Rainbows Day 2 -God’s Promise

 Today we learned why we have rainbows.  We reviewed the story of Noah’s Ark focusing on the end where they have the promise from God to never destroy the earth again with a flood.  We played with some Noah’s Ark toys and did some Noah’s Ark Crafts..  We also has some more yummy rainbows and did some more science experiments (the kids favorite).

God’s Promise

Discuss: Genesis 9:13 “I have placed my rainbow in the clouds. It is a sign of my covenant with you and all the earth.”

After a year of floating, the ark was finally on dry ground. Just a few minutes before, it was filled with growling, barking, honking, purring animals. Now the giant boat sat on a mountain top with the door wide open, the boat was all empty and quiet. All the animals had rushed out the door to fill the earth again. So what was Noah doing? He was gathering rocks. He was so thankful to be alive, he was building an altar to God. So Noah piled up the rocks to build a fire on them. This was the sacrifice Noah offered to God to thank him for saving him and his family. God was pleased with Noah’s sacrifice. But most of all, God was pleased that Noah was truly thankful. So God made a promise to Noah, “Never again will I destroy the world with a flood. I make this covenant with you and with all creatures. From this day on, there will always come a time for planting, and a time for gathering up what was planted. Day will always follow night, the warm days of summer will always follow the cold and snow of winter, as long as the earth shall be.” So God blessed Noah and his family. He told them to have many children to fill the earth with people again. He gave them the plants and the animals for food. Then God said to Noah, “Look up in the sky.” Noah looked up. The bright sun was shining, God made a brilliant rainbow appear. God said to Noah, “You see, I have set my rainbow in the sky. This will be the sign of the covenant I have made with you and all creatures, never again to destroy the earth by a flood. It will always remind us of the promise between you and me.” So, the next time you see a rainbow, you can think of Noah and the flood. Remember that God loves you, and that no matter how bad the storm, there will always come a bright new day. That is God’s promise, and God always keeps his promises.

Read: The First Rainbow By Su Box

Comprehension Questions:

  1. How many animals did God send to Noah on the ark? Two of every animal. (boy and girl)
  2. What did God send as a promise to Noah after they got off of the ark? (A rainbow)

Noah’s Rainbow

Materials:

  • 2 paper plates
  • paint
  • paintbrushes
  • Animals and Noah  (I used some that I had from a coloring book)
  • Scissors
  • Glue

Directions:

  1. First, cut one of the paper plates in half and let your child paint one piece brown.
  2. Paint a rainbow on the top 3/4 of the other plate. 
  3. Color all of the Noah animals and cut them out.
  4. Once everything is dry, staple the brown plate to the rainbow plate so that the rainbow is showing.

Noah’s Ark Play

Discuss: God sent the animals to Noah’s ark 2 by 2 (a boy and a girl).

Directions:

  1. Set up the Little People Ark and put Noah on it.
  2. Line up the animals outside the ark 2 by 2.
  3. Children can count by 2’s to see how many animals are on this ark.

Noah’s Ark ABC Puzzle 

We have a wooden Noah’s Ark puzzle that lines the animals up in ABC order.

Rainbow Lorikeet

Discuss:

This is truly where a picture is better than a thousand words. There intense colors have patches of emerald green, orange midnight blue, dull blue, ruby red,lemon yellow, purple, violet greenish gray. They are a small bird generally 11 to 12 inches long, on average females are generally a bit smaller and younger birds have duller markings. They are said to live over 20 years in the wild. Their vocalization is varied from “screeching” in flight to “chatting” during feeding.

                     

Rainbow Bible Verse

Read and talk about the verse with your child. Have the child draw a rainbow over the verse with crayons.

I have placed my

rainbow in the clouds.

It is a sign of my covenant

with you and all the earth.”

Genesis 9:13

IMG_0Youngest child’s on the bottom up to the oldest child’s!539

Rainbow Jello

Ingredients:

  • Jello for each color of the rainbow
  • Knox gelatin (6 envelopes)
  • Jello mold or Clear cups

Directions:

  1. Mix the purple jello with an envelope of the knox gelatin.
  2. Pour in two cups of boiling water. Dissolve the gelatin.
  3. Add 1/2 cup of ice. Stir until thick.
  4. Remove any remaining ice cubes and any bubbles that may have formed.
  5. Pour a little into each clear cup and/or mold. Let set in the refrigerator.
  6. Repeat with the blue jello and pour it over the set purple (and then the other colors).

Changing Daisies

Discuss: As the colored water is absorbed, the children will be able to see how the water is absorbed into the plant and will be amazed when the petals of the carnation change color.

