stART: Crictor (the snake)

stART is hosted by Michelle at A Mommy's Adventures...Visit her site for more literature-based activities.

My Mom and Dad bought this book for the kids while they were on vacation last week. Crictor is a Reading Rainbow book, written by Tomi Ungerer. The story takes place in France. Madame Bodot is given a boa constrictor, and she keeps it as a pet. She takes him everywhere she goes and even knits a sweater for him. At the end, he saves her from a burglar, and the town makes a statue in his honor.

When I told Sissy that we were going to read a snake book and do snake activities, she looked at me with "No, we are NOT" eyes and gave me a simple, "No." It wasn't so much a disrespectful "no" - more like a "You've got to be kidding me. Do you know me at all?" However, she did like the book and was quickly won over by making BEJEWELED snake BRACELETS.
I printed this pattern from Danielle's Place onto green cardstock. She decorated them with markers and glued on jewels. We taped the ends together.

Beyond the art project, we also...
made snakes with Play-doh. I introduced them to the ruler, and we measured our snakes because Crictor "grew longer and longer and stronger and stronger," and Madame Bodot measured him.

I like the simple illustrations.
They even put their snakes in their own beds.

Crictor goes to school and learns how to shape the alphabet on the previous pages, then learns how to count, too.

The kids tried making a few letter shapes of their own.

I printed off this snake shapes worksheet from Danielle's Place. The plan was to have Dash make the shapes from the pipe cleaners and have Sissy match them up. However, there was a little meltdown in the Dash department, and he was no longer involved. I made the pipe cleaner shapes (it's harder than it looks!), and Sissy matched them up while we said the names over and over.

Dash had gotten mad about something earlier, and he ended up ripping up his snake bracelets in anger. Then he was upset he didn't have a snake bracelet anymore, and he was crying because he wanted one. I told him it was too late. Hysterically, he was trying to pour out more glue to decorate a snake (which is in shreds). I put the glue up in a high cabinet so he couldn't reach it. This is what I caught him doing, trying to find a way to get up there.

I've got my work cut out for me.