Fantastic Mr Fox activities

We have read Fantastic Mr Fox at least four times this year and listened to the audio book more so I thought it was about time we did a themed week of activities. I think Peter loves it more than Harry and he can quote several passages from memory. His favourite saying at the moment is that he will 'knock it down dead as a dumpling'; 'it' usually being some Lego figure or other. I really like doing book-themed activities as we can incorporate lots of subjects and the boys usually really enjoy it. 

Harry answered some review/comprehension questions. He is really not keen on writing at the moment, although when he stops complaining about it he is actually efficient and good. I couldn't find a template I liked enough online so I just typed and printed the questions myself. 

Peter heard us discussing these questions and wanted to tell me his thoughts too so I wrote them down for him. He did some writing too; I had asked him if he wanted to write the letter 'f' but he asked to write Fantastic Mr Fox and he did a great job. I traced the letter on the paper with my finger and he followed it. 

I made them both a word search using a blank word search template from the Nature Detectives website. Harry had words and Peter had the letter 'f'.

We looked at the sense of smell as Mr Fox uses his to stay away from the farmers. We read the smell section of this book. 

And did a smell test. I gathered some objects and Harry smelled them while blindfolded. If he couldn't smell it, he used another sense to identify it. He used touch for the courgette and hearing for the bead shaker, which didn't smell of anything at all. 

We made a healthy meal for Mr Boggis, who only eats chicken and dumplings. We talked about food groups and calories. The boys decided he should still have chicken and dumplings as he likes them, but also carrots, peas and potato. They have him fruit and ice cream for pudding. I wrote the food groups on stickers and asked Harry to match them to the plates. 

I wrote some maths problems for Harry to answer verbally for this book. I actually thought they were quite hard but he did very well and answered them all quickly. 

Harry and Peter enjoyed the craft from this book. We made a junk modelled fox who is now standing guard over the kitchen! We used cans for legs and a cereal box body. The boys stuffed an old sock with newspaper for a tail, then covered the whole thing with orange tissue paper and paint. 

We added card ears and Harry drew a black nose and eyes.

We also folded an origami fox using instructions from Activity Village. Harry did this too and his looked good, but he unfolded it as he said it looked like a star. 

Jack and the Beanstalk activities

We have been working to a theme of the classic story of Jack and the Beanstalk these last two weeks. I don't normally split our activities into subject areas but I have done so this time as there is a lot to include! It has been a very popular theme.

Literacy activities 

We have two versions of Jack and the Beanstalk at home and we have read them both several times. The longer version has a lot more detail in and Harry and Peter did well describing the extra objects and events compared to the shorter version.

They retold the story using our beanstalk and printed set (see craft activities below). I asked Peter questions as we went along and asked Harry to think of some new events for his version of the story. He added that Jack sold the cow for the beans and an axe, to explain how he had an axe. He also added that the beanstalk grew bags of money hanging from its branches so Jack didn't need to climb to the top of the beanstalk! This would make for a very different version of events for Jack.

Peter matched up letters from some of the story words using this sheet I made. He cut out each letter then glued it to the correct place.

Harry thought of a simile and adjectives to describe the giant and I asked him to make ten new words from the letters of the word 'beanstalk'. I made letter tiles for him to use to do this.

Sensory and craft activities 

The boys have had great fun with a sensory tub of dry beans. I painted some gold and green as the magic beans and they both wanted to paint their own selection too. Harry started sorting the beans immediately into type. Peter used them to feed the toy cow we added to the story characters, make pretend cups of tea and scoop and pour. They played with these beans for a whole afternoon when I first got them out!

We made a beanstalk to add to the bean tub that looked great and was really quick. The idea was from here. I set out the materials and didn't need to help much. They both really enjoyed threading the leaves onto pipecleaners.

We made a land of clouds for the top of the beanstalk using a paper plate and cotton wool and Harry added the items from the lovely printable set from here for the characters and objects from the story.

