Monday, October 26, 2009

G is for Goldilocks

We have reached the end of our alphabet project. We started this project long before I had a blog, so most of our letter projects have not been posted. The letter "G" has been out there, waiting for the right idea to come along, and finally we decided on Goldilocks.

I cut the letter "G" out of a paper plate and R painted it.If you haven't noticed before, R loves to wear her bathing suit (or "bathing soup" as she calls it). You would think we live in Hawaii (that would be nice). We live in Massachusetts, and it is not warm.

While we waited for the paint to dry, we read two different versions of Goldilocks and the Three Bears.


The Three Bears by Paul Galdone: This is the classic tale, or at least I thought it was until I read the reviews on Amazon. There are a lot of complaints about the bears not being referred to as Papa, Mama, and Baby Bear in this book. They are Great Big Bear, Middle-Sized Bear, and Little Wee Bear. I thought it was strange when I read the book, but it never crossed my mind that it was an attempt at political correctness. The reviewers seem to think it is just that. I don't know if it is, but my children saw the bears and immediately thought of them as a family with a father, mother, and baby. Maybe they would see the bears differently if they had a different type of family. Anyway, I think people get worked up over the silliest things. Does it really matter what we call the bears?

R told me this book had to be read while wearing sunglasses.

Goldilocks and The Three Martians by Stu Smith: Goldilocks is fed up with chores and homework so she decides to build a spaceship and blasts off to Mars for an adventure. This is a fun twist on the classic story, and there are even bears and porridge in the story. Also, the martians are a family and are referred to as Papa, Mama, and Baby. We spent a little time comparing this book to the original story. R and C both enjoyed this activity.

R made this Goldilocks "G" almost entirely by herself. She grabbed a piece of pink paper and decided to cut out a dress. Then she cut some yellow yarn and made hair. I tied the ribbon for her, but that is all I did. She drew the face and the hand. I loved how proud she was when she finished.


Now that we have finished the uppercase letters, we are going to focus on lowercase letters for a while. R already knows all of the uppercase and lowercase letters, but she really enjoys the alphabet project and she is only three so I think it is a great review of the alphabet.

9 comments:

Susana said...

Your letter "Gg" is adorable. R did a super job.

Joe lives this story/book and I've never heard of the Martian version--we'll be looking for it.

Never knew the interesting fact about the political correctness of it--wow.

Very funny about R in her bathing suit and sunglasses:-).

Love this!

Jen said...

Oh, the Martian book looks great! I love Fractured Fairy tales- creative way to share point of view with the kids or a creative spin on a story.

Little girls and swimsuits? Funny to see you comment on that because my girls want to run around in theirs all of the time, even if it is 35 degrees out!

Hope your family is feeling better!

Take Care!

Jen from
Creative and Curious Kids!
http://raisingcreativeandcuriouskids.blogspot.com

Jenny said...

Great activities! LOL about her wearing her swimsuit.

Cara said...

The Martian story sounds cute, and I love the photo with the sunglasses (and swimsuit!). My son likes to run around w/ no shirt and his hat on. :)

Mandy said...

R does look super proud. I wish I could get myself together in order to do a project like this all the way through but for some reason, I struggle with it. My Donut doesn't know most of her letters and I wish I could figure out some wants to teach her the letters without doing any work! LOL

Valerie @ Inner Child Fun said...

Emily told me Goldilocks and the Three Martians needed to be read while wearing a tin foil hat. We never thought of sunglasses, but perhaps they would do a better job of protecting our brains from being read by aliens.

silly eagle books said...

I love the G with a dress--great idea. I also love the "wearing sunglasses while reading" thing--hilarious! My soon to be 3 year old is always telling me how things are supposed to be, too!

Natalie PlanetSmarty said...

I really like what R did - did you discuss "the vision" before or did she come up with it entirely on her own? Her cutting is pretty impressive too.
We also read several different versions of Goldilocks. My favorite was Brett's book with very elaborate illustrations. Anna's favorite is a pop-up version that we have at home :)

Lynn said...

I keep debating whether to start an alphabet project. I found a perfect portfolio folder to make an alphabet book out of when i was unpacking yesterday. I guess we should join the crowd and do it. It would help us to fill our winter days.