Integrating Holidays: Halloween Fun

This time of year is very long for parents, at least for me. Every day I get the question, when is Halloween? In schools they talk about Fall and Halloween for quite a while.

A favorite book to read:

To help with sequencing and comprehension skills, you can:
 enlarge items from the book, color them, lamenate them (for durability), and have your child put them in order of how they arrived in the story.

We read the book then I had her put them in order from what she remembered. After that, we checked the book to see what she got correct.
Once they were all in order, we made the noises of the two shoes going "clomp, clomp" and the other noises as well.

It was a fun activity and one we can revisit again and again. After a while, I am going to see if she can draw the items in order and create her own scarecrow.

Here is a link with tons of Old Lady activities for this book: Afraid of anything


Also fun Fall activities remember Leaf Man from a previous year?

Integrating Culture: Hispanic Heritage Month

From September 15th to October 15th, tht United States celebrates Hispanic Heritage Month. According to Wikipedia: "September 15 was chosen as the starting point for the celebration because it is the anniversary of independence of five Latin American countries: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. They all declared independence in 1821. In addition, Mexico, Chile and Belize celebrate their independence days on September 16, September 18, and September 21, respectively."

Hispanic Heritage Month also celebrates the long and important presence of Hispanic Americans in North America, starting with the discovery of America by Spanish conquistadors led by Christopher Columbus on October 12, 1492. While we no longer receive the day off of school for Columbus Day, we do need to recognize that he discovered a land where we know occupy and live.

The contributions of Hispanic and Latino are many and to help guide you on who and the what, here is the government website you can read on what they are focusing on here: Hispanic Heritage

Here are a few books to read:

Here is a website I have sent to my teacher, but there are some names of Latinos you could have your child look up and read about. Scholastic.

Here are some more resources you can use during the last part of this month and all year long to recognize Hispanic and Latino Heritage: Parents Connect.