Weekly Favorites for March 6, 2011

Here are my favorites for the week. I hope you enjoy the crafts and tips.

1.
Polar Bears
A cute polar bear craft. It would go along great with a polar bear themed book.

2.
Talk
Some tips from a kindergarten teacher on making time to let children talk.

3.
Sugar Density Rainbow
A great science experiment for St. Patrick's day. It looks challenging so if you are persistent, it may eventually work, but true scientists never get it right on the first attempt.

4.
Space Sensory Tub
A neat space sensory tub for kids to explore.

5.
Rainbow in a Jar Salt Art
Sand art, but with salt.

6.
Sensory Balloons
Another great sensory activity.

7.
Mixing and Layering Rainbow Pudding
A cute rainbow snack idea.

8.
Wash, Brush, Comb! Developing Preschool Hygiene Habits
Some great ideas on helping your kids to learn good hygiene habits.

9.
Weather Sensory Tub
A neat and creative sensory tub with a weather theme.

10.
On Our Shelves March
A variety of activities. Some are weather theme related and others are practical life. Inspired by the Montessori method.

11.
Mini Pot O Gold Cupcakes
Another cute snack for St. Patrick's Day.

12.
Shaving Cream Play Without the Mess
A sensory project using shaving cream without the huge mess.

13.
Science Discoveries
A great post about science for kids.

14.
Collages What to Do About Space
Some useful organizational tips for when children are making collages.

15.
Shiny Pot of Gold
Another St. Patrick's Day craft and an excuse to eat chocolates.

16.
Our Spring Nature Table, just who is it for?
A post about letting children create their own learning area and accepting their choices.

17.
Why Must We Sit in Our chairs?
A great post from Teacher Tom about how children learn best.

Weather Match and More

I’ve seen a few ideas for a weather theme on the blogs lately and thought I’d add a couple of my own. The matching game has pictures of different kinds of weather. There is the sun, a day with a blue sky, wind blowing the trees, a snowflake and a cloud with raindrops. The matching pictures either are something you’d wear in that type of weather or something you can do. In the wind, you can fly a kite, if you are out in the bright sun, you’d need to put on sunglasses etc.

 

Weather Recordings:
Here are some recordings to go along with a weather or seasons theme. they are good to have on in the background or for a listening area.

Lazy Summer Day - The Warm Sounds Of Summer
Light Spring Rain
Thunder Storm By the Sea
Thundering Rain Storm
Wind Blizzard
Windy Wasteland: Nature Sounds Only Version

Check out these weather themed activities and this awesome weather sensory tub from Counting Coconuts.
You'll find some neat weather art and science ideas here on Mrs. Karen's blog.


All images came from the links on my image credits page. (see in sidebar)

Towers, Slides and Finger Paintings

Yesterday was my second day volunteering with the toddlers. It was a little confusing at first because they had a few extra people there. There were two high school students who were there to observe. At least that’s what it looked like. Then a community reader came in and she sat in the reading area for a while. Some toddlers stayed with her the whole time reading books and the others chose to play in other parts of the room. They were really into the blocks still. When I arrived, they had the foam blocks scattered all over the floor. One of the toddlers started jumping on them again while grabbing my hands. This didn’t last long because she had found the container of small blocks. She wanted to build tall towers. I started building a tower on my own with the foam blocks. A few seconds after I had the tower three blocks high, a boy had knocked it to the ground. We laughed and I started to build another tower for him to knock over. This went on for a few minutes until he went over to cook in the kitchen area. Meanwhile, another toddler came over and handed me an empty bowl. I asked him what it was. He didn’t answer so I asked if I could eat it. He said yes so I pretended to eat and then asked if he’d like some. Then he took the bowl, pretended to eat and headed off to the kitchen area.

