying:
Penguin Dreams by V.L. Walsh - a cute book about a penguin with big dreams. 

Antarctic Antics:  A Book of Penguin Poems by Judy Sierra - a fun collection of poems in which the author imagines life in the Antarctic through the eyes of the chicks in an emperor penguin colony.

Penguin Pairs:  Counting by 2s by Amanda Doering Tourville - count by 2s adding up the penguins as you go along.  This book is part of a series called "Count the Critters".  The other books in the series feature odd or even numbers, counting by 3s, and more. 

Tacky the Penguin by Helen Lester- this is a great book about a penguin who is a bit odd, but his oddities pay off in the end.  This is a good book to use for teaching tolerance or individuality.

We strongly recommend all of these books!
To see more book projects, check out stArt at A Mommy's Adventures.

Penguins Playing in the Snow

We have created so many snowmen over the last few weeks that we had to move on to something different.  I thought penguins would be fun, and C has been learning about penguins in school so they seemed like the perfect craft subject.

C and R made snowy backgrounds by painting bubble wrap with white paint and then pressing the bubble wrap down onto the paper.

Once the paint dried, they made penguins out of hearts and sent them out to play in the snow!

For directions on how to make your own heart shaped penguins click here.

To get that messy hair, wake up and begin crafting immediately.