ON-GOING CREATIVE DRAMA CORNER: SHOE HOUSE

Shoe House: This fits right into the theme of "Home" as well as the Language/Nursery Rhyme theme of "Little Old Woman Who Lived In a Shoe":
You will need a tall appliance-sized box and a shorter box (big enough to hold a child or two).  In advance, glue them together in an L-shape to "sort of" look like a boot.  This provides two "rooms" for the children to crawl into for play.  Cut doors and windows into the "boot house" (it's especially cute if you leave the flaps on the windows, creating shutters).  The children can paint the house themselves unless your lesson plans won't allow time for it.  A nice touch is to print the nursery rhyme on one side of the house.  On the top of the boot, use a marker to create an "eyelets with shoestring" (it's actually quite easy as it's basically circles with X's between them -- look at a pair of laced shoes if you need a model).
Alternative: Making a Multi-Cultural Connection: Let children cover the "shoe-house" with magazine pictures of children from around the world.  Discuss how nice it would be to live together and enjoy all our differences. 

Plain old big box house: Simply get a large box and cut windows and doors into it.

Pumpkin House: For Peter, the pumpkin eater's house, have children paint a large box orange.  You cut the windows and doors into it.  This is a super opportunity to discuss round versus square (sphere versus cube).  In fact, the children will probably find a "square pumpkin" quite amusing.  The stem for the top of the house can simply be a small rectangular box painted green or brown (glue it down, of course).  Print the rhyme "Peter, Peter, Pumpkin Eater" on the side of the house (or attach a poster of it).  This box is great for having children "act out" the rhyme, and it can also become an extension of your art center as children can draw or glue torn pumpkins all over the house.  

You might want to use the houses above in conjunction with the activities in this month's nursery rhyme section of my website.

Please share your ideas too by e-mailing me at: stormie@preschoolbystormie.com

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Reminder from Stormie: If you would like to begin collecting ALL my current classroom ideas (each on a 4 x 6" index card), as well as new ones that I create, you can do so by ordering my "Activity Cards."  Click here to check them out.

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