Chinese New Year Theme - February 19-25, 2015

Chinese New Year isn't something we normally celebrate or even really talk about, but when I saw it on our library story time calendar as a theme I thought it could be fun to do it here, too.

Drew and I made paper lanterns out of construction paper. He worked on his cutting skills with scissors. This is a hard area for him because he still wants to use two hands. I thought finding a pair of kid's scissors that would pull themselves back into the open position would help, but it didn't. It just frustrated him more, so I let him use my scissors and he was much more successful. I was really surprised.

Then we made decorations for the lantern. He used a circle punch to punch out 10 circles. He made some "moons" as he called them that were missed punches. He liked the punch once he understood he had to put the paper into the slot, and he really liked counting them.

Next he used the glue sticks to glue the circles on. Glue is another one of those areas we haven't worked on and I know I need to. He gets frustrated when he doesn't have enough glue to stick things to except his fingers. I think using liquid white glue would be easier, but I am not sure how out of hand things would get before he had glued everything to himself, or his hair. He also used some colored circle stickers to decorate the lantern. It was a good way to make him count the different color circles and talk about which color had more.

Once it was all decorated I put it together. When I was done taping it and trying to fluff it out he kept saying it looked like an octopus. He was right. When I handed it to him he started alternating between ringing it like a bell and squishing it to make an octopus. I am not sure he got the idea of it being a lantern, but he liked it.

Ring! Ring! Ring!

It is an octopus!

We also did some painting. In honor of Chinese New Year we used the colors red and yellow. As he was painting we were talking about how when he painted with the red and yellow it made orange. He kept telling me that is how purple is made. Sadly, I kept trying to correct him that it was orange, but once I stopped to think about it he was right, last week we made purple the same way. He wasn't telling me we were making purple today, but that is how purple was made, too, by mixing colors. I think he outsmarted me on that one.

I helped him make a little dragon out of egg carton. I had to paint it for him because his paint wouldn't stick to and dry on Styrofoam, so, I had to use my craft paints. I don't trust him with those yet because they aren't as easy to clean up as his paint is. So, my lesson learned for the week is to make sure to buy eggs in paper cartons on the weeks that we need egg cartons, or find friends that do. He helped me glue the google eyes on to the head and then string the head and the body together with a pipe cleaner.

This week we were reading books about Chinese New Year and kites. I am going to roll the kites into my March theme of "In Like a Lion, Out Like a Lamb" starting next week. It seemed like a great tie in. He liked the Red is a Dragon book a lot, the others he isn't as into. I am hoping the more we read them the more he will enjoy them.

We had been intending to go to a Chinese New Year celebration with a Dragon Parade, but this weekend AJ and I were both to sick to really get off the couch, so we missed it. Instead we watched some videos on YouTube. It gave us a chance to talk about the Lion Dance and all the gymnastics they were using, and the how the drummers were playing and moving around to the rhythm, and then watch the snippets of a parade and all that was going on there.







There were supposed to be some other great adventures for this week's theme, but AJ and I both came down with massive colds and then my car died and we had to deal with that. Next year, I plan to be a little more on top of it and not just a spur of the moment theme.