Tagged with 'toddlers'

Directed Drawing

1. Draw a large rectangle, short sides up and down, long sides on the sides, to form the head.
2. Add a rectangular ear on either side of the head.
3. Add a zig zag line just below the top of the head to make hair.
4. Draw two parallel lines coming out of the bottom of the head to form the neck.
5. Add the start of another rectangle beneath the neck to form the top of the body.
6. Draw two circles for eyes and two half circles inside the circles to form pupils.
7. Add rectangular eyebrows at an angle over the eyes.
8. Add a rectangular mouth.
9. Using the bottom of the mouth as the base, draw three triangles, then connect the pointed tops of the triangles to the top of the mouth’s rectangle to form teeth.
10. Shape a nose between the eyes and the mouth, however you like.

Spooky Stories

STEM Sculptures

It’s almost fall! You’re probably spending a little less time swimming, climbing, and playing outside and a little more time relaxing indoors – the perfect place for fall craft projects with your preschooler! Luckily, fall is ripe with inspiration for preschool crafts, like the three we’ve chosen below. So pour some cider, have a seat, and let’s get crafty!

Turning Leaf Scratchers

With less sun and shorter days, autumn weather suppresses chlorophyll production in many leaves, allowing their beautiful orange, red, and yellow colors to shine through. Demonstrate this process with a fun leaf scratcher!

1. Cut a large leaf shape out of a piece of card stock or other sturdy paper. You can find lots of printable templates online, if you need one.
2. Have your kids cover the leaf in red, yellow, or orange crayon (or all three), making sure to leave a thick layer of color over the entire leaf.
3. Next, have the kids cover their leaves in a layer of green crayon.
4. Using a penny (keep a careful eye on very small children), scratch off the layer of green to reveal the beautiful fall colors beneath.

Click for a simple explanation about why leaves change color in the fall!

Fall Foil Trees

Continue the foliage fun with a painting project depicting all the beautiful colors of leaves in the fall.

1. Let your kids scrunch three pieces of tinfoil into loose balls.
2. Squeeze blobs of orange, yellow, and red paint on three, separate paper plates.
3. Instruct your kids to dip their foil into one color of paint paint, then press onto a sheet of paper several times to make their “leaves”.
4. Repeat, printing the foil in different colors on top of the original colors and in different places on the paper.
5. When your foil prints are dry, use brown paint to fingerpaint a trunk and branches into your fall forest.

Don’t forget to print some fall foil leaves at the bottom of your page – as chlorophyll production decreases, the stems of leaves weaken, and the leaves fall from the trees!

Paper Plate Spider Webs

Fall trees aren’t just full of leaves – they’re also full of spiders! Garden spiders are most active in the fall so you’re likely to see more of their elaborate, beautiful webs in the trees in autumn, too. Join the fun and spin your own spider webs out of a paper plate!

1. Cut the center out of a paper plate.
2. Let your kids color the outer edge of the plate with beautiful fall colors like red, orange, and yellow.
3. Using a single hole puncher, punch 12-14 holes around the edge of the hole.
4. Tape one end of a length of yarn to the back of the paper plate and wrap tape tightly around the other to form a ‘needle’.
5. Demonstrate how to weave the yarn back and forth through the holes to create the web, then hand the plate over to your child.
6. Once, the web is spun, remove the pin from the end of the yarn and tape that end to the back of the plate, too.

Add a pipe cleaner spider for the perfect fall finishing touch – cut four black pipe cleaners in half and twist to create an eight-legged creepy crawly!

Fall is chock full of fun craft ideas and it’s so easy to slip just a bit of learning into the fun!

Do your kids like to design cities or build towers? Building is one of my kids’ favorite activities. They love using a variety of materials to see what they can create. Today I’m sharing how we incorporate pretend play into our STEM building projects.

Engineer a City

We used the City Engineering and Design Building Set to begin our play. Aiden (age 7) started by building what was on the front of the box.

The set includes activity cards with design challenges and engineering problems to solve. Building a zip line was the first challenge Aiden selected. The activity card has you build two buildings. It states that you are at the wrong build and must quickly get to the other building. “Can you design a zip line to carry you across?” The back of the card includes possible solutions to the challenge. It also poses questions about the design. “Which of the solutions above would provide a faster ride?”

Aiden designed his own zip line after seeing the suggestions. He modified the ideas shown and came up with the zip line below.

Incorporate Pretend Play

Next, we added in the Snap-n-Learn™ Counting Elephants. I challenged Lily (age 3) to help the elephants get from one building to the other using the zip line. She thought it was a lot of fun watching the elephants zip down the line.

While she was playing with the elephants, I took the opportunity to ask her about the numbers on them. I asked questions like:

• What number is on your elephant?

• Can you find the number 7?

• What color is the elephant with the number 2?

• Can you count the elephants?

This activity was a great way for my kids to play together. The City Engineering and Design Building Set is recommended for ages 5 and up. Aiden built the city and then he and Lily played with it. They took turns moving the people and elephants around the buildings. They made up stories as they played.

