Ah, pizza!
With a husband from New York City, our book collection wouldn’t be complete without a book about pizza. “How to Eat Pizza” by Jon Burgerman is a favorite in our house. It’s funny for both littles and adults, full of bright colors, and lends itself to teach so many fantastic little lessons.
There are just too many lessons in this book to tackle everything at once, but that’s the best part – you can read it over and over again, focusing on something new with each read. We talk about the different shapes on each page (think circle for the whole pizza and triangle for each slice). We stop to point out the different colors of each page. Then we look at how the slices are feeling based on the look of their faces (frown, smile, tongue sticking out, eyes crossed). You don’t even need words on a page to understand a characters feelings and that’s a big lesson on emotions for littles to learn. And finally, this book is oozing with VOCABULARY. Just reading it over and over again, your little will pick up the names of different fruits, vegetables, emotions, and numbers.
After we’ve reread the story (it’s actually a story you won’t mind reading 20 times), we love to make our own shape pizza and get a little messy! We grab a couple paper plates. Your little can color the white plate brown with crayon or cut a circle out of brown construction paper and glue it on the plate. My little was on the younger side when we worked on this, so I decided to cut out the different shape toppings, but if your little is working on cutting – let him/her get creative and cut their own pizza topping shapes. We did black circles for olives, yellow rectangles for cheese, orange squares for pineapples, and green triangles for peppers. I let my little tell me the colors, shapes, and food vocabulary. Great for language acquisition! Then with a cotton ball, we spread the red paint all over the plate. I didn’t even worry about the glue, and we placed the toppings on the wet paint and let it dry.
Feeling extra zealous? Make some pizza for dinner. I leave the cooking to my husband, who is a much better cook than I am, but it’s pretty amazing to hear some of that vocabulary at the dinner table. Although realistically, it usually sounds something like, “Yuck – I don’t like basil”. (Hey kid – at least you know the word basil!)
My favorite part of all…hearing my little tell my husband that Chicago Deep Dish is her favorite pizza and watching him cringe.
Want to try this activity out? Just pick up the materials below and have fun!
Are You a New York State Pre-K Teacher?
This lesson aligns with the Next Gen Standards:
- Geometry: PKG2: Name shapes regardless of size
MATERIALS:
- Paper plate
- Red paint
- Cotton ball
- Multi-colored construction paper
- Scissors
- Brown crayon or brown construction paper
- Glue (optional)
BOOKS: