Category: Winter

Alphabet, Arctic Animals, Counting, Fine Motor Skills, Sensory Play, Winter

MORE Penguin Activities for Preschool

Lauren Johnson

There’s been a lot of penguin fun in our playroom this week! Penguins are a perfect theme to explore during the winter months. There are so many fun penguin activity ideas for preschoolers. I’m excited to share with you some penguin sensory activities, loose parts play, a penguin number sort, and a penguin letter matching activity. Take a look!

Sensory bins are by far my favorite activity to prepare for preschoolers. I usually prepare 3 – 4 each month to rotate in and out of our playroom. They always inspire long stretches of imaginative play. This penguin themed sensory bin is super simple. It has a cotton ball base to resemble snow, foam snowflake stickers and plastic penguin figures (Amazon). My 4 year old daughter, Lillian, had a blast hiding penguins under the “snow” and making the other penguins look for them. She also set them all up in a circle and hosted a penguin dance off. She loved it!!

Another incredibly simple penguin sensory activity that we enjoyed was playing with penguins in shaving cream. I gave my daughter a tray with a generous pile of shaving cream and two small penguin figurines. These particular penguins are from the Safari LTD Penguin Toob that I purchased at Michael’s. I like these penguins especially because they are positioned on their bellies, perfect for sliding around in the shaving cream. 

We used the penguins to make letters, shapes and designs in the shaving cream. Lillian never hesitates when it comes to getting messy so she was happy to use her hands to make a design, wipe it away and make a new one. This is an activity that stays fun year after year. I keep it on hand for her older brothers too!

Now that Lillian has finally stopped putting everything little thing in her mouth, we are really diving into the world of loose parts play. I set up a fun arrangement for a penguin themed loose parts invitation to play and Lillian dived right in! This set up included blue and white pom poms, blue and clear flat marbles, acrylic snowflake scatter, reusable ice cubes, small blue and clear plastic cups, and blue and white unifix cubes. The clear plastic trays they are presented in are from Dollar Tree. I used felt sheets to define each child’s work space and more penguin figurines from the Penguin Toob. 

Lilly got right to work gathering up materials for her penguin world. She very carefully arranged the pieces and added her penguins in their new little home. She made them a bridge and some ocean to swim in. This activity held her attention for a while as she practiced manipulating all the little parts, strengthening her fine motor skills and improving concentration. 

I even joined in the fun too! It was so relaxing to build and create with all these little parts. When Lillian was finished, she asked me to leave it out so she could come back and build more later! We will definitely be adding more loose parts activities to our plans!

Here is her creation from the second round of building. I found her doing this completely independently a couple days after introducing this activity. She was so proud of what she had built, she wanted me to take a picture!

As with every theme, I like to work in some practice with math, especially counting. Lillian enjoys counting activities very much and is proficient with numbers 1 – 5. She still needs practice with one to one correspondence when it comes to number 6 and higher. To help her practice, I pulled out a Penguin Number Sort activity that I had on hand. This game has several penguin number mats (1 – 10) and fish cards representing numbers in different forms.

You can decide which penguin number cards to use and place the corresponding fish cards in a sensory bin. The fish cards represent numbers in word form, number form, tens frames and tallies. 

Because this was Lillian’s first time playing a game with tallies, I decided to stick with numbers she knows well. I chose the 3, 4, and 5 penguin cards and placed the corresponding fish cards in a sensory bin for her to find and sort. She still needs help with reading the words and that is fine. I just want her to develop a concept of print and know that numbers have a word too. We will worry about actually reading the words later!

I try to add an element of play and imagination to the learning games that I set up for the playroom. We weren’t just sorting numbers, we were catching fish for the penguin’s dinner! Lillian was excited to “fish” for the penguins and figure out who gets which fish. In the future, I would add a paper clip to each fish and use a magnetic fishing rod to make it even more fun. 

During our penguin week, we also took some time to practice letter recognition with this Penguin Alphabet Cover activity. This activity allows preschoolers to recognize, name and match uppercase and lowercase letters. The alphabet mats only present 5 – 6 letters at a time, so that activity is perfect for preschoolers with a shorter attention span or those to have trouble attending to activities that work with the whole alphabet at once. You can set this up as an individual activity, giving your students one mat at a time to “cover up” or a group activity, providing all 5 mats and having students work as a team to get them covered. As before, there is an element of play to this activity as well. You can pretend the penguins are all mixed up in the bin and need help finding the correct “home” on the icebergs.

 

Because I specifically wanted Lillian to practice identifying and naming the letters in her name, I quickly hand drew a new iceberg mat with the uppercase and lowercase letters of her name. I pulled the letters I needed from the letter cards and set them up in a sensory bin. I told Lillian to help me find each penguin’s spot on the iceberg and she was excited to help.

As she chose each penguin, we practiced saying the name of the letters, talked about uppercase and lowercase, then found their spot on the iceberg. When we were finished, we touched each letter and said their names again. Lillian has her L’s down pat because that one is first. To my surprise, she is doing a good job with lowercase i and uppercase I as well. The letters she is having the most trouble with is lowercase a and n. We will keep practicing!!

The last thing I want to share with you from our very fun week of penguin activities is our art. I decided to do a directed drawing with Lillian. She is newly four and just recently started drawing people in more detail. I figured this is the perfect time to introduce directed drawings to her. We used the directed drawing instructions from Pocketful of Preschool that I got as a free download several years ago. I just ran a quick search and wasn’t able to find it again (at least for free anyway). However, there are LOTS of options out there, including some free ones on TpT. Feel free to choose the one you like best!

We started by painting the “snowy sky” background first. I provided a palette of paints with white, light blue, and light purple. I encouraged her to paint the whole paper and she was happy to oblige! On a separate sheet of paper, we went through each step of the directed draw together. She did deviate a little (as Lilly usually does!) because she wanted the nose to be a circle not a triangle. Once the paint was dry on our background, I colored and cut out our penguins and Lillian glued them to the snowy scene. 

Tada! Lillian was so excited to see the finished products and we will proudly hang these in our playroom. 

Thanks for checking out our fun activities from Penguin week! I hope this post inspired you to do some purposeful playing and learning with your preschoolers or helped you plan out your week in the classroom! If you need any links to the activities mentioned in this post, you can find them below.

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Alphabet, Book Companion, Valentine's Day, Winter

Valentine’s Day Monster Activities for Preschool *FREE Printable*

Lauren Johnson

Valentine’s Day is fast approaching!! If you are in need of some Valentine’s Day activities for your plans, you have come to the right place. In this post, I will share some monster puzzles, ABC monster games, as well as a fun Valentine’s Day monster FREEBIE to help your preschoolers order the letters in their name, identify letters, and identify letter sounds.

Preschoolers absolutely love learning the letters and spelling of their own names. Here’s a look at the Valentine’s monster name puzzles. These puzzles are editable so that you can add the names of your own students with templates that support names with 2 – 15 letters. You can also use these puzzles to practice counting, ordering letters, spelling vocabulary words and sight words, if you so choose.

There are several ways to use these name puzzles. I prefer to print them in color, laminate them, and add a magnet to the back of each piece. This makes the pieces easier to manipulate on a magnetic surface. A cookie tin from the Dollar Store is an easy way to display the pieces with plenty of room to arrange the puzzle. If you choose not to laminate the pieces for reuse, your students can glue the pieces in order on a sheet of construction paper.

Black and white versions of each template are available with this resource if you prefer not to or don’t have access to colored ink. You preschoolers can color their own name puzzles, cut out the pieces, order them and glue. This approach would incorporate some very important fine motor skills as well.

You can have your preschoolers go on their own “Love Hunt” with the Love Monster Alphabet search and find activity. With this activity, you can display the alphabet cards and tuck the 10 monster cards underneath 10 different alphabet cards at random without letting the students see. Your little learners can take turns naming each letter then peek underneath to see if they find a monster. This can be cooperative or competitive, it’s up to you!

If you would like your preschoolers to keep track of where the monsters are found, there are two alphabet mat variations to use. Students can cover up the colored hearts with counters or monster erasers with the colored version. If you prefer black and white, have your students color or dot the letters where the monsters are found.

You can also use the Love Monster Alphabet Mats with search and find sensory bins or alphabet hunts around the room. I set up a sensory bin with our 1 inch tiles for Lillian to find and match the letters. You could also use the letter cards and “hide” them around the room. Have students walk around and color in each alphabet heart as they find the corresponding letter. These Love Monster Alphabet Mats are available for FREE in my shop. The link to this freebie is at the bottom of this post.

Update: I found these amazing little heart shaped containers at Walmart and had to grab them for this activity!! They are just the right size to fit the 1 inch letter tiles that I like to use with this Search and Find Activity. They would also fit alphabet erasers or letter beads if you prefer to use those. I simply put one letter tile in each heart and hid the hearts in a sensory tray full of black beans. They added task of opening the little containers is not only super fun and engaging, it is any way to build those fine motor skills which is exactly what preschoolers need before they learn to write. 

The last Love Monster activity I designed for Valentine’s Day is a set of Love Monster Alphabet Puzzles. This activity includes a set of 26, four piece puzzles. Each puzzle represents a different letter of the alphabet with a piece for the uppercase letter a piece for the lowercase letter and two pieces for a picture that begins with that letter. My favorite way to put these puzzles together is cooperatively in a small group. Because all 26 puzzles at once can be cumbersome, I prefer to choose 10 – 12 letters to focus on for the game and only use those pieces. Once I’ve selected the pieces I want to use, I mix them up and create a draw pile. Each player takes a turn drawing a card and placing it on the table. If the card goes with another card that has been played, it gets placed with that puzzle. If it begins a new puzzle, it gets placed in an empty space on the table. Your students can work together adding pieces until all the puzzles are complete. The Love Monster picture on each puzzle provides an opportunity for your students to self correct as they go.

That’s it! I had a lot of fun creating and preparing these fun Valentine’s Day activities for preschool and kindergarten. I hope that you are inspired by them as you plan a fun Valentine’s week for your little learners!

If you would like all the fun Valentine’s Day Monster activities, including the FREE alphabet mat, you can find them in my shop by clicking the icons below.

You may also be interested in these posts from my blog!

Arctic Animals, Book Companion, Color Fun, Uncategorized, Winter

Penguin Activities for Preschoolers *FREEBIE*

Lauren Johnson

It’s been a while, but I’m back!! Now that we are in the midst of winter, I’ve got some fun activities for you all about one of our favorite cold weather animals- PENGUINS! In this post you will find penguin books, center ideas, sensory play ideas and a fun craftivity especially designed for your preschoolers.

There is no shortage of adorable penguin themed books for little readers. I always try to balance out a mix of nonfiction and fiction books for my kids to choose from. Most of these titles have bright, engaging pictures as well as short, predictable text. My three year old daughter, Lillian, loves books but she doesn’t yet have the attention span for long drawn out stories. I will say Penguin Problems, by Jory John and Lane Smith is one of my absolute favorites. It’s a funny story about a penguin who complains. A lot. When a wise walruses teaches the penguin to appreciate the wonderful things in his life, he begins to see that life out on the frozen ice isn’t so bad. If you like Karma Wilson and Jane Chapman’s lovable character from the “Bear Snores On” series, you will love Where is Home, Little Pip? The story is about a sweet, curious penguin who wandered too far from the nest. The story and the illustrations are so engaging.

