November 18th-22nd

Space

Supplies

• Construction paper
• Oreos
• Fly swatter
• Paper plates
• Flour
• Baby oil
• Tempera paint

Books

• "Papa Please Get Me the Moon" by Eric Carle
• "Roaring Rockets" by Tony Mitton and Ant Parker
• "On the Moon" by Anna Milbourne
• "I Want to be an Astronaut" by Byron Barton 
• "Faces of the Moon" by Bob Crelin
• "The Way Back Home" by Oliver Jeffers

Monday: Name Rockets.  Write your child's name on a piece of paper and count how many letters are in their name.  With different colors of construction paper, cut out the corresponding number of squares and write one letter on each of the squares.  Have them build the rocket going letter by letter.  Then add wings and a nose.

Tuesday:Phases of the moon oreos.  Read "Faces of the Moon" and talk all about the illustrations and the moon.  On a piece of paper, draw the moon in the phases:  New moon, first quarter, full moon, and third quarter.  Carefully remove one side of each oreo so the cream stays on one side of the cookie. (you get to eat the other side.)  With a popsicle stick or spoon draw a line on each of the oreos and show which part of the cream they should scrape off.  As they complete each phase, they can set it onto the paper and match it up.  At the end they can eat them all.

Wednesday: Alien spaceship.  Read "The Way Back Home".  Use paper plates and whatever you can find to create an alien spaceship.

Thursday:  Fly swatter sun.  Cut a large circle out of paper.  Place several globs of paint all over the circle and put  a larger piece of paper under it.  Now, your child can "swat" the paint all around to create a sun.

Friday:  Moon sand.  In a large bowl combine 2 cups of flour and 1/4 cup baby oil.  Mix together.  Play with it as you wish.  It clumps together so you can make molds.

November 11th-15th

Dinosaurs

Supplies

• Construction paper
• Used coffee grounds (saved from your morning cup of coffee)
• Wooden clothespins (Dollar store)
• Chenille sticks or yarn
• Flour
• Salt
• Baking soda
• Vinegar
• Red food coloring
• Plastic bottle 

Books

• "How do Dinosaurs Go to School?" by Jane Yolen and Mark Teague
• "Dinosaur Train" by John Steven Gurney
• "Danny and the Dinosaur" by Syd Hoff

Monday: "D" is for dinosaur.  Read a dinosaur book of your choice.  We read " How do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight?".  Then, we made a large "D" out of paper and I asked my son to color it.  When he was done, I helped him glue it onto a larger piece of paper and I wrote "Dinosaur" on the corner saying the letters as I wrote the word.
We then talked about what a dinosaur has on his body (head,neck, arms, legs, tail,etc.). Then we drew, cut out, and assembled our dinosaur.

Tuesday: Clothespin dinosaur.  Read a dinosaur book of your choice.  Cut a stegosaurus out of paper.  On the top of the stegosaurus write numbers 1- 10 or however high you'd like to go.  Number the top of the clothespins the same. Have them color the dinosaur and stegosaurus.
When your child is finished coloring they can put their "spikes" on their dinosaur by matching the numbers.
*  I played this with my 1st grader as well, and he added the "spikes" by solving addition.

Wednesday: coffee ground fossils.  Make coffee ground dough:
1/2 cup used coffee grounds
1/4 cup cold coffee
1/2 cup flour
1/4 cup salt
Mix together ingredients in a bowl and knead to make dough.
We read a book about fossils from the library.  We then went around the house collecting things to press into our dough to make fossils.  We made little balls, pressed them down, and then pressed the different items into it.  It took about a day and a half to dry.

Thursday: Dinosaur feet  Make dinosaur feet out of construction paper.  Get creative as you'd like.  I had my son pick out the colors and how many "claws" he wanted.  We talked about the shapes of the feet and claws.  To attach them to his feet I cut two smalls holes on either side, stuck chenille sticks through and twisted them together.

Friday: Dinosaur volcano.  First we read, "Dinosaur Train."  It is a story about a boy who goes on a dinosaur adventure and sees a volcano.  Fill the bottom of a bottle with baking soda (about 2-4 Tablespoons).  Fill another container with a pouring spout with vinegar and a few drops of red food coloring.  I had some red playdough so I covered the bottle with the play dough and rocks to make it look a little more realistic.  You could also cover it with dirt, sand, or rocks.
When you're ready, pour in the vinegar mixture and see what happens!!