Painting with Jars

Today we tried a new medium to paint with.....Jars!  My kids loved it.  I like to challenge the kids by putting out unusual items to paint with.  We have used rocks, jelly beans, Lego's, and ice.  It allows the children to use their problem solving skills, imagination, fine motor and many other benefits. 

 

this jar had ridges on the bottom and the kids figured out that if

they dragged the jar it would make this print

 

I just love how these jar paintings came out. 

*As always, when children are using anything breakable, close supervision is required. 







Pin It

Using Ice for Pre-Writing Skills

I am always amazed how the simplest things can keep children engaged for so long.  The kids in my care love, love, love to use the pipettes (or those little medicine droppers).  It is so great for strengthening those little muscles needed for writing, cutting and all those other fine motor skills they will use so much in Kindergarten.  All I did was put out some ice trays, colored water, and a tub of ice cubes.  They mixed colors, learned about volume, cause and effect, sharing, and loads of language!  So simple and so many skills being used!

 



Pin It

Painting With Pumpkins

Want a fun way to use up those pumpkins?  Use them for painting!  After we used ours for hammering golf tees, cut them open, examined the innards, roasted the seeds, I cut the pumpkin into small chunks.  Then I cut off a little of the inside to make them flat-ish, stuck a craft stick into the top, added some orange paint and voila....a new sensory/art/pre-writing experience!  

 

 

 

 

the top of the pumpkin has a nice built in handle, this was the favorite piece for the kids



Pin It

Golf Ball Paintings

This is a different version of the tried and true "marble painting".  We used golf balls.  The kids had a "ball"!  We used a deep tub, placed a piece of paper in, let the kids squirt in their colors, toss in the balls and roll away!  Great for cause and effect, problem solving, color mixing, creativity and large motor coordinations

 

Pin It

Beans and Tractors

This little man loves his tractors, and backhoes, and bulldozers and whatever big machinery you can think of.  He is always looking for things to load into his play trucks. I grabbed some beans that I keep just for play (cost about $2 dollars at the grocery store) and poured them into a pan for him.  He has played with this for days on end.  Loading, dumping, pushing. using his fine motor skills, problem solving, learning cause and effect, involving all his senses.  Who knew a bag of beans and some toy tractors could be educational.  It may look like he is only "playing" but he is learning, with every push, dump and scoop.  By the way, this little man is almost 2, in case you were wondering.  My almost 6 year old had almost as fun as the 2 year old. 

 

 

I store my "play" beans in recycled Gatorade bottles.  This is how I store my other items such as colored rice and pasta, aquarium rocks and whatever else we use in our sensory tubs.  It is easy to see what is in them and they line up nicely on the shelf.  You can also just let the kids play with the full bottles, with the lids tightly on. 

Pin It

Target Practice with Wet Sponges

We had so much fun with this activity.  First we soaked a couple sponges in a tub of water.  The kids drew their own targets on the fence with chalk.  Then, they took aim and threw the wet sponges at their target.  They problem solved the best angle to throw the sponge so it would stick to the fence.  This is great for hand/eye coordination, problem solving, fine motor skills, large motor skills, not to mention, a fun way to stay cool on a hot day (it didn't take long before the kids were using each other for targets).  All in good fun, of course! 



Pin It

Cork Boats

Have you visited A Little Learning for Two? If not, you should.  I saw these cork boats on her blog and thought they look super fun.  I borrowed a couple corks from our fabulous neighbors (along with their kids, thanks Kylea and Justin!).  The kids had a terrific time designing and creating their boats.  Here is what we used to make them.

-corks

-toothpicks

-craft sticks

-hot glue

-craft foam sheets

-screw in hooks

-yarn

I placed everything out on the table and invited the kids to design their boat using the materials on the table.  They did an amazing job.  I didn't provide them with any type of model, they came up with the design by working together and problem solving their way through the construction. 

We used hot glue to glue the sticks to the corks.

Screwed the hook into the front of the boat,

Here is one finished, they cut out their sails however they wanted.then I showed them how to fold it in half and push the toothpick in.  They did need a little help pushing the toothpick into the cork to hold the sails up.

Here is one that the girls designed.  I love it.  All about balance!

Here it is floating away in the little pool.

They even gave them a ride down the slide.

T designed his as a pirate ship.

They were a great hit, from start to finish! These were great for a warm summer day.  Now to go get some more corks (wink wink).



Pin It

Babba Box Review and Giveaway

Have you heard of Babbaco?  I just discovered this wonderful company. They offer a monthly subscription fun filled, play box for kids ages 3-6 (but I had tons of fun with it and I think any age would like it),  The boxes include theme based activities and projects, books and a code for digital downloads and online content.  It includes EVERYTHING you need to do all the projects, including instruction cards to help you out. They were so gracious to send us a box to try out.  SWEET!  I just had to share this amazing company with you.  They even offered to give a FREE box to one of my readers!  How great is that!  Let me show you what our box had in it.  Truly amazing. 

We received the Rainbow Theme Box. (Every month its a different theme)

We found this prism inside along with an instruction card on how to make rainbows with it

We chased rainbows all over the room trying to catch them. My son carried around the prism for days, trying to make rainbows everywhere. He liked it so much, he slept with it!

The box included a bubble wand filled with bubbles, and pipe cleaners so we were able to create our own too

A shape sheet, so you can make your own shaped bubble wands

And they worked very well

The next project was dying a sun hat, which was also included.  There was only one, so the kids each decorated one side.

The tissue paper and spray bottle were included to complete the project.

 The finished result.  She did the front and he did the back!

 

Since I'm not good at letting things go unused, we used the remainder of the tissue paper and made a rainbow on paper, using the same technique as the hat.

 

We read a book "A Rainbow of  My Own" which was included in our box too!

Themed coloring sheets

Once again, I can't resist a good quality box either.  We taped some paper down, added rainbow colors

toss in some marbles

Gave it couple of good shakes...

and our colorful results!!

A bright, sunny umbrella was also inside our lovely box.  My daughter loves it!


Isn't that an amazing idea?  Everything you need all in one spot.  They also have a code to go online and do some extension activities, but we have just been having way to much fun with the other wonderful activities and haven't had a chance to look at the online content. 

I was not compensated for this review by Babbabox, however, I did receive a free box to review.
  All comments  and opinions are my own.

So now it's your chance to WIN a box.  All you need to do is go LIKE Babbaco and Time for Play, on Facebook.
Leave a comment here telling me you have done so, along with your name and email so I can contact you if your the winner.  You can enter until July 31st. This giveaway is only for USA residents.
If you can't wait, or don't win, Babbaco has a special code just for my readers.  You can receive 20% off your first box with the code TFP20OFF. They are also running a Back to School special.  You can recieve 33% off your 1st 3 month membership, that's 20.00 a box (regulaly 29.99).  You all know I'm all about a bargin, gotta love it!  Go to their website Babbaco, and enter TFP33BTS in the Promotion Code Box. 
 So go ahead and enter, someone's gonna win, might as well be YOU!

And our winner is....Melissa Hoang!  Congratulations! You are going to love your FREE Babba Box.

Pin It