We spent a lot of time with Penguins Love Colors, by Sarah Aspinall. This is a fun story about 6 little penguins who all have a different favorite color, even though their home is surrounded by almost all white. They paint their mom a colorful picture in the snow, reviewing all the colors as they go, then get a much needed bath at the end.

I created a few colorful penguin activities to do after reading Penguin Loves Colors. The first activity Lillian chose was a colorful penguin and iceberg matching game. I set up the colorful penguins in an easy sensory tray and laid out the iceberg mats so that everybody could reach. We took turns choosing a penguin, naming the color and placing it on the correct iceberg. Lillian and her friend did a great job deciphering between pink and red, light blue and blue, and black and gray.

The next activity I created is a simple two piece puzzle set to match each color in the story, Penguins Love Colors. Each character was given a named based on their favorite color: Tulip, Tiger Lily, Dandelion, Violet, Bluebell, and Broccoli. With these puzzles, preschoolers can match the penguins to their corresponding picture by matching the colors.

Who loves Write the Room activities?? All of my kids love the challenge of finding all the elements of the story around the room and recording their findings on their recording sheets. I created a picture and word card for each colorful penguin in the story and designed three different recording sheets to choose from based on your learners’ abilities. The first recording sheet is for your pre-writers and requires only coloring to record their penguin findings around the room.

The other recording sheets are for writing (and coloring if you choose!). There are two versions of the Write the Room recording sheets. One version has a large space for preschoolers to write each word. This is better for those kiddos who are just beginning to write and need lots of room for their letters. The second version of the Write the Room recording sheet has smaller boxes designated for the words. You can give this sheet to your more confident writers to help them hone in on their fine motor skills.

Lillian is just starting to learn how to write letters, so I decided to use the Color the Room recording sheet with her. I taped the colored penguin cards to 6 plastic cups and provided the corresponding marker in each cup ahead of time. I hid the penguins around the house and had Lillian look for them. Each time she found another penguin, she could use the marker to color a penguin on the recording sheet. She was so engaged in the activity!

Up next, I created a Colorful Penguin Spinner Game. Preschoolers can use the spinner at the top of the page with a pencil and paper clip. This game can be used individually or with a partner. Preschoolers can take turns spinning the spinner and coloring in the corresponding colored penguin. The first color to get to the top of the graph is the winner! I like to laminate these or put them in page protectors so that they can be used over and over.

Another fun way to practice colors is with dot markers! I designed these colorful penguin cards with my pocket dice in mind. However, you can simply flip them over to make a draw pile or put them in a paper bag for students to pick from. As students roll (or choose) a new color, they dot a corresponding dot onto their Penguin Dot Art sheet. You can even add a standard dice to turn it into a counting game. For example, if your preschooler roles blue and 5, they add 5 blue dots to their picture.

Lillian is loves numbers and counting games, so we played with the color dice and number dice. We each took turns rolling the dice and dotting the penguin the right number of colored dots. She was so proud of her colorful penguin at the end!

Of course, the best way to follow up any story is with art. After we were finished reading and practicing colors, we created a colorful penguin ice painting.

This art project took a little prep ahead of time, but it was worth it. I simply filled an ice cub tray about 3/4 full of water. Then I gave each ice cube compartment a squirt of washable tempura paint. I added a popsicle stick to each ice cube and place the tray in the freezer over night. You will need to take them out of the freezer a few minutes before you start painting to let them melt slightly. The melted water becomes your medium so the paint will show up better when the cubes are wet. The final project ended up resembling pastels. So fun!

After we were done painting, we used some pre cut out shapes to build penguins on our masterpieces. I designed a template to use to make these shapes. I traced each shape onto the color paper that I wanted and cut them out ahead of time. You could also have your preschoolers color and cut each shape themselves, depending on ability. You can download this template for FREE at the bottom of this post.

