Do you need a done-for-you lesson plan for your homeschool preschool Co Op with the letter Z? I gathered all my favorite letter Z crafts and preschool ideas, then put it together for a full 2 hour preschool lesson.
Welcome to Preschool Co Op! If you are wanting to know how to start an at home preschool co op, go here for beginning instructions. If you are all set, and just want to hop into the Letter Z preschool co op lesson plan, then let’s go!
Preschool Words Starting With Z
Zoo, Zebra, zinc, zipper, zap, zed, Zest, zero, Zorro, zombies.
lesson Z Sections:
- Welcome Play (waiting for everyone to get here)
- Introduction to the letter Z
- Draw Like Zorro
- Handwriting Z (print)
- Snack Time: Zebra Cakes, Zoo Animal Crackers
- Lesson on Zebras
- Zoo Matching Game
- Zero
- Zombies
Supplies to Buy at the Store or Online
- Handwriting helpers for little hands (optional)
- Pens
- Printing Paper and Ink
- Markers/crayons/or colored pencils
- Scissors
- Dollar store sword
- Sandbox or playdough for Zorro Z activity
- Snack ideas: Zebra Cakes, Zoo Animal Crackers (plain, circus, and chocolate).
- Mini water cups
- Bonus: Uno
Optional Note: Many people have asked for just the coloring handwriting pages that I made for each letter. You can find each of them for FREE on each letter lesson plan. OR you can BUY IT as a digital download (CLICK HERE) or a physical copy (CLICK HERE)
Prep Work
Week before: go over supply list and buy all the online items.
2 days before: Go on a shopping trip to pick up the rest of the needed supplies.
Day Before:
Printables:
- Download and print 1 handwriting Z coloring page per child
- Download and print 1 set of Letter Z Visuals/Dinosaur-Dragon activity combo
- Prepare for the Zoo by cutting out the animal categories and taping them to the side of containers. Cut out each animal squares. You can use them for the sorting game, and use them for the animal sounds and animal actions game. You can also print a copy, and use it for the Bonus Zoo matchup game.
Night before set up:
Gather all of your stuffed animals and put them in the room that will be the ‘Zoo’. Punch a hole in the printable Z(zebra) and the two O(owls). thread a ribbon or string through them and hang them up so the sign reads ‘ZOO’. Have the containers where the animals should go around the room waiting.
Prepare your home with these suggestions here
welcome Activity
Have the room filled with all your stuffed animals that they can play with till everyone arrives.
“Hello Everyone, welcome to the zoo! We have all of the lovely animals in their safe cages. . . Oh No!
they are all out of their cages. Can you put them back where they go? (have the kids gather up the stuffed animals and sort them into boxes)
That was great! Can we sort them in a different way? (dump out all the animals, and have them do it again, but this time, by color, or by size, or by carnivore, herbevore, omnivore, etc,.)
(Bonus idea: furry, feathery, hairy, scaley, slimy, crawly)
Don’t have a lot of stuffed animals? You can ask the kids to bring their own, or use cut out animals that are in the z packet.
Introducing The Letter Z
Welcome everyone, do you remember what letter we learned last time? What was it’s sound? Do you remember any of the words that start with Y?
What letter are we learning about now?
let’s sing the abc song.
It’s Z!
Z! We are on the last letter of the alphabet! isn’t that wonderful?! Z makes the ZZZZZ sound. as in Zebra
Zorro And the Z Blade
Gather everyone in a circle.
There once was a hero named Zorro. He was a lot like Robin Hood, but instead of a bow and arrow, he was amazing at swordfighting. he stole from the evil rich people and gave it back to the poor people who it was stolen from. Everytime he took a bad guy’s money, he would slash over, down, and over again, making a letter Z over the door or wall of the bad guy’s house so they knew who was helping the poor people.
You are going to be Zorro right now and you are going to be slashing the letter z into this sand (or flattened playdough)
(hand them a dollar store sword, and show them how to slash the letter z into the sand. Record them doing it for their parents if possible. wipe the sand clean, then hand the sword to the next child.
Handwriting: the letter Z
Now let’s write z with a pen instead of a sword
Gather everyone to the table with pens and coloring pencils or crayons, and have them practice writing uppercase and lowercase Z with this free printable, and the preschoolers can color the picture afterwards.
Snack beginning with the letter Z
Zebra Cakes, Zoo animal crackers (plain, frosted, and chocolate)
Lesson on Zebras
Zebras.
Zebras are kind of like horses, but they don’t sound like horses! and they aren’t really easy to ride like horses. Listen to this sound of zebras. can you make that sound? bwop bwop. Zebras live in the continent AFRICA. This is where Africa is on the map. you can see where North America is, where the buffalo bison roam, and where South America is where the jumping jaguar lives, here is Europe where the foxy fox lives, and Asia where the Yak lives, and Australia where the kangaroo and koala lives. Africa has lots of other cool animals too, like the giraffe, elephant, lions, hippos, rhinos, gazelles, warthogs, meerkats, hyenas. . . lots and lots. Have you ever seen a movie about a lion and a king? That was in Africa!
Animal Sounds Game
Now let’s Play a game where you have to make animal sounds, and everyone has to guess what animal it is (remember the sound for zebras!)
Have each child come up and show them the picture of an animal from the animal sound list. When they guess it, pick another child till all the animal names were picked.
Animal Actions Game
Now, instead of doing animal sounds, let’s see if we can act like the animals. But you have to be quiet! (taking turn using the animal action squares).
Bonus Game: Zoo Match Up
This is by far my favorite game. I even love it as an adult!
It’s a bonus, because it doesn’t work very well with less than 5 people.
Everyone will get an animal. Each animal has a pair (2 alligators, 2 giraffes, 2 snakes, etc,.) when everyone has had a chance to look at their animal, say go, and then they need to silently act out clues from their animal. When 2 kids think they have the same animal, the grab hands and fall to the floor. The last 2 kids standing are out.
It is a very quick game and can be played lots of times.
Bonus Bonus Game
This was not in the schedule, but the 4 year olds made time for it! They took the stuffed animals and began to play dodge ball with them.
Ending Game Zero
I thought I was so funny. I told the kids I had a test for them. “Who can name all the numbers up to 10?” All of them raised their hands and started counting as fast as they could.
I then told them that they had all failed the test. They all forgot Zero!
Zero comes before one.
You are going to do some pretty big math equations. There is adding, subtraction, and even multiplication! But don’t worry. There is a trick to the page.
Hand them out the worksheet where all the answers are zero. Once all the kids have a page and a pen, help them through it. Zero Plus Zero is Zero, write that down! Oh, this one is multiplication. . . ” Until they all get that each answer is zero, and they can finish the paper.
Bonus Zero. Play the card game uno. and talk about the goal is to have zero cards. Also give them these math questions where the answers are all zero. They’ll think it’s funny.
Bonus Bonus Ending Game: Z for Zombie tag.
I remembered this right at the end, and of course it was a big hit. I sent the kids outside, had one person be the zombie (they had to act like a zombie and say “brains”). Once the zombie touches a person, that person also turns into a zombie, and they go on like that till everyone is a zombie. Last person alive is the winner and can be the starting zombie next time.