Materials:

  • Food Coloring (each color of the rainbow)
  • Water
  • 6 Clear Glasses
  • 6 White Daisies

Directions:

  1. Place 1 tablespoon food coloring and quarter cup of water in each glass.
  2. Place 1 stem of daisies in each glass and wait for a couple of hours.
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More rainbow fun that we had this week:

Rainbows Day 1 -Colors

We spent the first day of our rainbow unit study learning the colors of the rainbow.  We had fun with baking, crafts, reading, science experiments, similes, and math.  The favorite activity for the kids today was definitely the rainbow flower cookies that we made.  The three older kids can now recite all the colors of the rainbow.

Colors of the Rainbow

Discuss: What are the colors in the rainbow? (ROY G. BIV) Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Purple. Newton added indigo and orange to give a total of 7 colors similar to the number of notes in a musical scale and number of days in a week. Indigo is not really a color. It is a shade between blue and violet. Many people omit indigo from the rainbow spectrum because it is not a color and is hard for the human eye to distinguish between the blue and violet.

Read: Liz Makes a Rainbow by Tracey West

Comprehension Questions:

  1. What are the colors of the rainbow? Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple
  2. What is shade of color between blue and purple sometimes called? Indigo

Ordinal Numbers

Directions:

Give the child a blank rainbow and have him listen and follow the directions below as you read them.

Start at the top and color the first arc red.                    Color the fifth arc blue.

Color the fourth arc green.                                           Color the third arc yellow.

Color the second arc orange.                                      Color the sixth arc purple.


Rainbow Color Matching


Make a large rainbow out of poster board.  Place the rainbow on the floor with small items of each color in a basket.  The child places each item on the appropriate colored arc.

Rainbow Similes

Read: What Makes a Rainbow? by Betty Ann Schwartz

Discuss: A simile is a figure of speech consisting of a comparison of 2 objects using like or as. Similes tell you what something is LIKE. Similes are in What Makes a Rainbow? “Red LIKE a ladybugs wings.”

Materials:

  • Poster Board
  • Markers or Crayons
  • Printing Paper

Directions:

  1. Pick a color. Describe the color by answering the following…
  2. Tastes like
    Smells like
    Sounds like
    Looks like
    Hot like
    Cold like
  3. Tell in a sentence or group of sentences what this color looks like, sounds like, etc…
  4. Lightly sketch an outline of a large rainbow on the poster board.
  5. Write our poems in the stripes exactly how the children dictate it to you.
  1. Kids can make a smaller version of the Simile Rainbow on a piece of paper.
  2. Kids write the word color over and over for each arc in the rainbow.
IMG_0363

Rainbow Pudding Cups

Ingredients:

  • 6 packages of different colored Jello (purple, blue, green, yellow, orange, red.)
  • 6 Cups of Vanilla Ice Cream
  • 6 Cups of Hot Water.
  • Clear glasses
IMG_0329

Directions:

  1. Follow the instructions on the back of the jello box, but instead of adding a cup of cold water, you add a cup of ice cream.
  2. Make sure you pour the pudding in a clear glass, and let each layer set up in the refrigerator before you add the next layer.  
IMG_0330

Rainbow Puzzles


I print off page 8 of this Rainbow Download and let the children cut them out and place them together.

Cotton Ball Rainbow

Materials:

  • Cotton balls
  • White paper cut in a cloud “shape”
  • Construction paper in each color of the rainbow
  • Glue

Directions:

  1. Give child the cloud shape.
  2. Cover the bottom of the cloud with glue.
  3. Child places color paper at the bottom of the cloud.
  4. Add additional glue all over the paper cloud.
  5. Place cotton balls to add “fluff.”

Planting A Rainbow

Read: Planting a Rainbow by Lois Ehlert

Materials:

  • Sugar Cookie Dough
  • Food Coloring
  • Unsweetened cocoa powder
  • Sucker Sticks

Directions:

  1. Divide the dough into 7 parts (one for each color and one for the flower centers)
  2. Color the dough with the food coloring (red, orange, yellow, green blue, purple)
  3. Add a tablespoon of unsweetened cocoa powder to the dough, for the brown, flower centers.
  4. Roll the dough into 1/2 inch balls.
  5. Place colored balls around the centers, to form flowers, on a greased cookie sheet. Press them together a little, so they stick to each other. T thought he was playing with play dough!
  6. Add a sucker, pushing it through the dough into the center of the flower. 
  7. Bake as normal for sugar cookies (350 degrees Fahrenheit for 10-12 minutes).

Baking Soda & Vinegar

Discuss: When the baking soda and the vinegar mix they create an acid-base reaction and the two chemicals work together to create a gas (the bubbles).  Observe the 3 states of matter: the baking soda is the solid, the vinegar is the liquid, and the bubbles is the gas.