I went over to the small table where the little girl was building tall towers. I told her that her tower was really tall so she started knocking it over and laughing. After the tower was completely destroyed, she started rebuilding it. Another toddler came over and started knocking blocks on the floor. I kept picking them up and putting them on the table for the other girl to use for her towers. I started to label some of the blocks telling her which ones were round, square, white, red, big, small etc. she’d repeat the words as she built. I counted her two towers and then she counted up to four by herself. I think she thought she had four towers instead of two, but that’s okay. Finally, she found a new game. She thought knocking all the blocks off the table was fun. I told her she’d have to pick them up which she did, but it was really fun for her to keep knocking them over. Another girl noticed and she started doing the same thing only this time, she was scattering them across the room. That’s one thing about working with toddlers; you clean up even during play time. If we didn’t, everything would be on the floor all at once. I find it’s easier to pick things up that aren’t being played with. If they take them out again, it’s okay because we can pick something else up that’s not being used. I ask the toddlers to get involved by having them put books back on the shelf or by bringing foods back to the kitchen area. Even if they don’t put the foods back in the baskets, it’s a start to have them bring the things back to the right area.

The structured activity of the day was sponge and finger painting. They were using these foam sponge type things. They weren’t exactly sponges, but a thicker foam material. They were washable. There were hearts, numbers, dogs, rhinos, etc. The idea was to have the toddlers stamp with them. We had a few trays of paint with different colors and the toddlers could use any of the stamps or colors that they wanted. We practiced asking each other for stamps or other colors of paint since everything was divided up among three tables. This turned into finger painting after a while and stamping handprints onto the paper. A couple of kids decided to fill their whole paper with different colors. This was another mess to clean up, but it was fun for them. As long as it was fun for the kids, it’s worth the trouble. I saved the teachers some time by cleaning all the paint trays and stamps.

Later, they had a circle time where one of the teachers sang songs with the kids and looked at books. Those who wanted to participate could and those who didn’t were busy on the climber. It has a slide that the kids love sliding, crawling or walking down. Some even like to go up the slide. This is one place where there is constant negotiating. Kids are either in each other’s way or there are too many people on the slide or the stairs at once. I kept telling them, “One at a time on the slide, please.” After hearing this a couple of times, one of the little girls started repeating me when she saw too many people on the slide. For the most part, the toddlers listen.

In the afternoon, we ate lunch and then at 12:30, it was nap time. I was disappointed because I was there until three O’clock and they slept all through the rest of my time there. They usually wake up earlier, but they had a busy morning.

Guinea Pig Care Sensory Tub

Here’s the next tub in my critter care series.

What’s in the tub:
Two plush guinea pigs,
Guinea pig food,
Bowl,
Measuring cup,
Water bottle,
ABC blocks,
Yogurt treats,
Chewable ice cream cone,
Plush carrot,
Shavings,
Paper bag,
Eye droppers,
Plastic syringe with no needle of course,
Empty medicine bottles,
Nail file,
Cotton pads.




Keep in mind that this would be best for preschoolers and kids that you’d trust not to put these things in their mouths.
I’ve included almost everything you’d need to care for a guinea pig, but for this tub, I added some stuff that could be used for dramatic play as well. They can use only the things in the sensory tub or pretend they are vets and care for the guinea pigs. Since we have one guinea pig that always goes to the vet, I thought it was a good idea. Some people don’t know that you should take your guinea pig for a checkup once per year. Some people think of critters as disposable animals and don’t take them to the vet even when they get sick. I think the best way to fix that is by educating our kids about the importance of living things even if they are small and don’t live as long as other types of pets.

The two plush guinea pigs are custom made by Morumoto. She makes custom plush guinea pigs and other critters and does a great job! I sent her pictures of our pet guinea pigs and she made exact replicas of them. I also included the little plush carrot she made for us as an extra.

All the other supplies are actual pet supplies. The ice cream cone was an extra one that we had. When we gave it to the pigs, they didn’t want to eat it so I didn’t have a use for the extra until I made this tub. On the other hand, they love the strawberry yogurt treats. I included these in the tub because they smell so good. The measuring cup is for scooping and pouring the food, shavings or treats. There are some little wooden chew treats as well as blocks. There are a lot of textures in this tub. They can burry things in the shavings as well. The tub is an actual guinea pig carrier.






