Learning about Seasons

With the extreme weather patterns that seem to be hitting all over the country from frigid cold to major droughts it got me thinking about seasons.  In addition to that their are days when it's cold outside and my 3.5 year old will ask if we can go swimming in her pool.  When I try and explain that it's winter and too cold for swimming she doesn't seem to understand and insists that it's ok!!

In an effort to try and teach my daughter about the 4 seasons I came up with an activity that I hope will help her understand a little bit better.  Here's how it works:

I used toilet paper rolls and wrapped them with pictures I printed from the internet.  These pictures were of something that represented the season.  For example, a sun for summer and a snowman for winter.  I also printed different pictures of things that would go along with the seasons.  Again for example, a picture of a beach for summer or a pumpkin for Autumn.  I cut those into circles and glued them to the tips of popsicle sticks.  I had plain and colored popsicle sticks but I chose to use the colored ones just to add some color.   Actually, I tried to use popsicle stick colors that went along with the season; red for winter, purple for spring, yellow for summer and orange for autumn.

Here's what I started with:

Here's how it looked after I glued the paper onto the rolls and popsicle sticks:

Then I randomly placed the popsicle sticks on the table and Tiffany had to pick one and place it into the correct season.

She really enjoyed the activity!

Before, during and after the activity we talked about our 4 seasons.  She had a genuine interest and I am confident the more we do this activity and others like it she will have a clearer understanding of what each season is about.

Here are some other close up shots:

(pictures I used to go along with the season winter were mittens, snowflake, sled, Santa Claus and icicles.)

(pictures I used to go along with the season summer were the beach, a pool, bathing suit and amusement park)

Whatever your weather might be may you enjoy what Mother Nature brings!!

Susen

Shaving Foam Hearts

Oh so pretty are these marbleized hearts that come from using shaving foam.  My 3.5 year old has played with shaving foam before and I can't say that it was her favorite craft mostly because I don't think she is completely comfortable with the way the foam feels??!!  However, I absolutely LOVE the way the foam looks once it's dried so I encouraged Tiffany to try again and try again she did.

Do ya see what I mean?  The "hmmmmm" face of what do I do with this now??  

Once you lay the paper flat down in the shaving foam and than lift off this is what you get.  

Once you wipe off the excess shaving foam this is what you get.  It's actually this part in the process that I love the most.  When wiping off the excess shaving foam you get the marbling effect.  I think using a paper towel like we did to wipe it off allows you to make more swirls!

We cut out some hearts, attached to fishing wire and displayed these beauties.

Close-up shot.  They are just so pretty!

Ok, so here's what you need to make some of your own:

1. Shaving foam

2. Baking sheet or large flat dish

3. Spray a bit of shaving foam into sheet/dish

4. Add a few drops of food coloring to the foam

5. Swirl the food coloring around in the foam with a straw, toothpick or q-tip.

6. Take a piece of card stock and lay the paper flat down in the sheet/dish.  Press paper down than carefully lift off.

7. Wipe off excess shaving foam.  We used paper towels but you could use a piece of cardboard or even another piece of paper

8. Let dry

9. Cut out or decorate with whatever theme you are going after.  

10. Have fun!!

Fishing For Letters

My husband came up with this game for my son's 3rd birthday party.  Jonathan is now 8 years old but we still have the game.  My 3.5 year old is having fun with it now but with a new spin on the game!  Initially, we thought up this game for my son's pirate themed birthday party 5 years ago.  The kids had fun by simply fishing for the fish.  The new spin on the game is I've added both upper case and lower case letters to the fish to help my 3.5 year old with letter identification.  In addition, the fish already had little mouths on them that my husband had put on.  For some reason Tiffany thought the mouths looked like sad faces and she asked to put happy faces on them too.  The game had now also turned into a feelings game as we would have to fish out the happy fish and the sad fish!

Hubby was in charge of making the fish and the fishing poles but as you can see he used washers for eyes which worked great with the magnets on the end of the fishing rope.  The size of the washers are good because you need to work the pole a bit in order for the magnet to get a good stick and pull up the fish. So this game also encourages hand/eye coordination!

BOTH kids having fun in the 'cardboard box' fishing pond!

Quiet Bins

Just check out Pinterest and you will see tons and tons of Quiet Bin/Box ideas.  Types of bins, contents of bins, labeling of bins and so much more!  I was ultimately inspired by Teaching Mama and her post that you can read by clicking on the link and as a bonus FREE printables for your Quiet Time Bins/Boxes.

I haven't put these bins to use yet but plan on it this upcoming week.  My 3.5 year old has not been napping for well over a year now and I would like her to have some time where she can play by herself with little to no supervision from me.  My plan is to rotate the toys after about 2 weeks and use toys that my daughter does not normally play with.

Here's what I included in the bins:

These printables can also be found at Teaching Mama

I found these cute Sesame Street books after I had filled the bins and added one to each bin.  

I hope this post helps inspire you to make some Quiet Time Boxes/Bins for your little one(s)!

Learning Numbers

I came across a post from Danya Banya on number recognition which intrigued me because my 3.5 year old likes counting numbers AND jumping and this activity covered both of those things!  I knew I wanted the numbers to be out of sequence so I used painters tape on our kitchen floor (too cold to go outdoors) and randomly taped squares and numbers to the floor.  Tiffany can definitely recognize numbers 1-9 but 10 and up not so much.  I only went up to 12 but next time I will focus more on the higher numbers.

Initially I called out a number and asked Tiffany to jump onto it.  She didn't seem very interested SO I introduced bean bags and that caught her attention.  We have 4 bean bags so I gave her 2 and kept 2 for me.  I asked her to throw her bean bags onto a certain number and then I asked her which number I should throw mine on.  This worked really well.  When we first started playing Tiffany did not know numbers 10, 11 or 12.  But by the end of our game...success!  She called 10 a 10 an 11 an 11 and 12 a 12!!  

Also by the end of the game Tiffany was ready to jump to the numbers that I called out to her!  

This was a great activity that offered gross motor skills by jumping and throwing in addition to number recognition...win, win!!

Shadow Fun

Here is an activity that I take zero credit for. The only invite the kids had for this activity was from Mother Nature!  After living in our home for 15 years I never once took notice of the sunlight that shines perfectly onto my dining room wall.  Perfectly that is if you are interested in a game of shadow puppets!   I'm not sure if it was my 8 year old or my 3.5 year old who found this gem of fun but they both had a blast making different shadows with their hands and bodies. They probably would have played longer but unfortunately we had a school bus to catch.  I have a sneaking suspicion that if the sun pokes its little head out this weekend when we have time to play than more shadow play will be in store!

I enjoyed snapping pics of their shadow play!!

Playing With Homemade Play Dough

My daughter loves play dough but personally I am not a fan of the store bought kind.  My favorite kind of play dough is the kind I can make at home.  The Imagination Tree has an easy peasy recipe for home-made play dough, click here.  After making this play dough in hardly any time at all Tiffany was creating.  I had some red and green food coloring and I opted for the red.  I didn't put as much red so that it would be more of a pink in color.  

Tiffany making a 'birthday cake!'

I put out candles, sprinkles, some cake pop sticks and a rolling pin.

And this is Tiffany's finished product!

What fun things do your little ones create with play dough?