V is for... Vases and VOLCANOES!

     Have you ever tried to do a science experiment with 13 kindergarteners?  I tried this very thing with my Kinder Corner class, and let me tell you something, I learned a couple of VALUBALE lessons!  The first, always have extra ingredients because after the first spill of vinegar, I ran out.  The second, no matter how reassuring you may be, if you tell a kid something is going to explode they will either love it or be scared out of their minds!  There really is no in-between. 

     So what does this have to do with the letter V and Story Time?  Well, as you may have read last week, we tackled volcanoes this week.  I will get back to that in a minute, first; let’s discuss the letter of the week card.  I found the most adorable letter V turned into a flower vase online and just knew I had to do it, especially since spring has sprung!

Materials:  Index card with capital V, 3 flower stickers, 3 green paper stems, crayons, and glue stick

Front of card

Back of card

1)    Color the capital V.

2)    Trace the upper and lower case Vv on the back of the card.

3)    Glue the green stems inside the V.  Stick the flowers on top of the stems.

     Ok, I said I would get back to my volcano, and now is the time.  If any one of you has ever been in a science fair, undoubtedly someone made a Papier-mâché volcano and erupted it.  Well, that is exactly what we did. Only I learned from my Kinder Corner Science experiment mistakes.  Instead of having every child in Story Time explode their volcano, each kid made one, and then I exploded mine.  After class, I gave each child the instructions as well as a list of ingredients so that they could explode their volcano at their home.  Good idea, huh?  In order to see the volcano in action, watch the video!  It really is fun and exciting.  As for how to make the actual volcano, click here.  It was the easiest volcano I could find!

     The route I went with my book choices this week was a little different than usual.  Instead of picking a book on vases, I picked a spring counting book called Flowers and Showers by RebeccaFjelland Davis.  This book was fun because not only were the kids able to do a little counting; the pictures were vibrant and very spring-y!

     When I did a search for picture books on volcanoes, not much came up that was short enough for my kids to sit through.  I ended up going with Volcanoes: Nature’s Incredible Fireworks.  This is a great book not only because it is non-fiction, but the pictures are amazing.  The boys in my class were really into this book.  The loved all of the action pictures of volcanoes exploding.

     I did have one really fun spring song that I used this week.  It is appropriately titled, “Spring,” by Kidzup Educational Music.  I like a lot of this company’s music and tend to use it a lot.

     That’s it for this week!  I hope you enjoyed the exploding volcano!  I know we had a lot of fun doing it!  Come back and see us next week when we cover the letter W!