Full STEAM Ahead: The Mitten - Comparing Contrasting and preschool reading comprehension

The Mitten

Lesson Plan for Preschool

Prepared by Mrs. Yandell

OVERVIEW & PURPOSE

In this activity, students will explore the story “The Mitten” with an interactive project. Children will focus on comparing and contrasting objects of differents sizes and make inferences about what they think will happen.  

EDUCATION STANDARDS

1. Comparing and contrasting measurement of objects
2. Literacy- reading comprehension, ability to reference and retell a story
3. Fine motor skills

OBJECTIVES

1. Be able to retell the story
2. Ability to reference main characters in the story
3. Distinguish sizes of objects as smallest, big, biggest
4. Infer what object would hold more based on its size

MATERIALS NEEDED

1. Sock mittens
2. Animals or objects of all different sizes
3. “The Mitten”

VERIFICATION

Steps to check for student understanding

1. Are you able to recognize which sock is the smallest and which is the largest?
2. Can you identify which sock will hold more objects?
3. Which sock will hold less objects?
4. Why will one sock hold more and one hold less?
5. Will a sock hold more larger object or more smaller objects?

ACTIVITY

We will start this activity by reviewing the book “The Mitten.”  Students will be asked what occurred during the beginning, middle, and the end of the story, as well as, reference main characters.  Next, we will compare and contrast socks of different sizes, and students will identify which sock will hold the most and least amount of objects based on its size.  To start the activity, each student will be given a sock mitten ( all are different sizes), and be asked to fit as many animals into their sock as they can.  Encourage them to observe the difference in size of the sock when there are no objects and when it has objects inside.  

The Mitten Recap by Jessica Yandell

Our preschool students have been reading the book “The Mitten,” so we took the opportunity to do a STEAM activity based on the story.

 

This was a great opportunity for the children to practice comparing and contrasting objects of different sizes, as well as, practicing fine motor skills.  The kids loved trying to fit all of the crazy bugs and animals into their sock mittens! They were able to observe that smaller socks will hold less objects, and the larger socks  hold more objects. What a fun and interactive way for preschoolers to integrate literature and math in the same project!