Letters "S" and "U" -- Preschool Storytime for 4 & 5 year olds

Letters: S & U -- Preschool Storytime for 4 and 5 year olds

Display: Near the window I displayed sloth and unicorn stuffed animals with a yellow street sign that says "Sloth Crossing" 

The picture above shows two of my sloth stuffed animals and the "sloth crossing" sign that I own. 

Welcome Song (with actions)

Let's clap our hands for_____(child's name.)

Let's clap our hands for_____(next child in the circle.)

Let's clap our hands for_____(next child in the circle) 

You're welcome here today!

Song finishes when everyone has been welcomed. Other actions

may be: stamping feet,tapping knees,nodding head e.t.c. 

Book #1 - Slowly Slowly Slowly Says the Sloth by Eric Carle

Activity: Sammy the Star-Eating Sloth!

I introduced my puppet Sammy just as I previously mentioned in my last post.  Basically I told the children I asked the zoo to send me a pet and they sent me Sammy in a post office box. I opened the box in front of the children and they looked amazed by what they saw. I pulled the sloth out of the box and put him on my arm and said that he really liked stars. 

Then I had yellow stars laminated with images on the back of them that begin with the letter "s". I called the children one by one up to the front and they all had to give a clue away to the group of what the image was. If they didn't know what it was, I helped them out. 

Example: Star with an image of spagetti. I said "this is a noodle dish with tomato sauce! It rhymes with Magetti!" My supervisor says it is perfectly fine to make up a nonsense word to rhyme with it to give them a clue. I then had the children "feed" Sammy the stars by putting it in his mouth. They laughed so hard when I had the sloth make pretend eating sounds. "Om nom nom! Yummy!" I made the sloth say.  The kids laughed at this and thought it was very amusing. I discarded the stars into the box that the sloth came from with the puppet's mouth. 

Book #2 - I Wished for a Unicorn by Robert Heldbreder

Activity: Up the Stool or Under the Umbrella

After reading the unicorn story I brought Sammy the Sloth out again. I told the children to get into a circle and watch me. I'm going to have Sammy pick one child at a time (by tapping the kids on the head softly) and then the children will choose to go either under an umbrella (a Scooby Doo Umbrella to emphasize the letter "s") or up on a stool (stool also begins with the letter "s"! Would you look at that?!)

The children all closed their eyes and once I picked a child, that child would then go up on the stool or under the umbrella. The kids would then open their eyes and be surprised to see what the child chose to do. Then the kids and I (and Sammy the sloth!) would all sing 

"Under the umbrella, umbrella, umbrella" 

Then if the kids chose to be up on the stool we would sing:

"Up on the Stool, up up up! Up on the stool, up on it today!" 

Goodbye Song:Time to Say Goodbye

(tune: “Up on the House Top”)

Now is the time to say, “Goodbye”.

My how fast the time did fly.

Our day is done, so we must say,

“Goodbye, goodbye for today”.

Ho, Ho, Ho – Time to go.

He, He, He – Wave like me.

Now it is time to say, “Goodbye”.

Grab your things and off you fly! 

What I then did was I passed out out smiley-face or star stickers to re-emphasize the letter "s" but I wish I had been able to pass out unicorn stickers to remind them of both letters. 

Take Home Craft

I need to upload a picture of these letters to show an exaple but my supervisor has big letters that children color and decorate that coincide with an animal or object that begins with that letter. For this week the S was made to look like a sea-horse with seaweed surrounding it. 

Then as a take-home sensory activity the children are to use cotton balls to form the letter "s".  The cotton balls are supposed to resemble snowballs. Since it's February, this activity makes perfect sense! 

For the take-home craft for the letter "U" the children color an upside down umbrella with the letter U on it. The children are given instructions to splatter water down on blue paint for it to look like rain!

The take-home sensory activity for the letter "U" the children will simply write underneath something. For example, the children could write under the covers, under a table, under a chair, etc.