Saint Patrick’s Day Activities The Leprechauns have invaded our day care When the children go outside to play they turn the chairs and tables upside down. When the children take naps the leprechauns switch shoes around. On St. Patrick's Day the leprechaun will write a note apologizing for the mischief he has caused and tell them where he has hidden a pot of gold for them to find. They will follow the clues around the day care center until they find the gold covered candy coins. Two weeks ago, a leprechaun "lost" all his gold in our play spaces, he left us his pot and a reward notice saying that if we could find all his gold and refill his pot by St. Pats Day, he would leave us a reward. Let the children find the gold (gold spray-painted items - anything I could think of - rocks, buttons, keys, feathers, spoons etc.). Each time they find a piece of gold, they place it in the leprechauns pot and I give them a "Lucky Shamrock" sticker to put on. On St. Pats Day, the leprechaun will return at naptime and pick-up his small pot full of gold - and in return he will leave a large pot (a Halloween witch's cauldron) full of a reward. The reward will consist of shamrock shaped cookies, a pitcher of lemonade tinted green, festive cups and napkins, and a goodie bag for each child. Some of the other things we will be doing - the leprechaun will leave a green footprint trail to the pot, but we will only be able to see the trail with our "magic glasses" Crafts Magic Leprechaun glasses green tagboard cut into shamrock shaped sunglasses with green cellophane covering the eye openings Leprechaun binoculars 2 tp rolls stapled together and painted green. We will look for Leps all day. Filter Paper Shamrocks Precut shamrock shape out of coffee filters. Mix water and yellow food coloring and place mixture in a baby food jar. Do the same for blue. Let the children use eyedroppers to drip colors on the filter shape. The colors will run together and make beautiful shamrocks. Filter Paper Eggs Precut egg shapes out of coffee filters. Mix water with the basic colors. Do the same as above. Create wonderful eggs. Shamrock Prints Cut bell pepper in half and clean out the seeds. The children can dip the cross sections of the pepper into some green paint and press the shamrock print onto paper. Song I'm a little leprechaun(sung to I'm a Little Teapot") Dressed in green, The tiniest man That you have ever seen. If you ever catch me, so it's told, I'll give you my pot of gold. Movement Tall and Small Here is a giant who is tall, tall, tall. Here is an elf who is small, small, small. The elf who is small will try, try, try. To reach the giant who is high, high, high. Act out the movements as you sing. Stand tall, slowly sink to the floor, slowly rise, stand tall, stretch and reach arms high. Cut out 10 potato shapes out of brown paper and number them 1-10. Place them on the floor in a row and have the kids jump from one to ten singing One potato, two potato, three potato four...etc. Recipe Leprechaun Pudding. Materials: one 1-ounce box of sugar free instant pistachio pudding for every five children, 1/2 cup of milk per child, 1 small resealable plastic bag per child, 1/2 cup measuring cup, 1 spoon per child. Put tablespoon of pudding mix in sandwich bag, add milk, then close the baggy and have kids shake and squeeze, then eat. E-Mail Back Home