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Deanne

Friday, May 21, 2010

e is for ......


I have been looking at the short vowel sound 'e' with the little ones, following on from 'a'.
We have been looking at words that begin with 'e' including egg, elephant, echidna, exercise, explorer.
I like to do lots of hands on stuff with the little ones to help them remember and I came up with the brilliant idea to make an elephant from a boiled egg and some vegetables.
We used celery sticks for the legs and a celery leaf for the tail, the ears were carrots, the eyes cloves (I told them not to eat those), we used slivered almonds for the tusks and a piece of red onion for the trunk, although you could probably use a piece of capsicum or something else.
They were a big hit- the little ones had so much fun making them and then eating them.


Don't they look cute lined up in a row?


 Another day we made patty cake echidnas. 
I found some milk chocolate and dark chocolate bullets and we cut them in half to make the spines. 
We used smaller pieces for the eyes and nose.


 The Girl had lots of fun- though I think she ate as many bullets as she put on the echidnas!


They made a special treat for morning tea.
They would make great birthday party fare- I can feel an Australian Animal themed party idea coming on!


We used potatoes to make elephant footprints.
I cut a fairly round one in half and then we stamped it using these great paint impregnated stamping pads - cheap enough and no messy sponges to wash!
Then in a different coulour we used fingers to make the toes- B4 wanted to join in but didn't want to use his finger- so I cut a piece of potato with the apple corer and he used that instead.


I also cut an 'e' out of a potato for them to print as well.


B5 with his finished work.
We also made an 'e' book and playdough 'e' things and exercised and explored and sang songs and read lots of 'e' books - lots of fun memory building stuff!

4 comments:

  1. Hi Deanne,
    Just popping over to say Hi! Lovely to hear from someone from my region too. You probably know a few people that I know! Looks like your children love the hands on learning too. My twins would love to make those egg elephants! I have just started teaching them phonics and they love to have boiled eggs for lunch. A learning lunch could be on the cards next week!

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  2. Thanks Ann,
    Yes home schooling is a small world, we probably do have people in common!

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  3. Hi Deanne,
    followed your blog from Ann's blog. I enjoy finding other aussie homeschoolers blogs to read. Love the food animals - so original and so much fun. I'm thinking my toddler would love to do this. The elephants footprints is a clever idea too. thanks for sharing

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  4. Hi Helen,
    It is lovely to see what Aussie homeschoolers are up to too! I had a quick peek at your blog and hope to spend some more time having a good read through soon!

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Thanks for taking the time to comment, I always appreciate your kind words.