Keep reading for some fun penguin activities for preschool, pre-k, and kindergarten. These activities are sure to be a hit with your little one!
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JANUARY STORY OF THE MONTH
Our January Story of the Month is Penguins Love Their ABCs by Sarah Aspinall. This is the sweetest story that will encourage your little one to practice their alphabet skills.
Click here to check out the song I sing before reading this book!
In this story, six little penguins go on an alphabet hunt. Mama Penguin hid all of the letters in the snow, and above each one, she placed an object that starts with that letter. The penguins’ job (and your child’s job!) is to find the letters and name the sounds.
I love how interactive this book is! There are even questions like “Do you know the first letter of your name?” and “Which color flower do you like best?” on some of the pages.
However, I do not agree with the keywords chosen for some of the letters (specifically g, i, o, & x). When I read this book, I make sure to change those keywords to better examples (such as guitar, igloo, octopus, and box).
Click on the picture to learn more about this adorable book!
Looking for more penguin books for preschool and kindergarten? Check these out!
There is also another book in this series called Penguins Love Colors. This is another great choice for a January read aloud! In this version, the six little penguins paint a surprise picture for Mama Penguin, who loves colors. This is a great book to practice color recognition and reading color words.
After reading Penguins Love Their ABCs or Penguins Love Colors, check out these fun penguin activities that include Penguin Cookies, Penguin Masks, and FREE Penguin Numbers that can be used to play an awesome math game.
Adding these activities to your winter plans, either at home or in your classroom, will help bring learning to life for your little one!
Want a FREE printable pack that includes all the Story of the Month directions? Click here!
OREO PENGUIN COOKIES
Oreos are one of my all-time favorite cookies! They taste great, are fairly inexpensive, and can be made into so many different things! *Check out these Oreo spiders we made for Halloween.
For this month, we made our Oreos into the cutest penguins on the ice-block thanks to Jessica from Mrs. Plemons’ Kindergarten!
Ingredients:
- Oreos
- Mini Oreos
- Candy Eyes
- Swedish Fish (make sure to get a bag that has orange fish in it)
Directions:
- Take one regular-sized Oreo & open it up. Place the side with the filling on a plate.
- Take the other side and cut it in half. Place each half on the Oreo on the plate to look like penguin wings.
- Take two orange Swedish fish candies. Cut off the tails of the fish. Place the two tails at the bottom of your Oreo to look like the penguin’s feet.
- Take a mini Oreo and open it up. Place one side of the mini Oreo at the top to look like the penguin’s head. Add candy eyes.
- Cut a triangle-shaped piece of an orange Swedish fish and place it on the penguin’s face as the beak.
- Bam, you’re done! Easy peasy penguin cookies that are delicious to eat!
Need more winter inspiration? Check out this post for 15+ activity ideas!
PENGUIN MASKS
In Penguins Love Their ABCs, the penguins go on a scavenger hunt to look for letters. How fun would it be for your child to go on a scavenger hunt to look for letters while wearing a penguin mask?!
These masks, inspired by Literacy Enrichment and Play, are super simple to make and give students a chance to practice their fine motor skills.
Supplies:
- Paper plate
- Construction paper (black & orange)
- Black pipe cleaners
- Scissors
- Glue
- Hole puncher
Directions:
- Cut a paper plate in half. Then cut out circles for eyes.
- If your little one is ready to use scissors, have them cut strips of black paper into small rectangles. (If they’re not quite ready for this, you can complete this step for them.)
- Glue the black rectangles onto the paper plate.
- Cut out a triangle from the orange paper and glue it on as the beak.
- Hole punch each side of the mask, then add black pipe cleaners to secure it in place (we used two pipe cleaners for each mask & wrapped them together in middle).
- Have fun wearing your mask while you go on an ABC scavenger hunt!
Want a fun idea for a winter sensory bin? Check out this post!
FREE PENGUIN NUMBERS
Even though the penguins in Penguins Love Their ABCs are looking for letters, that doesn’t mean you can’t incorporate math into this book, too!
Check out these FREE Penguin Number Cards that can be used in so many ways! This download comes with large penguins holding number signs and small penguins with the matching numbers on them.
One way to use these numbers is to play a “Count the Eggs” game. We pretended mini-marshmallows were penguin eggs. Then I had my little one count out the correct number of penguin eggs for each penguin number. This is a great way to work on one-to-one correspondence.
Another way to use these numbers is to play a “Snowball Toss” game. My students love this game! First, I taped the large penguin numbers onto the wall. Then, I had my students choose a small penguin number. They had to find the matching large number on the wall and throw a “snowball” at it. (We used snowballs similar to these). They had a blast!
You can also challenge your child by having them take the same number of steps back as the number they choose. For example, if they choose a 3, have them take 3 giant steps backward before tossing their snowball at the number 3 on the wall. Great way to work on their gross motor skills!
This activity (along with all of our freebies!) can be downloaded from the Free Activity Library. If you’re already a member of our email community, you can click HERE to head to the Free Activity Library, enter your password (it’s on your most current email from me), and download your copy!
If you’d like to join our email community & receive the password as my way of saying THANK YOU for joining, you can click HERE to subscribe. Once you enter your information, the password will be emailed to you within minutes.
Have you read Penguins Love Their ABCs? Do you have any fun penguin activities for preschoolers or kindergarteners that I should add to our list? Let me know! Comment below or find me on Instagram [@littleslovelearningblog] to share!
Looking for more penguin activities? Check out this Polar Habitats printable pack!
Want more book-inspired activities and printables? Check out the Storytime Club!
Did you miss any of our past Story of the Month posts? Click HERE to check them out!
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Happy Learning!
