Preschool Lab: My Body

This summer, I'll be doing Preschool Lab every week since we're concentrating on science with our Fizz Boom Read Summer Reading Club. This week, we talked about the human body and some of the body parts inside us. I borrowed heavily from Amy Koester's Body Science program, which made planning super easy! Make sure you click through and see what she did.

Here's what I did!

Storytime:

Opening Song: My Hands Say Hello - this is our standard opener for all preschool storytimes. It's especially relevant here because we're talking about body parts!

Book: Parts by Tedd Arnold. I read this silly story about a boy who thinks he's coming apart because he notices hair in his comb, peeling skin, and something gray fall out of his nose. It's a funny intro to different body parts. 

Felt: Body parts. I used the templates that Amy linked to to create a felt person with various body parts. As I put the parts up on the board, we talked about where they are in the body and what they do. The body parts I included were lungs (we all took a couple deep breaths), stomach, brain, and heart. I also included the bones to tie in to our next book. 

Book: Dem Bones by Bob Barner. Before I read this book, I asked the kids to tell me where they could feel bones inside their bodies. You can feel bones in your forearm, your lower leg, your fingers, your toes, etc. I sang the book and as I turned each page, I asked children to find the body part it talks about.

Song: Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes. Besides just being one of my favorite storytime songs, this is a great song when you're talking about body parts. I like to do it slowly and then repeat it faster and faster. When we were done doing it SUPER FAST, I told the kids to feel their heartbeats! 

Closing Song: Do You Know What Time It Is? - our standard closer, which signifies to the kids that storytime is over.

After our storytime, families were invited to explore the stations I had set out. I encouraged grown-ups to talk to their kids as they worked at each station, to reinforce our new vocabulary and concepts. 

Stations:

Stomach: 

I ran this station just like Amy did in her program. I put out plastic baggies (I didn't tape mine and they held up just fine) and various foods. Kids put some food in their baggies and then ground it up just like our stomachs grind up the food we eat. The kids really enjoyed smashing the stuff in their baggies! I provided sheets for them to draw what their food looked like before and after it was smashed, but many families skipped this step; they were so eager to get to the smashing!

Bones:

I found this idea on Coyne's Crazy Fun Preschool via Pinterest. I had volunteers cut out body shapes for me ahead of time and I provided glue, scissors, and q-tips for children to add the bones to their person. 

Heart:

Again, this one came right from Amy's program. This station was the least-used and I think I had plenty to do without it. It was kind of loud in the room and I'm not sure that kids could really hear a heartbeat anyway. I think a few people visited this station, but families gravitated towards the stations where they created something. 

Take-Home: Because one of our prizes for the Summer Reading Club is a science activity to take home and do, I didn't want to give out a craft every week with Preschool Lab like I have during the school year. I still put together some activity ideas for families to do at home and I included a book list. I also included some fun, free printables from 2 Teaching Mommies. They still had some things to do at home, but it was much less labor-intensive to include printables than to put together all the pieces for a craft. 

Of course, I also put out a display of books for families to check out.

We had a lot of fun with our Preschool Lab and I'm excited to continue for the rest of the summer!