Materials:

  • baking soda
  • vinegar
  • spoons
  • clear cups or containers
  • food coloring
  • a tray to hold any spills

Directions:

  1. Add a few drops of food color to each spoon.
  2. Fill the rest of each spoon with baking soda.
  3. Add ¼ to ½ cup of vinegar to each cup.
  4. Choose a spoon and stir it into one cup of vinegar.

More rainbow fun that we had this week:

Rainbow Unit Study

In this unit study we learned all about rainbows. This unit has 5 days worth of lessons. We did this unit study with cousins, from tots to 1st grade, but it would be great for Preschool age. This unit study was tons of fun for the cousins, but I guess cousins are always ton of fun whatever their doing!  I made a lapbook for each child with their work from the unit so that they could go back and remember what they learned.

Day 1 Colors of the Rainbow

Day 2 God’s Promise

Day 3 The Color Wheel

Day 4 Double Rainbows

Day 5 What Makes a Rainbow

Rainbow Book List

Book can be read by the child or by the parent to the child, depending on the child’s reading level.

Books I used in the lessons 

Liz Makes a Rainbow by Tracey West

The First Rainbow By Su Box

Take a Walk on a Rainbow by Miriam Moss

All the Colors of the Rainbow by Allan Fowler

What Is a Rainbow? By Chris Arvetis and Carole Palmer

What Makes a Rainbow? by Betty Ann Schwartz

A Rainbow of My Own by Don Freeman

I can eat a Rainbow by Annabel Karmel

Planting a Rainbow by Lois Ehlert

Other age appropriate books

Noah’s Ark by Barbara Shook Hazen and Diane Muldrow

Singing with Noah by Cissy Padgett

The Rainbow Mystery by Jennifer Dussling

Duckie’s Rainbow by Frances Barry

On Noah’s Ark by Jan Brett

Elmer and the Rainbow by David McKee

The Magic School But Makes a Rainbow by Joanna Cole

Over the Rainbow by Judy Collins

Song List

Roy G Biv by They Might be Giants

Video List 

  • Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That! (Season 1 Episode 16) 
  • Elmo’s Rainbow 
  • The Magic School Bus Makes A Rainbow

Here are some of our other Elementary Unit Studies:

Preschool “Love, Joy, Peace” Canvas Painting

I placed letter stickers in the bottom corner of the canvas to spell a word. Then I had the kids choose their colors of paint and make long strokes of paint all the way across the canvas.

After they were happy with their canvas, I gently peeled off the letter stickers.

Their finished canvas’s turned out beautifully…

I have other fun Preschool posts too:

Preschool 100 Day

We celebrated 100 Day with cousins, from tots to first grade but I would recommend it for around Kindergarten age.  We had fun counting to 100 over and over by counting candy, jumping jacks, seconds, inches, and lots more.  We read lots of books, had a snack, completed a writing activity, and covered a ton of math concepts.

Book List…

One Hundred Hungry Ants by Elinor J. Priczes

I’ll Teach My Dog 100 Words by Michael K. Frith

One Hundred Days of  School by Trudy Harris

Henry’s 100 Days of Kindergarten by Nancy L. Carlson

Emily’s First 100 Days of School by Rosemary Wells

Miss Bindergarten Celebrates 100 Days of Kindergarten by Joseph Slate and Ashley Wolff

Graph 100 Jelly Beans

Materials:

  • 100 Jelly Beans
  • Simple Graph

Directions:

  1. Count out 100 jelly beans.
  2. Graph the jelly beans by color on a simple graph.
  3. Ask the children which color has the most?  Which color has the least?  How many red jelly beans are there?

100 Jumping Jacks

The children jumped and counted 100 jumping jacks.

100 Piece Puzzle

The children worked a 100 piece puzzle together.

100 Quiet Seconds

The children all laid down and tried to be quiet for 100 seconds.

Name 100 Animals

We started out with the children naming as many animals as they could as I wrote them down.  I tried to write down exactly what each child said so that they would feel that their ideas are just as important as others.  For example if a child suggests dog and another child suggests Dalmatian I wrote them both down even though a Dalmatian is a dog.  When the children started running out of ideas we used the animal books for some help.

100 Days of School Poem

We read this 100 Days of School poem to the children.

I’ve never seen a hundred,

It’s pretty big, I guess.

I keep asking everyone.

And they just say, “Oh yes”…

“A hundred is an awful lot”…

“A great big huge amount”…

But I am really worried,

‘Cause I’m just learning how to count.

I’m learning all my numbers,

And I’m trying by myself,

To understand a hundred.

But I might need some help.

I can’t believe we’ve been in school

For a hundred days!

A hundred is a lot, I know,

So I am just amazed!

I like to come to school each day

And I love my school a lot.

Mom says I go to school to learn

But it’s fun so I forgot!

