Sweet and Silly Honey Hunt Book Based Activity for Preschoolers

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Make reading extra sweet with a honey hunt booked based activity for preschoolers! Your kids will love this easy and fun pretend play activity from Alisha!

Books are such fun and have the power to bring you anywhere in the world. You can become a princess riding through castles or a pirate sailing the high seas.

Books can shape the way we see the world.

Book-based pretend play provides a way for the reader to become part of the story. Putting your child into the action makes reading even more fun!

Sweet and Silly Honey Hunt Book Based Activity for Preschoolers

This honey hunt book based activity makes the beautiful story of The Bee Tree by Patricia Polacco (affiliate link) into a silly and fun cooperative game. 

Click here for more practical pretend play ideas.

There are only a few supplies needed for this pretend play game:

• The Bee Tree book (at your local library or order online)
• Yellow dot stickers (affiliate link)
• Craft sticks (any flat item will work)
• Black marker
• Glass jar or cup
• Optional: honey (only for children over one year of age)

Bee Ready with this Game Prep

Once you have gathered your supplies, I recommend making your bees and sticking them to the tree before reading the story.

On your yellow dot stickers, use your black marker to draw two dots for eyes and some lines for bee stripes.

Then place some of the bees on the craft sticks. Make as many sticks as children that will be participating.

These are the “bees” that you’ll be following to the bee tree.  Place the “bees” inside of the glass jar.

Try this great spelling activity utilizing craft sticks.

You’ll use your remaining “bees” or yellow stickers to place on a nearby tree. I recommend finding a good sized tree with bark that the stickers will adhere to.

Then, stick them all around the trunk. Make sure you spread out your bee stickers!

Finish up by hiding the honey behind (or near) the tree.

Once your “bee hunt” game is set-up, enjoy some memory making time together as you sit and read “The Bee Tree.”

As you’re reading, stop and talk about any cultural differences you notice in the story. You could also talk about how Patricia Polacco creates a sense of adventure and community in this book.

When you (or your child) have finished reading, it’s time for the pretend play game to begin.

Let’s Go on a Honey Hunt Together!

The main point of this pretend play game is to find the bee tree. Pretend that you are the characters in the story!

Begin in a spot outside that is a good distance from your bee tree.

Open the jar and have the first participant let a bee free by taking out a bee stick.

Show your children how to make the bee “fly” by waving it around in the air while they run. Then tell them to follow their bee around the yard, looking for the bee tree and the honey.

Pace out the game so that all the bees can be released before your children find the bee tree.

Check out these additional scavenger hunt activities.

It was super fun to make buzzing sounds while holding the bee sticks and running with them up and down the sidewalk, over lawns, and across driveways.

As your children race around chasing their bees, keep setting more bees free. Continue to “release” bees until all the children are following a bee and your bee jar is empty.

Once they are all free, guide your children on a more direct line to the bee tree. You could help point them in the right direction by using the hot/cold game if they need a nudge.

Once they’ve found the special tree, pretend to blow smoke on the tree, just like in the story.

Reach into the beehive and pull out the honey. Rejoice and enjoy the sweet honey from the bee tree!

If your children are like mine, they’ll probably ask to play this honey hunt book based activity again. You could adapt this game to use with other stories, too.

Make connections to Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne or We’re Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen with a few tweaks to this activity. We’d love to see your ideas!

How do you make books come alive for your children? Share your best suggestions in the comments!

from Hands On As We Grow https://ift.tt/2DLS6r5