Last but not least, to wrap up our penguin day fun, we played penguin ice rescue. Ahead of time, I froze small plastic penguin toys in yogurt containers filled with water. When it was time, I popped them out on a tray and gave Lillian and her friend a cup of warm water and a plastic dropper. I allotted 15 – 20 minutes for this activity and they played with it for almost an hour!

The girls took their time excavating the penguins from each block of ice, talking about the parts of the penguin as they emerged from the ice. Then they played together with the penguins in their little ice world, setting up a penguin hospital and giving them all a check up. I love how their imagination took this activity a step further and made it so engaging!

I hope you found some inspiration for your preschoolers from this post. If you would like access the resources mentioned above, you can find them by clicking the link below.

You can download the FREE Penguin Loves Colors Craft Template by clicking the DOWNLOAD button below.

Penguin Template Download

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Alphabet, Winter

Snowman Alphabet Activity for Preschool and Kindergarten

Lauren Johnson

It is freeeezing cold here and we are exploring all things winter, snowmen included. I am excited to show you this Build A Snowman Letter and Sound Match activity!! Not only is it adorable, it can be turned into a cooperative game. Have you ever played the game Hiss with your preschoolers??? If you have, this game will feel familiar.

The Build a Snowman game is designed to strengthen letter recognition as well as beginning sound recognition skills. It has 104 cards, 4 for each letter of the alphabet. To build a complete snowman, you will need a head card, uppercase letter, lowercase letter and picture card (with a corresponding beginning sound). This may sound like a lot of cards, but don’t worry!! I designed this game so that is is easy to cut with a paper cutter to save you precious time.

Players

This game works best with 1-4 players.

Setup

Before you begin the game, you will need to decide how many letters of the alphabet you want to include. I suggest using no more than the cards for 12 letters of the alphabet at a time (48 cards total). This will keep the game manageable as far as space and time needed to play.

Shuffle the selected cards and place them all in a draw pile that your students can reach.

How to Play

Decide who will go first.

For each turn, have players draw one card and decide where to place it on the table or work space.

Head cards can be placed on top of any snowman that needs a head.

The letter and picture cards must be placed with other corresponding letter and picture cards.

If there are no corresponding cards on the table for the card that has been drawn, that card can be placed on the table alone to start a new snowman.

Continue drawing and placing cards until all the snowmen are built.

Because this is a cooperative game, there are no winners and losers. Preschoolers and kindergarteners can work together or independently to complete the task of building all the snowmen. I especially like this format because it keeps the cards organized and sets the pace for the activity.

The cards are designed in such a way so that they are able to be placed in any order, as long as the head is at the top. This makes it easier to match the letters and pictures in the order they are drawn from the pile.

If you would like to add the Build a Snowman Letter and Sound Matching Game to your classroom or homeschool, you can find it by clicking the image below. Have fun with your little learners!

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Alphabet, Winter

Snowflake Alphabet Activities for Preschool

Lauren Johnson

I’ve got some new winter alphabet activities for you! Just in time for our first snowfall!! These activities are perfect for preschoolers who are mastering their letter recognition, letter sound correspondence, and letter formation.

This set of activities is everything SNOWFLAKES and includes several ways to use these Snowflake Themed Letter cards. I included a set of uppercase and lowercase letters so that you can decide what your preschoolers need to practice.

The Say, Build, Write Mat is perfect for these dry erase sleeves. I got these from the Target Dollar Spot over the summer, but you can just as easily use a page protector with dry erase markers. The mat allows your preschooler to display a letter card, say the name, say the sound, build the letter, and write the letter.

I left the “build” area of the mat open ended so that you can decide what materials you would like to provide your preschoolers to build the letters. Giving the kiddos a choice of materials would also work well. Things like pipe cleaners, mini erasers, play doh or beads are great options.

What is it with preschoolers and dice?? Writing letters can seem like a tedious task until dice are involved. The Snowflake Letter Cards fit easily inside pocket dice. You can choose 6 letters you would like your preschooler to practice writing. Then have them toss the dice and record the letter they land on. This activity works well in partners or independently.