So we counted to one hundred

And now I think I know,

That one hundred days we’ve been in school…

And there are lots more days to go!

Lots more days for having fun,

In our very own classroom.

And if I learn to count some more

I’ll be at a million soon!

Estimating 100 Inches

Materials:

  • Yard Stick
  • Masking Tape
  • Pen

Directions

  1. Line up the children against the wall.
  2. Show the children on the yard stick what an inch looks like.
  3. Write each child’s name on a piece of masking tape and give it to him.
  4. Tell the children to put the tape on the floor where they think 100 inches would be from where they are standing.
  5. Measure out 100 inches to see how the children did.

Counting Money

Materials:

  • 100 Pennies
  • 10 Dimes
  • 1 Dollar Bill

Directions:

  1. Have the children count out 100 pennies by putting them into piles of 10.
  2. Count the piles of 10 by tens to get to 100.
  3. Trade out each pile of 10 for a dime and then count how many dimes it takes to get to 1 dollar.
  4. Show a 1 dollar bill.
  5. You can also count quarters with older children.

Fruit Loop Necklace

Materials:

  • Yarn
  • Fruit Loops

Directions:

  1. Each child counts out 100 fruit loops.
  2. Children string the fruit loops onto the yarn.
  3. Tie the ends of the yarn together to form the necklace.

Make 100 Day Hash

Materials:

  • Miss Bindergarten Celebrates 100 Days of Kindergarten by Joseph Slate and Ashley Wolff
  • 10 small cup or bowls plus one for each child
  • Pretzels
  • Popcorn
  • Mini Marshmallows
  • Cherrios
  • Chocolate Chips
  • Peanuts
  • Oyster Crackers
  • Almonds
  • Raisins
  • Chex Cereal

Directions:

  1. You can use the ingredients that I used, the ones in the book, or make up your own.
  2. Put each ingredient in a different bowl (10 bowls).
  3. Each child takes 10 pieces from each ingredient bowl and places them into his own bowl to make 100 pieces.

Sorting Number Cards

Have the children put number cards in order from 1 to 100.  You can use any cards you have to make your own with index cards.  I used the A Beka Numbers Flashcards.

I Wish I had 100…

I made a simple writing page for the children that said…

I wish I had 100 ______________ because _____________.

On the first day of school I couldn’t _____________, on the 100th day I can.

100 Fingers and Toes

Materials:

  • Poster Board
  • Paint
  • Paper Plates
  • Bath Tub of Garden Hose for cleaning
  • Children (we used 5 children)

Directions:

  1. 5 children times 10 fingers each and 10 toes each makes 100.
  2. Set the children around the table and set a paper plate in front of each child.  Pour a little paint onto each plate.
  3. Set the poster board on the table  in the middle of all the children.Each child makes a right hand print on the poster by dipping their hand in the paint on the plate and then sticking in on the poster.  Then each child does it again with their left hand.

Then have the children wash their hands in the tub or with the hose. Put the poster board on the bathroom floor or outside if it’s nice out. Have the children one at a time place their right foot in the paint and then on the poster and then their left foot. Rinse their feet in the tub or with a hose immediately to avoid unwanted paint in the house.

After the paint dries, count the fingers and toes by 5’s (there should be 100).

I have other fun Preschool posts too:

Counting Ice Cream

I made ice cream scoops in different colors with a number on each one. I laminated them so that we can use them again. Then I made a cone so the kids could put the ice cream scoops in number order on the cone.

These kids are having fun learning their number order!

You can also learn colors with this activity, or have the children bring you the number/ color that you ask for!

I have other fun Preschool posts too:

Preschool Fun

We get to meet with cousins once a week to have some preschool fun.

Roll the dice and see what number you get!

Paper scraps frame!

Music Time!

Bowling to practice counting and writing our numbers.

Writing the alphabet!

The babies get to play too!

Snowman Fun!

Don’t forget to check out my Preschool Clown Colors post and Preschool Clown Shapes post as well.

Preschool Clown Shapes

He painted a different color each day and I cut them into shapes. He LOVES painting! I wrote the name of the shape on each one and then I placed the shapes on the wall with a clown juggling them.

He cut the different shapes from playdough too. I also made felt shapes (look in the background of the picture below) for him to play with.

Teaching him brings me such joy… I absolutely love see him learn new things. Don’t forget to check out my Preschool Clown Colors post as well.

Preschool Clown Colors

I love learning and teaching new things with my boy; he’s so smart, he already knows all of his colors at 2 and a half. He painted a different color each day… Blue + Yellow = Green

I cut each painted paper into a balloon shape for him and wrote the color word on the balloon with a black sharpie. Then I placed the balloons on the wall with a clown holding them. I used normal balloon sting to give a bit of a 3-D effect.