Tagged with 'Toys'

The 2020 calendar gives us an extra day to par-tay! On February 29, we all will be celebrating Leap Day, an extra day at the end of month that only happens every four years.

 How will you spend your extra day? With an assist from the Learning Resources’ Magnetic Learning Calendar and Froggy Feeding Fun™ Fine Motor Skills Game, we plan to LEAP into what makes this day on the calendar so unique! 

What day is Leap Day? 

In 2020, Leap Day falls on Saturday, February 29. Soak up that extra 24 hours…it won’t happen again until 2024. And Leap Day only occurs in the month of February. 

Why do we have Leap Day/Year?

 Every four years, an extra day is added on to our calendar. Our modern calendar consists of 365 days, but the actual time it takes for the Earth to get around the sun (orbit), is just a bit longer. To make up for that time, an extra 24 hours are built into the calendar every fourth year. 

But why do we call it “leap” year?

 The typical year is 365 days, referred to as common years. There are fixed dates for every holiday. For instance, New Year’s Day in 2020 was on a Wednesday. After February 29, 2020, has come and gone, an extra day will be added, making New Year’s Day “jump” one day ahead to a Friday. What a leap! 

Let’s celebrate first by looking at our calendar. The Learning Resources’ Magnetic Learning Calendar gives us a great visual. This year, February starts on a Saturday.  

This calendar serves as a helpful tool for learning about days and months, and is an easy way to include kids on the schedule for the family. Chances are good they have a classroom calendar, so with their own chart at home, they can be the “calendar helper” every day. It is magnetic, has a wipe-down surface, and even features a way to discuss the daily weather! 

Next, discuss things that can leap. Kids can leap, and we just learned that days can leap. What about frogs? Yes, frog can leap! In fact, we can’t think of a creature that doesn’t love to LEAP more than frogs! 

But before they do all that leaping, a frog has got to eat. The Froggy Feeding Fun™ Activity Set is an award-winning game that has lots of options to play. It comes with two adorable frog and lots of spongy flies.  

From a sensory standpoint, this activity has lots. The feel of the flies with their soft yet formed shapes make them easy to grasp. They create lots of color in a play space.  The first skill to try is opening the frog’s mouth by squeezing the corners.

Once your child gets it down, they might not stop feeding the frog! How many can it fit in its mouth? 

This game focuses on strengthen fine motor skills, but also reinforces math skills. A roll of the two soft dice reveals the color and number that the frog can pick up. Number recognition, color recognition, and counting skills are challenged! 

With the frog firmly in hand, you can also work on sorting the flies. Set up a pattern for kids to match.  

Rainbow order is always popular. What color comes after yellow? 

Because there are two frogs, lots can play this game. Let’s try picking up more flies! 

Squeezing the frog’s mouth open again and again will improve muscle grip for handwriting down the road. These frogs sure ate a lot. Time to leap back to the pond for a nap. 

What great fun you are, Leap Day! See you again in four years! 

Save it for later!

Kids love every opportunity to build, design and create whenever possible. I always look for ways to incorporate hands-on engaging activities in thematic centers. February is the perfect month to implement a geometric heart STEM toys challenge that would be the perfect compliment for your morning work tubs, math workshop centers, and science stations.

Whether you happen to be teaching geometry content or not, it’s so important to be exposed to visual and spatial hands-on experiences. The Learning Resources Geometric Shapes Building Set is the perfect way to manipulate, create and build 3-dimensional shapes.

In order to get started, you’ll need to decide how to best differentiate for your target age group. Giving students a completed visual is a great way to start. If you’d like to give them some clues but not necessarily a completed visual, you can always provide picture clues of how to get started. On another note, you can always just begin with the most challenging scenario. This is just listing how many of each puzzle piece, and then slowly add in some modifications to support your students so they don’t get to the point of frustration.

In order to begin, you will need to gather each of these Learning Resources Geometric Shapes Building Set pieces:

• 7 long purple side edges
• 10 short green side edges
• 16 rounded blue side edges
• 10 orange round vertices
• 3 red round vertices

If you’re wondering where to start building a 3d dimensional heart with this set, you’ll want to build one of the two rounded upper portions. This is one complete rounded upper portion and below I’ll take you through step by step.

Step 1:

Take 2 sets of 5 short green edges and connect each set to one orange vertex (you’ll end up with two as seen).

Step 2:

Take two sets of 4 rounded blue edges and assemble them into 2 circles using one with 4 oranges vertices and the other with 3. They will soon become attached so one orange vertex will be used in both circles.

Step 3:

Place step 1 into the center of step 2 and assemble as seen.

Step 4:

Gather 2 sets of 4 blue rounded edges and attach them with a red vertex as seen. Then place them on top of steps 1-3 and connect them at each orange vertex.

Next, you’ll be connecting the two circles via the base of the heart.

Step 5:

Attach 3 long purple edges to one red vertex and another one with two long purple edges. These will be attached to the upper rounded portions but don’t actually attach to the vertex. They just lay flush to it. Also, assemble two long purple edges to one orange vertex.

Step 6:

Use the 3 long purple edges with the red vertex to attach the two-round semi-circles. Each outer purple edge will connect to the outer orange vertices of the circles and the center will connect to the center of the one circle with 4 vertices. The two long purple edges and two loose purple edges will attach to the outer orange vertices and hang down to create an apex as the point of the heart.

Kids and students are sure to love this STEM challenge both in and out of the classroom!

Save it for later!

