Preschool Math Activity with Groovy Joe

Did you know that Pete the Cat author, Eric Litwin, has a brand new book? Yep! If your preschoolers love Pete, then they are going to fall in love with a dog named Groovy Joe. Ours sure did! So I put together a simple preschool math activity with Groovy Joe, ice cream, and dinosaurs.

What, wait? A dog named Groovy Joe, ice cream AND dinosaurs? In one book? Oh yes! Just wait until you see!

Full disclosure: I was provided a copy of Groovy Joe Ice Cream & Dinosaurs. This post contains affiliate links for your convenience.

About the book:

Groovy Joe Ice Cream & Dinosaurs has lots of rhyming and repetition, just like the Pete the Cat series. This book also focuses on sharing, something we talk a lot about in our preschool classroom.

What did Joe say?

“It’s Awesome to share!”

In the book, a dog named Groovy Joe spots an ice cream truck. After he sings his ice cream song, a dinosaur stomps into the room. And then another. And another! Each time, Groovy Joe shares his ice cream until it’s all gone. And then, he turns the ice cream tub upside down so it becomes a drum. Everyone starts to dance!

Preschool Math Activity with Groovy Joe

After getting our copy of Groovy Joe Dinosaurs & Ice Cream, I set up a simple math activity during our circle time.

I placed an ice cream container filled with some styrofoam balls and an ice cream scoop.

As we read the book and watched each dinosaur take a scoop of ice cream from Groovy Joe, I had our preschoolers remove a scoop of “ice cream” from our container.

Each time we counted how many scoops were now out of the container, and figured out how many were left.

When the container was empty, we did what Groovy Joe did.

We turned our ice cream container upside down and used it like a drum!

We ended this activity reminding ourselves how good it feels to share, just as Groovy Joe did with his ice cream.

And then … we listened to the book and had fun singing with Joe! (We’ve since listened to this several times, it’s loved THAT much.)

Books by Eric Litwin:

More about Eric Litwin:

Eric Litwin is the song singing, guitar strumming, #1 New York Times Best Selling author who brings early literacy and music together. He’s a former teacher who was concerned how the love of reading seemed to fade between kindergarten and third grade. He began bringing more music and interactivity into his instruction. As an author, Eric connects literacy to music and movement and uses call-and-response and repetition. He uses the Multi-Learning Approach in all of his books.

I have had the pleasure of talking with Mr. Eric on the phone and his passion and enthusiasm for children’s literacy is amazing! I’m waiting for him to visit my area so I can watch him perform in person.

Image from EricLitwin.com