Dr. Seuss – Nurture Mama

March 2nd is Dr. Seuss Day. Dr. Seuss made such a great contribution to children’s literature, and his contribution is worth noting. As my children are a little older and busier with school/preschool this year, we will just mark the occasion by reading his books. Some of our favorites include:

The Cat in the Hat

Ten Apples Up on Top

The Lorax

The Foot Book

Mr. Brown Can Moo, Can You?

My Many Colored Days

The Grinch Who Stole Christmas

Fox in Sox

My friend Karyn at Teach Beside Me shared a helpful list “Learning to Read with Dr. Seuss“. She broke down the Dr. Seuss books by reading level, and this list has been really useful for us. My seven-year-old daughter is needing a little encouragement to want to branch out and read books herself (instead of just being read to), and this list is super helpful in giving me some options for her to read on her own.

Our family has had lots of fun with Dr. Seuss in the past. Be sure to check out these related posts from past years.

Bartholomew, Yertle, and The Lorax

My Many Colored Days

The Foot Book

If you need someone else to read Dr. Seuss to your children (I have to admit, some of his books tend to drag on a little long for me), you can always turn to YouTube. There are a number of videos of his books being read aloud, like If I Ran the Zoo and Green Eggs and Ham (especially fun for Florida Gator fans with Tim Tebow reading it). I am sure there are others if you do a little searching.

What is your favorite Dr. Seuss book?

March is the month of Dr. Seuss, and we have been having a lot of fun reading his books and doing related activities. Some of his books are great fun, like “Mr. Brown Can Moo! Can You?“, but I have to admit that some of his books get a little long in the telling (we gave up halfway through “If I Ran the Circus“). Here are a few highlights of our preschool Dr. Seuss theme.

Note: These activities were done with my two youngest children, ages five and almost three.

Read Bartholomew and the Oobleck and make gloop.

This was an understandably messy activity, but the kids loved it. After a little while they added a few of their small plastic animals and had fun hiding and finding them. The recipe for the gloop can be found here.

Read Yertle the Turtle and make turtles that stack

Inspiration for the turtles came from Happy Birthday Author.

Here is a close-up of Zach’s turtles before we cut them out. Look closely and you can see the little turtle faces he drew (circle-ish with two dots for eyes) and the legs and tails. He has just started drawing people this week and I love it! The purple squiggles in the middle he said are slides.

Read The Lorax and make Truffala Trees

Inspiration for the Truffula trees came from I Can Teach My Child.

I gave the instructions on the trees to my husband on a Saturday afternoon, and he got busy with the kids and made quite a few trees. Once the trees were made they stuck them in some homemade playdough for more imaginative play.

The next day Lily wanted to do another craft, but we were getting ready for church and I told her no. She grabbed the Lorax book and started making her own book. She did four or five pages and it was so fun to see her drawings.

According to Lily, the Lorax is saying “Hey, who chopped down the tree I came out of?”

Tag: Dr. Seuss

Celebrating Dr. Seuss

Days with Dr. Seuss: Bartholomew, Yertle, and The Lorax