The boys also wanted to use the dry beans to make glued pictures. Peter added as many as he could and said it was a pebble beach! Harry coloured some with metallic pens and made a treasure chest for them to go in. He also made a space rocket.

Peter did some of the activities from this printable pack - cotton bud paint dots to fill in letters and cutting and matching characters to their shadows.

Science and maths activities 

We soaked some of each type of dry bean in water then compared them. We also took them apart to see the seed coat, root and leaves inside. The difference in size after one night soaking was amazing and they came apart really easily.

I had some lap book activities already prepared for Spring based on plant life so we tied this into the beanstalk theme and looking at the beans. Harry completed the mini books as a display poster, answering questions about the parts of a plant and the purpose of each part.

We also did some maths activities using the dry beans several times. I thought I should get value out of them seeing as they have littered my living room floor for a whole two weeks! Peter matched the correct number of beans to numbers on paper plates. Harry filled pots with the correct number of beans to answer sums I wrote for him. We also did some fractions. I gave him a group of beans and asked him to place the correct amount on plates for half, third and quarter fractions. Harry likes using manipulatives for maths and the beans worked well for this.

Cooking

We cooked using beans too (although not the ones that had been played with all week!). We used a recipe from Jamie's Italy cookbook for fagioli all'italiana. 

Harry did all the preparation himself, including collecting herbs from the allotment to use. The herb smell as they cooked was great! We used the beans in a casserole for tea.

We have had great value and enjoyment from the Jack and the Beanstalk theme and I am sure we may use this one again!

World Book Day craft and Five Children and It activities

We celebrated World Book Day late this week, so we could do it with the friends we usually meet for a group session on a Tuesday. Harry and Peter watched the World Book Day episode of Blue Peter to get them in the mood.

I made Harry a crossword using clues from books we have recently read. He hasn't done a crossword before and he loved it - his face lot up when he realised the answer to a clue! The coloured squares spelled the word 'fruit' and he went off to find a chocolate orange prize hiding in the fruit bowl. The crossword maker I used was great and almost instantly created the crossword based on the clues and answers I gave. I also gave Peter a short verbal book quiz, as he likes to be involved!

We made book cover collages. I printed a variety of book cover pictures I found on Google Images from books we have read recently. I gave these to Harry and Peter together with some collage embellishments and shiny paint sticks. They were really enthusiastic and focused doing this so I would recommend this as a really fun World Book Day craft for all ages.

Harry split up the words and pictures from several covers and used them for his collage. 

Peter made his own Misterland using Mr Men covers.

The boys dressed up. Peter loves Spider-Man at the moment and is delighted that Spider-Man is really called Peter too. Harry dressed up as Mr Bump and loved adding plasters all over himself!

We met friends at the park, who were also dressed up. The children played then we sat down to discuss 5 Children and It, which we have all been reading. We talked about the wishes in the book and how you could ensure that bad consequences didn't happen from wishes you might make. We talked about the family and what clues there were as to whether they were rich or poor.

We talked about the Psammead and watched YouTube clips from different TV/film versions of the story, which had different interpretations of the Psammead. This is Harry's interpretation.

We looked at this book, which has some good pictures of life around 100 years ago, when the book was written. The first cars appeared in the streets and families started having photo portraits taken. The clothes were quite different and we discussed this.

We used the comprehension dice to answer post-reading questions. Harry said the main idea of the story was about the children making wishes. He made up an imaginative alternate ending with a foreign spy who kidnapped the Psammead, so he could wish for his country to rule the world and the children had to go to the rescue.

Harry and I looked through the book for some interesting words and defined them - he had a really good attempt at the meaning and I read him the dictionary definitions too. We also talked about similes and thought of some other ways to use the beautiful comparison from the wish to 'be as beautiful as the day' (I liked Harry's Mummy one!). 

We really enjoyed 5 Children and It and will be listening to the other stories in the trilogy as they were all in the same download from Audible.