Floral Arrangements

I noticed that my daughter had not played with her Pipe Cleaner and Strainer sensory box (found in this post) for a while so I decided it was time for a change. 
 
I really liked the fine motor practice she had been getting from sticking the pipe cleaners in the small holes so I started looking around the house for something that would give her the same fine motor practice.  I found a bunch of fake leaves and flowers.  Most of them fit but I had to cut the leaves off the big branch they came on.

 
 Here is her almost finished project.  I love that she is getting that specific fine motor practice again.  I'm also excited about this activity because I can change out the flowers/leaves with the seasons.
I think I will have her start making a centerpiece for family dinner once a week.
(or every night if she really enjoys it) 

Games We Love

Here are a few of the games we love that teach reading and spelling.

 
 
Great for toddlers and early readers that can work on just matching letters to create words.  Also works for older kids who are practicing spelling (a flap lifts up to cover the word on the bottom of the card).
 
 
 
 
 
This is an easy pre-reading activity.  Little ones can match up the two piece puzzles by color and older kids can practice reading the word and matching it to the correct picture.
 
 
 
Bingo is always fun.  We have a few bingo charts in different sizes that we made in Excel, printed off, and laminated.  Great way to practice sight words (also letters, numbers, and shapes).


More or Less Than


This is how I taught my daughter the concept of more or less than.

 
I got out a bunch of her little animals and told her that her alligator was very hungry and he was looking for dinner.  I then grouped some animals on either side of alligator. 


 
I asked her, "Would alligator rather eat more animals or less animals?"  She said, "More".  I then told her to point him towards the animals he wants to eat.  She understood immediately and we played like this for awhile. 
 


When she was starting to get bored with the game I brought out the dry erase board (I had prepared it earlier).  For the first one I asked, "Would alligator rather eat two bites of food or just one?"  She said, "two". I demonstrated how to make an alligator mouth.  She quickly made it through the top two rows of the board.  The hardest part for her was drawing the mouth but she always knew which way it should be facing.  The bottom rows were just as easy for her but I wanted her to practice hearing and saying "more" and "less"  and I also wanted her to practice estimating.
 
Because she picked this up much quicker than I thought she would I will be working on "equal to" this next week.  I plan on teaching it the same way.

Shaving Cream and Glitter

 
Kids love the feel of squishing shaving cream.  We play with foam soap or shaving cream often at our house.  On this day I set out the shaving cream (in a tray) and let her pick out glitter.
 

She picked red, white, and blue.  This would have been a good Independence Day craft (I'll have to remember for next year).  I let her add the glitter on her own but usually have to tell her to stop so that she does not use the whole bottle.
 
 
She played with it for awhile.  She enjoyed trying to mix all the glitter into the shaving cream.


Then she requested some glue and paper.  The glue is not necessary but she wanted to add some to her shaving cream/glitter mixture so we did.  Then she used the mixture to paint a couple of pictures.
 
 
I love shaving cream play almost as much as she does because it holds her attention for a long time and is easy clean up.


Check out our fun July 4th activities from 2013 on my other blog!

WOW Children's Museum

We have visited the WOW (World of Wonder) Children's Museum, in Lafayette CO., a few times this year but this is the first time I managed to get pictures.  I really like this place because it is small and not overly crowded.  I also like that you only have to pay for the young kids, not all the infants, teens and adults in your party, like you have to at most museums.
 
 Small room where your kids can make their own wood cabin.

 Large pirate ship when you first walk in the door.

Cushioned reading area under pirate ship.
 
Dress up and dance area.  There is also a big stage.
 
 Be the center of your own little bubble.
 

 Fun pulley chairs help teach your kids about gravity and pulley systems.
 
Fun little market area has a grocery store, a kitchen, and this great tree that your children can gather peaches from.
 
 Music room has a piano and musical instruments.  It is kept dark for this fantastic instrument.  Your child passes their hand over the lights and it plays the notes.  There is a button that they can push that changes the type of instrument that they hear.  Kind of hard to explain but I love it and want one!
 
 
 I do not want to overwhelm this post with more pictures so I will just list off some of the other areas.  Train Station, Bank, Sand Box, Light Reflecting Area, Art and Craft Room, Fan/Wind Room, a Toddler Area, and other small exhibits that change every couple of months.  There are also indoor and outdoor eating areas.
 
Here is a link if you want more information about the WOW Children's Museum.



Ice Rescue

For a fun alternative for a dinosaur dig I froze her dinosaurs in a big block and brought it out on a hot day.  I put the ice block in a tray on the porch and told her that her mission was to rescue the dinosaurs.

First she started with a hammer but it was too slow for her taste so she asked for something that would work faster.

I brought her a bottle of hot water and told her to see if it would help.  She was excited to see immediate results and requested another bottle of hot water (and another and another).

She concentrated on one dinosaur at a time.  By the end she was being very careful where she poured the water so that she was only releasing one at a time.
 
 
After rescuing all the dinosaurs she had a tray full of water.  First she asked for soap to give her dinosaurs a bath.  A little while later she requested her chair so that she could relax with her feet in the water.

Learning Animals


We currently have three flash card packs that I am using to teach my daughter about animals.  We have Insects, Animals, and Sea Life packs, all found in the $1 section at Target.  Here are some of the ways we use them.

 
We lay them all out on her table.  I ask her to point to (or put a rock on)  all the ones that have a specific characteristic.  Examples: Find all the animals that walk on four legs.  Find all the animals that eat meat.  Find all the monkeys.  Find the animals that swim well (Did you know leopards swim well?  I had to look it up when my daughter insisted that they do.).  Find all the animals with tusks, horns, or antlers.  There are so many characteristics that you can have your child point out.  Also try having them find all the animals whose name begins with a specific letter.  For older kids, try having them point to all the animals that can be found on specific continents.


 
We have a large fabric map that usually hangs on the wall but we can easily take it down and use it as a learning mat.  This game is a little more advanced because we are working on learning the continents and oceans this year.  We look at the picture together and I let her guess what continent or ocean that animal lives in.  Then I read the back of the card to see if she was right.  I help her place the animals in the correct ocean or on the correct continent (when we play with the land animal cards we have to stack the cards).
 

We have a small collection of little animals that my daughter loves.  For this game I pulled out all the cards that match her animals and set both the cards and animals out on her table.  She immediately sat down and started matching them up without me saying a word.  (We use these animals for lots of activities.  They can be purchased at stores like Micheal's or here at Amazon.com)


My daughter is not familiar with a lot of the insects yet so I am coming up with different ways to help her learn the names.  Sometimes we lay all the cards out and have her pull out all the animals with a specific characteristic.  Once she has only the flying insects in front of her I call out a name and she has to try and pick up the right card.  If she is wrong she puts the card back and we try again.  We keep going like this until she is holding all the cards.
 
 
Sometimes I let her choose which insects she wants to learn that day.  I let her choose between 6 and 10 cards.  She does a good job of picking different insects (however, the butterfly and tarantula are always picked).  We practice the names and also read the back of the cards to learn more about the insect.  We all also do this game with the other animal packs we just do not have to concentrate as hard on learning the names because she knows most of them.