farm animal class #1 -- pigs

We started the Spring Semester for our Monday Homeschool Classes this week, and I thought that I would actually try documenting the classes that I'm teaching from week to week.

My preschool class is about farm animals, and this week's theme was pigs. Here's a photo of our two pigs this past winter. This week was butcher week for these gals, their hams and bacons are off at the smokehouse as we speak, their chops and roasts are filling our fridge.


I started the class by singing "Old McDonald, with the pig verse only." Then we all moved and sounded like pigs together. For story, I read them Pigs Aplenty, Pigs Galore, by David McPhail. Then we played a game where they were each pigs that rolled in "mud" (black foam mats).






Our craft -- a piggy face. (This is Zoo Boy's.)














We finished up with another game -- a duck-duck goose sort of thing but with pigs -- one child walked around touching the heads of the other kids reciting the "This little piggy went to market" rhyme. On the "wee wee wee" line, the child that is touched gets up and runs around the circle, then starts the verse with the next child.

I had these coloring sheets available for the kids after the class, as there is an hour for the class, but that is really too much time for kids this age (3-5).

Cute class -- big class, 15 kids.

I also started a Beginner Crochet class for students ages 7 and up. I have 7 kids and one adult. This week we learned how to chain both by hand-crocheting and with our hooks. The kids went home with crochet hooks and a skein of yarn and directions to practice chaining.