Click Clack Moooo: A Farm Mural

Earlier in the week I hung out with a group of four kids--the group includes an almost three year-old, her five year-old brother, a four year-old, and her six year-old sister.  They're all beginners in English, and advanced in Italian. :0)

When we get together, we have a routine we usually stick to:
First we doodle--

and I label the kids' drawings if they're not able to do so themselves.  Then we sing a few songs; this week we sang a song that's also a book:

After the sing along session, I read aloud another one of my very favorite children's books:

This book is so clever and fantastic...each time I read it I think may enjoy it more than the listener!

If you don't own this book or have never heard of it, do yourself (and your kid) a favor and hit the play button below to listen to a mom narrate it:

The kids loved the illustrations, and though they couldn't understand a lot of the irony without some explanation, they immediately understood the absurdity of cows typing and hens going on strike.

After the story we made a chart of farm animals and labeled each one--the kids helped me to illustrate:

When the lesson was over, I suggested that their parents cut the pictures out and use them as flashcards.

Then we used a huge piece of butcher paper as a background for our farm.  We started with the trees:

and we added other things you might find on the farm, and labeled everything.

The farmer and his wife were my favorites.

While we worked, I jotted down and illustrated new vocabulary words on a chart we kept hanging:

I knew a good deal of what we'd done had stuck when the littlest one mooooooed at her mom when she came to pick her up.