Brazilian Preeschool--Escola dos Brasileirinhos

For about 7 months now some Brazilian moms (and one grandma) have been getting together to teach their kids Portuguese. We are all native Brazilians, some married to Americans some to fellow Brazilians...but all living in the USA. It has been such a fun journey! I am so thankful to God for putting such a special group of people together. We each have our own personalities and talents and we make a great mix. I feel so blessed that I wanted to share the love. So I am going to post here once a while about what we do in our group. But here is a first lesson for all of us-- If there was such a thing as a Motherhoood Manual---it would say--- raising kids is much easier with good friends!
Anyway, yesterday at our meeting we studied about FRIENDS or AMIGOS as we say in Portuguese. Monica read a wonderful story to the kids.It talks about how we learn things from animals and how they are our friends.
Here is the book she read (this book is in Spanish and English--not Portuguese-but she translated it so it worked perfectly)
My Friends/Mis Amigos

Then later, we sang a song about the ant (formiga)in the story. Part of the song said
"FUI AO MERCADO COMPRAR LIMÃO
E A FORMIGUINHA SUBIU NA MINHA MÃO
EU SACUDI, SACUDI, SACUDI
MAS A FORMIGUINHA NÃO PARAVA DE SUBIR"

This song is about someone going to the store to buy items and an ant biting a part of the body that rhymes with the items bought. Kids love it because they can move together with the song as the singer tries to get rid of the ants. Moms love it because it teaches parts of the body and names of food items. Perfect all around!
After singing, Creative Monica had the kids do a craft. They glued a picture of a lime (LIMÃO)then stamped their hand (MÃO) on the paper. The kids had to draw an ant (FORMIGA) moving up in the hand. It went so well with the song. The kids loved it! Unfortunately I forgot my camera...so pictures will start next week.