It’s a grand day for a dash when Dog decides to challenge Strawberry to the greatest race of all time! There’s plenty of action! Drama! Excitement! But…is Strawberry even aware of any of this?
We read Dog vs. Strawberry, written by Nelly Buchet, and illustrated by Andrea Zuill (Random House Studio, 2024). When Dog’s owner innocently offers her a strawberry, Dog takes it as an open challenge for a race. Dog sprints, jumps, leaps, chases her tail, and even takes a power nap. But the stoic (and completely unaware) Strawberry always seems to have the advantage. Narrated in a NASCAR commenter’s voice, this book is hilarious, with escalating laughs as our story time kids realized that the race was very one-sided indeed. Highly recommended!
The project was relatively simple. We crafted a box dog with poster board ears, tail, and a paper cup nose. We paired it with a red plastic ball pit ball made to look like a strawberry. Then we had some races!
The thing that really elevated the project was the dog’s super boop-able black foam nose. It’s a repurposed costume clown nose, securely hot glued to the paper cup. The foam nose made pushing and bumping the strawberry extra fun.
First, we raced down tables with the kids boop-ing the strawberry to the finish line. But then things segued into a form of soccer, where kids tried to boop the strawberry past me into a “goal.” Very appropriate for World Cup time! We had a blast!
Have a reluctant reader who might appreciate good race? This simple project will get them raring to read letters and words with the assistance of their own personal reading robot! Built out of things in your home or office, it’s low tech, but high levels of F-U-N!
Next, write alphabet letters on Post-it notes and stick them to a tabletop. Have the reader and their robot sit on the opposite side of the table. As you call out the letter, they can slide and release their robot towards the proper Post-it!
Where there’s rubbish, disorganization, and debris, you will find a happy herd of piggies, ready to roll! The perfect indoor game to combat the winter blahs…it’s trash time!
First, the pig! Wrap a large oatmeal container in pink paper, then add a circle of pink paper to the lid as well. Next, cut a paper cup down to approximately 1.75″ and cover it with pink paper. This is your pig’s snout. Use extra paper for the ears, and a curl of paper (or corkscrewed craft stem) for a tail. Draw the eyes and nostrils on with markers. Finally, tape 3 paper towel rolls together to create the “steering stick” for your pig. You can color it with markers, or fancy it up with colored tape. You’re ready to race!
Time for the race! Scatter “rubbish” in a large area (we used plastic eggs, old film canisters, and toilet paper tubes because they rolled smoothly). Have all the contestants line up, standing behind their pigs with the steering stick. On the shout of “Go!” players push their pigs forward, zero in on a piece of rubbish, and push it across the finish line.
A less competitive version is to turn a table into the “goal,” and have kids roll the rubbish underneath it. When all the garbage is under the table, everyone wins!