The syringe as I said above has no needle with it. Syringes are used a lot with critters to give them their medicine. We use a nail file a lot on our guinea pigs because they don’t like their nails cut and filing them down is much easier. I mostly included it for the texture and having another object to explore. A lot of the children that I’ve known have had guinea pigs as pets and I know a lot of centers keep them too. This idea might be fun for centers who have guinea pigs since they can’t always be handled by so many children. This way children can experiment without harming or scaring the guinea pig.



We can teach children about guinea pig care, but ultimately, it’s the adult’s responsibility. Children should be supervised at all times while handling a guinea pig.


Guinea Pig board book
What Bounces? Guinea Pig Board Books
Guinea pig coloring page
Guinea pig facts
Kids and Guinea Pigs
Information for parents about guinea pig care and possible rules for children to follow while interacting with guinea pigs.

Assignments

I started my first class yesterday and discovered that one of my assignments was to create an early childhood blog. I asked if I could use my current blog and my professor said yes. The assignment entries will be different than my regular entries. They’ll be more personal and they have requirements. For my current followers, I’ll continue to post things like I have been posting right along, but I’ll also have to add specific entries for my assignments. To warn you, there will be a few of them in a row next week, but I’ll be able to space the others out more. They will all be labeled with an assignments tag so if you don’t want to read them, you can skip them and they’ll be in their own category. I’ll be posting a new sensory tub later today or tomorrow.

Blocks Aren't Only for Building

I volunteered last Wednesday and it went well. I was supposed to help out in the infant room, but since there were only two babies there, they sent me over to the toddler room. Those kids ranged from sixteen months old to two and a half. They didn’t have any structured play time, but they did a creative activity with shaving cream that the kids loved. They squirted a few blobs of shaving cream on the table and added different colors of paint. The kids loved mixing the colors and making a mess.

We looked at a lot of books. One they enjoyed showed the different parts of a truck. I wish I remembered the title, but it had mostly pictures. It was filled with different textures for the kids to explore. On one page there was a mirror, bumpy textures for the windows, round sand paper shapes for the wheels etc. As we went through the book, I labeled the parts of the truck and the textures. The kids would usually repeat me and took time to feel each texture. They especially enjoyed looking at themselves in the mirror. They didn’t notice it at first until I pointed it out, but after that, they’d stop longer on that page.

One of their favorite things to play with were the foam blocks. One boy figured out
He could sit on one and jump up and down. I grabbed his hands and he liked jumping
while holding my hands. A few other toddlers grabbed a block from the pile, came
over and said, “My turn.” A little girl found another use for the blocks. She liked to sit on them and rock back and forth. She said she was rocking the boat. She grabbed my hands and she realized she could rock faster and go farther back. When she’d almost hit the floor, she’d pull herself up. Sometimes she couldn’t pull herself up fast enough so I’d help her out. The boys joined in, but they quickly got back to jumping.

Then they found smaller plastic blocks that you can put
together. A little girl started building a tower and a boy came over and knocked
it down. They both laughed and other toddlers came over to see what they were doing.
The boy and girl built the tower again and started to fight over who should knock
it down. Eventually, one of them knocked it over and they all started laughing again.
Now the problem was who was going to rebuild it. I gave the two toddlers the same
number of blocks and told them to put one block on at a time. They liked doing that
and now they could both build the tower and knock it down. They did this several
times while their friends watched. It was nice to see them actually sharing the blocks
because usually toddlers don’t cooperate like that. Most of the time, they want the
toys all to themselves which I saw a lot throughout the day. It’s normal though.
They are starting to learn to share and take turns. Later on, one of the little girls found a smaller set of plastic blocks. She sat on the floor independently and worked on her building. It was only three or four blocks high, but she brought it over and said, “I made a tower!” I told her it was a great tower and she brought it back to add to it. They seemed to have trouble fitting these blocks together. They have shapes on the top and you have to turn them just right to make them fall into place. It was challenging enough for them, but not too challenging to the point where they’d give up.

