Kindergarten Prepares for Gingerbread House Making

Re-reading a new classroom favorite, The Gingerbread Baby

The anticipation is building for the annual ginger bread house making happening next Friday in kindergarten. Milk cartons are being collected, house designs are being developed and thoughts of all those sweet treats are being talked about! To prepare for house building, we have been reading different versions of the Gingerbread Man to begin comparing and contrasting story settings, plots and characters.

Thinking of a story idea

The first version we read was Jan Brett's rendition of the old tale, called The Gingerbread Baby. This book had a surprise ending for the gingerbread cookie does not get eaten! After several readings, the kindergarten authors imagined they were gingerbread cookies and thought  of places that they would hide so they did not get eaten as well.

Helping one another with sight words

Using finger spaces to separate words

After drawing detailed and colorful pictures over several days, the artists turned to writing down their hiding place ideas for their gingerbread people using kid writing. It has been amazing to see the growth and development of our kindergarten writers as more letter sounds are being heard and sounded out, lower case letters are beginning to be used while writing, finger spaces are being utilized with fewer teacher reminders, sight word charts are being referred to spell familiar words, and students are supporting one another, and encouraging words are being shared.

Writing words to complement beautiful illustrations

Below is a list of imaginative kindergarten responses:

If I were a gingerbread cookie, I will hide...

• behind a rock
• in a present
• in the shower
• in a rainbow shoe
• in a rock outside
• under the bed
• inside a heart
• in the ocean with the fish
• behind a Christmas tree
• on a shelf with paper gingerbread cookies
• in a rainbow box
• under a bed near a portal to escape if I have to

Be on the look up for a display of our kindergarten gingerbread cookie hiding spots coming soon. The next step will then be to  publish a classroom book of  all of the wonderfully creative ideas from our young writers and illustrators.