Chinese New Year!

Being a first year teacher, I am extra excited about every holiday that comes around because I feel as if I am celebrating them for the first time. In the case of Chinese New Year, this really is the first time I am celebrating it, making it super special. Adding to my excitement was a chance to use all of the cool stuff in the Chinese New Year unit that I won from http://teachertothecore.blogspot.com/. It was created for first and second grade, so I modified some of the activities to fit my preschoolers. It has everything you need for a successful Chinese New Year celebration, including bulletin board goodies.

 
The Panda Smart Art was a big hit with the kids.

 

 



We also used the dragon hat template to create our tissue paper dragon head.
I recreated the image on poster board and wrote the color names in colored marker. I gave the children sheets of tissue paper to tear and glue onto the poster board.

 
 

 

Then it was time to decorate the body. I drew scales onto yellow roll paper and let the kids do the rest.

Our original costume was really long in order to accommodate all of our kids, but the day of our parade fell on the same day of Nor'easter, so many of our children did not show up for school. We cut the roll down and cut the excess into strips to hang from the sides. (We were originally going to do this with tissue paper). Sticks were added and Viola'!

We had been practicing our dragon dancing without the costume all week to traditional Chinese music and learning how to move in harmony with each other, so by the time our dragon costume was done we were pros. 

 

Of course no Chinese New Year Celebration is complete without chopsticks. The children were surprisingly good at using them. It helps that they had been using them in various centers throughout the week. (i.e letter sorting, colored rice sensory table, Lego color sorts). I was still impressed at the skill at which they used them to eat. :-D 

 

Other activities included fan dancing with child created fans, Chinese clothing for the dress-up center and one of my favorite books "Tikki-Tikki -Tembo". It was hi-la-rious to hear the children try to say the full name. I laughed so much my sides ached.

To find it on Amazon Click Here

To get a copy of the Chinese New Year unit I used, which includes many more activities,  Click Here 
To see the blog on the unit by its creator Click Here

I can't wait until next year!!! I have so much more planned. I would love to hear what ideas you have come up with for the Chinese New Year. Please comment below.

From one of our exercises on working in harmony.