Lunar New Year Book Activities - Live Learn Literacy

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Yesterday was an inquiry filled day for the kids and me as we researched Lunar New Year together. I used to read books to my students in the classroom for Lunar New Year, but the year with my children at home was fun to get to be more creative and spend more time diving into the holiday traditions and learning together.

Paper crafts made from activities included in *Ruby’s Chinese New Year* book by Vickie Lee.

Ruby’s Chinese New Year Read Aloud

My children loved reading Ruby’s Chinese New Year by Vickie Lee. The bright illustrations were captivating, and my children loved hearing the repeating pattern of naming animals that joined Ruby along her journey as the story progressed. During the read-aloud, we paused for CVC words we learned that were often included in the book, such as cat and rat. After the read-aloud was completed, the kids wanted to make the crafts explained in the back of the book. So we grabbed the red paper, glue, and some gold glitter and got to work. They made banners and lanterns from the resources found in the book. The back pages of the book include directions for paper lanterns, paper fans, and banners to celebrate the Lunar New Year. Finally, we went outside to hang up our finished projects and decided to watch YouTube read-aloud of the book again.

The paper lanterns were a perfect cutting practice activity for my preschooler. Unfortunately, we didn’t have gold paper, so my kids were beyond excited to use gold glitter instead.

Year of the Tiger Activities

We ran out of time to complete all the activities I found on Pinterest, but I’m thinking of using those ideas for my upcoming rainforest unit anyways. But what we did have time for was making tiger puppets, tiger playdough, and a rainbow sensory bin with the book Go Get ‘Em Tiger! by Sabrina Moyle and Eunice Moyle. The puppet and play dough ideas came from pins I found on Pinterest. Please visit my page @ChrisCMoreno for more Tiger Ideas in my Rainforest Unit. Click this link for the playdough recipe I used.