Snowflake Search and Cover miiiighhtt be my favorite activity in this set because it’s just so fun to set up the search tray. For this one, I just tossed a bag of cotton balls into a tray and set the cards up, but you can present them however you like! Make a draw pile, a sensory bin, it’s up to you!

Next, I’ve included a Snowflake Color the Room recording sheet in uppercase and lowercase letters. For this activity, you simply hang the Snowflake Letter Cards throughout the room and have students travel around to find them. As they find the letters around the room, they can color them on their recording sheet. Lillian is just learning pen control, but she enjoyed pointing to the letters and saying their names as we found them around the room.

For those preschoolers who are ready to write, I’ve also included at Snowflake Write the Room Recording Sheet in lowercase and uppercase letters. This is an easy way to differentiate too! Simply give your pre-writers the coloring sheet and your writers the tracing sheet. They will be completing the same activity but fine tuning different skills. Win-win!

The best part of this set of activities is that once you have the Snowflake Alphabet Cards ready to go, all you have to do is print the rest! The cards can be used with all the recording sheets in this resource, so you can get a lot of mileage out of one prep.

If you would like to add the Snowflake Alphabet Activities to your collection of winter themed activities for preschool, just click the image below.

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Winter

Preschool Mitten Activities *FREE Printable*

Lauren Johnson

Winter is here! Emmett, Lillian and I started January out by talking about the characteristics of winter and all things mittens. Keep reading to find a FREE mitten matching printable.

The playroom is now STOCKED with books about winter and snow for the month of January. I choose to read Winter is Here to my preschoolers to introduce characteristics of winter. We talked about winter words like mittens, coat, scarf, snowman, etc. We pointed out winter words and pictures as we read the story. You can find FREE printable Winter word cards HERE. There are many, many more winter and snow books available for the kids to flip through on their own or bring to me during reading time.

After the story, we listened to the song Three Little Kittens (Little Baby Bum version). Then we gathered all the mittens in the house and took turns “losing” them. This was basically an Easter egg hunt with mittens instead of eggs and the kids loved it. After the last round, we piled all the mittens together, matched them, and counted our matches.

Next, Emmett decided to play a mitten memory game that I’ve had in my stash for a couple of years. This particular mitten matching game came from Karen at Prekinders. You can check out more of her winter themed resources HERE. Matching games are his FAVORITE. Now that he is five, he can play by the original “concentration” rules. But if this is too challenging for your preschooler, you can adapt the game by allowing students to only turn 1 card over on each turn and leave it facing up during the game. This way, your preschooler can focus more on visual discrimination as opposed to remembering where each card is.

Speaking of matching, I like to use Emmett’s love of matching games to squeeze in a little phonemic awareness practice. I created this mitten rhyme match to help my preschoolers continue to strengthen their phonemic awareness skills using only pictures.

You can read more about this matching activity and grab it for FREE by clicking HERE.

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phonemic awareness, Winter

Mitten Rhyme Match for Preschoolers *FREE Printable*

Lauren Johnson

My preschooler loves matching games. So I like to play off of that passion whenever possible, especially when it comes to fostering phonemic awareness skills.

I created this Mitten Rhyme Match game to complement our winter themed activities in January. The matching game includes 8 pairs of colorful mittens. Each mitten depicts a familiar picture with high quality clip art.

Preschoolers can look at each picture, say the name out loud and match the mittens according to their rhymes.

If you are short on time, this matching game can be cut into rectangular cards with the paper cutter and used as a typical matching concentration game. I decided to cut the game into the shape of the mitten and set up a “clothesline” for my preschooler to hang his matches on. He LOVED this!

Our “clothesline” was just a string tied under the canopy of our Melissa and Doug grocery store. You can set a clothesline up just about anywhere. It doesn’t have to be fancy!

Emmett was very proud of his finished product and asked to leave the “clothesline” up so he could do it again later. Of course I said yes!

