What My Child is Reading

No Sleep for the Sheep! by Karen Beaumont is a lyrical bedtime ode to those having trouble sleeping. All the farm animals wake the sheep in the barn. They want to sleep in the barn, too. No Sleep is a great book to share at bedtime.

New Christmas books come out each year, so it's a challenge to find ones appropriate for preschoolers. A Child Was Born: A First Nativity Book by Grace Maccarone is a simple story with detailed illustrations about the birth of Jesus. We enjoyed the rhyming text and the familiar beginning, middle and end.

Our favorite book this week by far was a parody of Madeline, Frankenstein: A Monstrous Parady by Ludworst Bemonster. The rhymes and events are spot on for fans of Madeline. Bobo enjoyed the monster aspect for it. His favorite parts were about the little monsters wetting their beds and losing their heads. I'm adding it to my "must-reads" list for parents.

Monster Door

The Pin

I saw this pin on Play Dr Mom's pinterest board a few weeks ago. It's so cute and simple, so we did it!

Our version of the monster door

What they used(I think):

Streamers (green)

Masking tape (thick)

Paper plates (white)

Construction paper (black)

I say "I think" because the pin doesn't link back directly to the post about the door. Bobo wasn't willing to wait for me to scroll through all the posts until I found it, so we improvised.

Help, the monster is eating my brains!

What we used:

Streamers (red and yellow)

Paper plates (black- iris and eyebrow)

Styrofoam plates (white)

Wall tape (I think you use it for the corners of walls)

Band-aids (neon green, orange and purple)

Bobo loves the monster door. It reminds him of one of his favorite spooky movies, Monster House, which is on our Not-so-Scary movie marathon list. Check!

Tot School: Happy Halloween

We hit Target's dollar spot, finally!

Top to Bottom and Left to Right

Monster making craft

Monster Bingo

Gel window clings- Decorating

Teddy Bear Counting

Monster pre-writing

Monster magnetic puzzles

The Pin

We pinned it and did it!

So you know how I've been waffling with the counting bears? There's a book for that! We used the counting bears to place on the pages for this math activity. Bobo's favorite part was making a rainbow with the bears. As always, decorating is a fun activity for Bobo. He loves making our house spooky.

TGIF
Read Learn Explore
Tot School

Tot School: Halloween 2012

Bobo has been choosing lots of monster and Halloween books during our weekly library visits. I've been sorting and organizing our school supplies. Add those two things together and we've been learning with Halloween type activities for the past month. 

Pictured above (from left to right, top to bottom)

Haunted house sort with black and orange jewels and bone stones
Skeleton magnetic game from last year
Coloring books with Sesame Street Halloween
Linking toys
Alien and Robot Stickers

Bobo's greatest strength at the moment is his imaginative play. Anything can become a world full of rich characters. So when I set up activities, I'm never really sure what is going to happen. Our simple sorting activity became a battle against evil with Batman as the hero.

The linking toys became a quiver for his arrows.

Bobo's other great strength is his Jedi mind trick. This kid can talk me into anything. After looking at the Halloween book, we needed to buy white body paint. Sure! Just look how happy he is, though.

Linked up with:
Read.Learn.Explore.
Taming the Goblin's Halloween Blog Hop

WMCIR: Where he mashes...

"Its called the MASH. The MONSTER MASH. Its a graveyard smash!"

Bobo is crazy for Monster Mash by David Catrow. He asks for it every night, "I need the book where he mashes." The book is an illustrated representation of the song by Bobby "Boris" Pickett. I am very fond of this song, so I sang it the first couple of times. We also listened to the original song on Youtube.

I quickly discovered, it wasn't my amazing vocal skill that sold this book. It's the illustrations! After the third or fourth time we read the book, Bobo started to ask questions (as he often does). "Why is the monster trying to kiss the cat? Where is Dracula's baby? Where's the crib keeper five?" Note: It took me awhile to figure out that last question.

The large, two-page illustrations are detailed and fun. They may be scary for sensitive readers, but my little guy loves them. The lyrics, of course, are a hit. Don't wait until Halloween to check this one out!

Our other must-read for this week is the Amazing Spider-Man Storybook Collection from Marvel. We've read several of these stories before, but there are some we've never seen. I like that they are all available in one place and I only need to check-out one book for a month's worth of reading. Bobo likes that it has Spider-Man, Venom and the Green Goblin. 

Bobo and I are always looking for new books. Leave a comment with some of your favorites. Happy reading!

I'm linking up at Hope is the Word.