Keep it Going

The next challenge Aiden undertook was to build a crane.

After he built the crane, he and Lily got to work lifting elephants.

There is so much learning going on along with their play. Building the set works on lots of STEM skills - problem solving, following directions, sequential thought, critical thinking, spatial relationships, creativity, and early engineering. Fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, number recognition, and counting are also being developed here.

What’s your child’s favorite building activity? How can you add in some additional learning to the play?

About the Author: Trisha

Trisha is a science educator and stay at home mom to three. She’s the creator of Inspiration Laboratories, a blog dedicated to encouraging learning through creativity and play.

Looking for summer activities that will help beat summer brain drain? Look no further than your backyard. Using materials from home, these fun science activities are practical and deepen each child’s experience with the natural environment.

You already love to play with your 3- to 5-year-olds. Now, turn those play times into rich learning experiences. It’s easier than you think and lots of fun. In fact, your child won’t even know how much they’re learning!

 1. COLORS

Learning colors helps children identify the world around them as well as develops their ability to categorize. 

• Throughout the day, ask your child “What color is this?” or “Can you find the red one?” with foods, toys, or things in nature.
• Celebrate one color each day. Each day focus on one color and see if you can find things of that color, a giant color scavenger hunt.
• Sort toys like the Farmers Market Color Sorting Set and Super Sorting Pie into color groups.
• Using washable paints, let your child experiment with mixing colors. What do red and blue make? How about yellow and red?
• Make colored ice cubes with water and food coloring. Use the colorful ice cubes to paint the sidewalk.
• Play “I Spy” with colors. Have your child point out things of different colors in the play he or she is doing.

 2. NUMBERS

Kids learn numbers by observing and talking about what they see. Numbers, counting, and making sense of numbers are all vital skills in developing a child’s mathematical ability. 

• Count everything you can. Count the steps you take, the bites of food you chew, the number of fingers on your hand, the numbers of rocks you collect, and so on.
• Make numbers with playdough, tape, paint, sand, sticks, or markers. Give your kids something to trace or copy first to show them each number’s shape.
• Practice matching the Number Pops numbers to the corresponding dots on each pop.
• Match numbers to your own groups of items. Start number jars from 1 - 9. Collect items and put the correct number in your number collection jar, one thing for 1, two things for 2, and so on. You can use anything for your collections. Things like pennies, buttons, marbles, toys, or blocks.
• Play hopscotch.
• Play dominos.
• Play “What Time Is It Mr. Wolf?”.
• Use your Dino-Sorters and count the number of dinosaurs in each color group.
• Pretend play store using your Cash Register.

 3. SHAPES

Learning to distinguish shapes helps children become discerning and observant, important thinking skills.  

• Create shapes using play dough, Wikki Stix, pipe cleaners, tape, or craft sticks.
• Search for shapes in your house or backyard. Look for one at a time. Find circles, squares, rectangles, and triangles. It’s helpful to show your child the shape in a picture or an object so he has something by which to compare and refer to. Let him hold that shape while you search.
• Ask “what shape is that” with everyday objects like a plate, a book, or a cell phone.
• Make 2-D shapes with craft sticks and play dough.
• Sort puzzle pieces, stickers, or cut-outs by shapes.
• Draw lots of shapes with crayons and markers.
• Do a shape art project like this house project.

 4. SCIENCE

Science helps kids wonder, observe, and problem solve. What’s more, science is all about the world in which we live. 

• Learn sandbox physics! Compare the dry sand in your sandbox to wet sand. How is it different when you add water and try to build something?
• Drop different items into a bucket of water to see what floats and what sinks. Try rocks, feathers, pom-poms, balls, fruit, and toys.
• Freeze food-colored water in balloons. When frozen, peel off the balloon’s skin and observe the melting process. Try one in the sun, one in hot water, and one in cold water. Observe and enjoy the process.
• Bury dinosaurs in the sandbox. Pretend to be a paleontologist and dig to find them.
• Put different materials in a cupcake tin to see what melts in the sun. Be sure to include a crayon. Make predictions and observe.
• Go to the zoo. Learn about the different animals.
• Try the engaging science activities in the Primary Science Lab Set.

 5. ENGINEERING

Kids naturally gravitate toward building things. Engineers build and problem solve so given the opportunity, you can develop both with a little playful fun.

• Use blocks to build a skyscraper. Experiment with the base to see if it makes a difference in height.
• Build a creative castle or rocking robot using a Gears! Gears! Gears! Kit.
• See if you can build a bridge that holds the weight of a favorite toy. What will you use to make it strong? Try bricks, books, and paper.
• Build a marble run using cardboard rolls and tape.
• Make houses for your stuffed animals using recycled materials.
• Make a fort out of cardboard boxes and furniture.
• Build the three little pig’s houses -- one of straw (grass works), one of sticks, and one of blocks.
• Build puzzles like the Puzzle Globe.

 As you can see, play is learning, particularly at the preschool ages. All the activities above playfully incorporate foundational skills that will become building blocks for future learning success.