They also had fun pushing big trucks around and riding bikes. They kept crashing
their bikes into me. I had to remind them to be gentle with the bikes because that
could hurt. I showed them how to slow down and bump into me gently, but then they
decided to play bumper bikes with each other. I had to stop that because I thought
they’d fall over or hurt each other when they crashed. Finally, they decided that the bikes would be perfect to knock the tower over. The toddlers who were building the towers didn’t like this. They wanted to knock their tower down by themselves. I tried to stop the bike each time before it destroyed the tower. Sometimes it was successful and other times not. I told the boys that their friends didn’t want them to knock their building over, but they thought it was so fun. Eventually it was okay because the other toddlers started laughing at the boy on the bike hitting the tower. These toddlers have discovered that blocks aren’t only for building.

Weekly Favorites for February 27, 2011

Here are my weekly favorites.

1.
Seashell Matching Game
A seashell memory game good for a beach/ocean theme.

2.
Kitchen Science Freezing and Melting
A great science experiment using food.

3.
Pretend Cotton Candy Craft
A cute cotton candy craft.

4.
Discovery Bottles
Discovery bottles made by children themselves.

5.
Dr. Seuss Birthday Celebration: Cat-in-the-Hat Snack
A cute Cat-in-the-Hat snack.

6.
Incredible, Indulgent Sensory Activities
A few sensory activities that make the whole room smell good!

7.
Salt Dough Shamrocks
A neat St. Patrick's Day gift idea.

8.
Fabulous Floam!
A recipe for floam.

9.
Fun Food Friday Swimming Fishies
A cute homemade lunch.

10.
Balloon Yoyos
How to make balloon yoyos.

11.
Our February Poem
A poem for February with props to help the children remember the poem and act it out.

12.
Babies in the Sensory Table
An important activity for babies even though it can be messy.

A New Look

Play2Grow now has a new look. I also have a new blog button if anyone wants to link up to me. What are your thoughts on the new template?

Marshmallow Sorting

Here’s an activity I had thought of for Valentines Day, but instead of using only hearts, I decided to make it a shape sorting activity instead. I used an egg carton and silicone ice cube tray with hearts. I had the regular round marshmallows and the strawberry heart shaped marshmallows. This is a really simple activity for preschoolers, but toddlers could do this as well. You could add more challenge for preschoolers by having them count the marshmallows or by adding other foods of different shapes to sort. I had counted out the exact amount, but for a little snack, you could add some extra for them to eat. This activity is good for fine motor skills, classifying and learning about shapes.

TEN: (The Education Network)

Kate from An Amazing Child asked me if I could share her new networking website that she has created with my followers. It’s called, TEN: (The Education Network.) It’s a networking site where parents, students, childcare providers and teachers can all come together and share ideas. Its set to launch on March 1st, but it’s already up and running if you want to register and look around. It’s easy to set up your profile and add your information. It’s free so why not check it out? You can also follow the site’s progress on Twitter.The following is a description of the site from Kate, the owner.

On March 1 we will be launching our free open-share network dedicated to progressive
early childhood education. It is called TEN: (The Education Network.)
TEN will allow you to form groups (whether it be online groups or actual playgroups),
share ideas and resources, meet other people in your local area, and organize events,
participate in discussion forums, upload activities and photos and more.
TEN differs from facebook in that it is a network dedicated to early childhood education.
All members have a common interest and bring with them a wealth of knowledge and
ideas. TEN offers your followers the opportunity to meet and share ideas with other
people in one place and will allow you to further
grow your community. You can link-up with other like-minded people and groups from
around the world and share ideas and activities.
TEN is an education network. It is designed to bring parents, teachers, daycare providers
and students together in order to create a sharing community for the benefit of our
children. It is a free service. Please stop by and have a look.