Slip in some learning ABC games this National Cupcake Day with ABC Party Cupcake Toppers from Learning Resources! This sweet, award-winning set includes six colorful pretend play cupcakes with slots on top and storage inside, 26 double-sided letter toppers, and 26 picture toppers for some delicious learning and fun! Designed to guide your sweet-toothed sweetie from letter names and sounds to simple spelling, there are so many ways to play, like:

1. Learn Your Letters

Place a series of letters (experts recommend teaching S, A, T, I, P, and N first) on the cupcakes and ask your child to find a specific letter. Give them a broad hint, if need be, by telling them whether that cupcake has chocolate or vanilla frosting, or give a more particular hint by sharing the color of the frosting with that letter on top.

2. Learn Letter Sounds

Place a picture topper inside a cupcake and slot the letter topper with the first letter of that word on top. Ask your child to identify the letter, then ask what sound it makes. Pop the cupcake open to see the object starting with that sound. Or switch it up by placing the picture topper on top and asking what letter or sound it starts with.

3. Spell It

Several of the picture toppers feature objects spelled with just three letters. Choose one of these simple, sound-it-out words, and place it inside the cupcake. Then use the letter toppers to spell the word on top of the cupcake. Help your child sound it out, then open the cupcake to check their work!

4. Alpha Order

Place the toppers with the first six letters in the alphabet on top of the cupcakes and shuffle them around. Ask your child to put them alphabetically, singing the Alphabet Song for support. Continue with the rest of the alphabet, then pick letters at random for an extra sticky challenge.

After practicing with the ABC Party Cupcake Toppers, surprise your sweetie with an actual cupcake-making session! Cupcakes make the perfect Valentine’s Day treat, and your kids can help this year because we’re sharing some of our favorite, kid-friendly cupcake ideas to make together on February 14. Once your cupcakes are baked and cooled…

Mix! Start with vanilla frosting (homemade or store-bought), drip a few drops of food coloring, and let your little one mix it up. Dip! Once your cupcakes are cool and frosted, let your kids dip them into bowls of sprinkles and candy hearts. Top! Kids can randomly place Valentine’s candies on top of the cupcakes or make patterns like Xs, Os, and hearts. Make a Monster! Make a mushy Valentine’s monster cupcake using marshmallows or M&Ms for eyes and pretzel sticks for antennae. And don’t forget to practice! Practice your letters while you bake by asking your child what letter makes the sound “mmm” like a monster or “Kuh” like a cupcake! Learning Resources’ ABC Party Cupcake Toppers make the perfect Valentine’s surprise for your sweetie – place your order today!

Host a STEM-tastic Playdate to Celebrate November 8!

Invite the whole crew over for National STEM Day this November 8th with a science-, technology-, engineering-, and math-themed playdate!National STEM Day began in 2015, as our nation began to recognize that STEM-centered careers were growing 70 percent faster than other occupations. Research has shown the introduction of STEM concepts to children can improve their social and emotional development, as well as their rational thinking skills.

STEM really goes beyond conveying knowledge from teacher to student. Kids learn problem-solving, critical thinking skills, and collaboration with their peers. Connections are made between school, community, and home that seem to stick. The real-life implications of STEM pull together ideas that teach children that what they learn, as well as the ideas they share, benefit our world as a whole.

Let’s bring together all these concepts into a big, fun playdate. With the help of Learning Resources’ STEM-centered products, we engineered an engaging afternoon with our friends, completely screen-free.(And another beauty of STEM? It knows no age. If little brothers and sisters want to join in on the fun, the more the merrier!)We sent out invites, had our friends over, and made an afternoon of activities!

STEM Station #1: Botley

Spread out on the living room floor for our first STEM Station was Botley. This little coding robot lives up to its reputation for out-of-the-box fun. From the first moment Botley lit up and began chatting with our friends, it was love at first code.

With just a quick skim of the directions, the friends were coding in minutes. Before we knew it, Botley was pushing around blocks and racing toward the finish line.

A solid 45 minutes was spent at the Botley station, as the friends took turns sending Botley backwards and in circles. (It was hard to tear the kids away to move to the next station, but our playdate clock was ticking.)

STEM Station #2: Beaker Creatures

Our friends moved from the floor to the kitchen table to discover the fizzy, funny wonder of the Beaker Creatures Reactor Pods. Each mysterious pod is filled with an alien traveler. Who were they going to discover?Each individually wrapped pod comes with a classification card that will help our friends figure out who is who.Time to drop in our first discovery.

As they waited and watch the water foam, the friends tried to figure out which alien could be lurking in the inky waters.

All set! Who did we get?

Filling out the identification card made the friends feel like they were classifying new species from out of this world.

And soon one bowl was not enough. Let’s dissolve more! Who can we add to our collection?

STEM Station #3: Coding Critters

We set up an additional folding table in the family room to accommodate all our scientists, technicians, engineers, and mathematics for more STEM-tastic discoveries. Station #3 included the Rumble and Bumble, the adorable Coding Critters. Similar to Botley, Rumble and Bumble are screen-free, coding fun. The Coding Critters come with a storybook. First things first, the older friends read to the younger ones about with whom they were about to play.

Rumble and Bumble’s playset was fun to set up, but even more fun to knockdown. Once the friends figured out how to get Rumble moving, the crashing began!

The Coding Critters have a “code mode” and a “play mode”. In the play mode, our friends began to interact with Rumble like it was a real live pet! There were even challenges in the storybook…one was how to teach Rumble to have a snack with Bumble.

Like all awesome playdates, our time had to end. But the afternoon of STEM-centered fun will not soon be forgotten!Happy National STEM Day!

Save it for later!