Rr is for Reindeer

We've been covering the letter Rr this week for Charis and Atalie, and since it's reindeer week at our house, we made Rr reindeer. Makes sense right? This was a fun and easy way to review the letter Rr.

Prep: I drew the letter R r on card stock with brown marker. I did not put the empty space in the capital R, allowing for the wiggly eye to serve that purpose. I pre-cut the rectangles for the antlers. That's it!

• I let them color the Rrs in w/ brown marker. You could use brown marker, paint, or glue and shreds of brown paper. I chose marker so it would dry faster. Good practice for staying inside of the lines!
• I again used glue in a small container and a cotton swab to let her glue on the wiggly eye. We had a discussion about why the reindeer only has one eye. Ever notice that projects from kids with a side view of the character produces a product that looks like 2 eyes on one side of the head to us? It's about perspective and what they know to be true about faces; faces have 2 eyes. An explanation of why only one eye is needed would be a great teachable moment here.
• I used Do-A-Dot markers for the red nose, but you could do anything...puff balls, colored in circle, a button, glue w/ glitter, etc.
• We glued on a pre-cut ear (again, only one).
• Then I explained antlers. We talked about what they look like (a comparison to a tree branch is what I used) and how we could use the little rectangles to "build" them on our reindeer.

My preschooler has an aversion to glue and other sticky things on her hands. So I showed her how to use the cotton swab to put glue where she wanted the eye/ear/antlers to be and then sticking the pieces on the paper. That is much cleaner than holding that tiny piece of paper and trying to apply glue without making a mess on your hands.