Activities

Read From Head to Toe by Eric Carle. Encourage the children to move their bodies like the animals in the story, bending their necks like a giraffe or raising their shoulders like a buffalo.

Read the book From Head to Toe by Eric Carle. Encourage the children to listen and watch as you demonstrate the movements, then follow along.

Place a tunnel on a soft surface stretching it out straight so that you can see through the whole tunnel. Tell the children to crawl through the tunnel, one at a time, to the other side as a free choice activity.

Have each child crack an egg into a large glass bowl and observe. Help the children describe the texture with words such as slimy, gooey or runny. Provide an eggbeater and encourage the children to scramble the eggs.

Add tractors, play vegetables, farm equipment and animals to the block center and encourage the children to play farm. Talk with them about harvesting the vegetables and driving them in tractors and trucks to the store.

Show the children pictures of people from the past, for example, pioneers or from a different decade. Ask questions about how differently people dressed and looked. Play music from the different eras, such as the Charleston or the Twist.

During outdoor time, fill bins with water, child-safe baby shampoo and food coloring. Provide whisks to create frothy bubbles. Provide small cups for pouring and scooping.

Play an upbeat song that children enjoy and encourage them to dance in any way that they choose. When the music stops, the children should freeze in place like a statue. This could be done in large group.

Bring in a variety of fruits and/or vegetables for the children to taste such as papaya, kiwi, melons, strawberries, cucumbers, zucchini and carrot sticks. It's fun to have unusual varieties they might not have seen before.

Have the children sit on the floor, in a circle. Sing the “Strawberry Song” with the children.
Yummy, yummy strawberries, So red and sweet and plump.

Bring in actual fruits, such as oranges, apples and blueberries, and discuss the vitamins in each. During small group, cut the fruits open and discuss the parts inside. Consider planting the seeds and tracking the growth process.

Have the children prepare a fruit kabob for a snack to eat outside, during outdoor time. Slice up fruit in small pieces and have children place their choices on a skewer. The sharp tip can be cut off if needed.

After washing hands, give the children plastic knives and fruit to cut, such as bananas, oranges and pears. Under direct supervision, encourage them to cut the fruit and place it in a large bowl.

During outdoor time, set up a produce stand or a drink stand for the children to role-play the exchange of goods and services.

Set up a produce stand or a drink stand for the children to role-play the exchange of goods and services, during outdoor time.

Prepare a variety of melons such as cantaloupe, watermelon, honeydew and pique the chilldren's interest by asking what they think it will taste like:  sweet or sour.

Instead of a baby doll in the sensory center table, give children either plastic or real fruit to wash. Add scrub brushes to use on the fruits and vegetables.

During outdoor time, teach this version of Duck Duck Goose! Change the name depending upon which food you are learning about – Grain, Grain, Dairy

Use a poster board to graph a taste test. Title the graph “Do You Like the Taste?” and draw three columns. In the first column, list a variety of fruits that the children will taste along with a picture of each one.

Using a pushpin, poke four to five holes about an inch above the bottom of a clean water bottle.  Have the children predict what will happen when you fill the bottle with water.  Next, fill the bottle with water and quickly screw the top on.