You can grab your copy of this Mitten Rhyme Match for FREE by clicking the image below. As always, thank you for looking!!

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Christmas, Counting, phonemic awareness, Winter

Gingerbread Activities for Preschool *FREE Printable*

Lauren Johnson

December is here!! I am so excited to share what Emmett, Lillian and I have been up to!! I put together a few gingerbread activities for preschool, including a FUN counting FREEBIE. Take a look!

There are SO many good gingerbread books out there for preschoolers, it is hard to choose. I will say, this selection of Jan Brett books is what I have in my collection and we focused especially on the Gingerbread Baby. There are many more on my wish list!!

I set up a little STEM challenge for Emmett immediately following the story, Gingerbread Baby. These are Picasso Tiles and a little gingerbread felt ornament that I got from Target a few years ago. I challenged him to create his own house for the Gingerbread Baby and he got right to work.

One thing I love about teaching preschoolers is watching their thinking process. Emmett immediately made a standard house with a roof, added a chimney and called it a day. Then he realized he wanted a “working” chimney.

He took his original roof and chimney apart and redesigned it so that it actually had a pathway into his Gingerbread house. Then he collected some small toys to test it out. He was so proud of himself!

I’m happy to share the table tent STEM station signs with you. To download a copy, press the button below. Simply print a fold in half for a little table tent!

Download Gingerbread STEM STation signs here

Next, he headed straight for the sensory bin! Everything that I used in this bin I already had stashed in the house from other activities. This one is dry pinto beans, large buttons, gingerbread themed foam stickers (Michael’s), sparkly Christmas balls, and various bowls and utensils.

Lillian loved this bin. She had a great time collecting similar items in the containers. I’m still finding those sparkly balls around the house!

While Lillian was busy with the sensory bin, Emmett and I practiced counting syllables. He is just starting to develop his phonemic awareness, so we did this activity together.

I designed the gingerbread cookie picture cards so that 6 would belong in each category, 1 syllable, 2 syllables or 3 syllables. But Emmett made a couple of the cards up for discussion. For example, he called the “tree” a “Christmas tree” and put it with the three syllable words instead of the one syllable words. We also talked about whether we wanted to call the gift a gift or a present. Emmett decided it was a gift and put it with the one syllable words.

If you’d like to use this Gingerbread Syllable Sort with your preschoolers, you can find it in my shop by clicking the image below.

After syllables, we practiced counting gum drops on these adorable gingerbread cards. The picture cards depict numbers 1 – 20 and there are three versions of the recording sheets, 1 – 10, 11 – 20, and 1 – 20.

We spread the cards out face down on the table to make a draw pile but you can also put them in a sensory bin for the kids to pull from. I gave Emmett gum drops to manipulate in the tens frame to represent each number he found. He was very particular about wanting to use only green and red gum drops like in the picture which was so funny. If you’re not interested in using the tens frame portion of this activity, you can hang the cards around the room and have your preschoolers search for all the numbers, tracing them as they find them.

If you’d like to use the Gingerbread House Counting Activity with your preschoolers, you can find it in my shop by clicking the image below!

The last gingerbread activity I want to share with you is a FREE counting activity that you can play with or without dice, depending on your preschooler’s readiness. If you choose to play with dice, have your preschooler roll the dice for each type of candy at the bottom of the page. After each turn, use that amount of candy on the gingerbread house. If you want to give your preschooler a little bit more independence, let them decorate the gingerbread house however they like, then count the number of each candy that they used.

Emmett chose to play with dice this round, which was perfect for him. He had so much fun with this one! If you’d like to download this activity for your preschooler, you can find it in my shop for FREE. Just click the image below.

That wraps up my list of preschool gingerbread activities for you!! I hope you are able to find some fun inspiration for your preschool classroom or homeschool. Please feel free to share your experience. I love you hear from you! @mrsmamabird #learnwithmrsmamabird

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