Drawing Robot

I was totally in awe and inspired when I saw these "ART BOTS" over on Teacher Tom's blog.  Oh my robot goodness.  We did ours a little differently than his, you should definitely see how he made his for the kids in his school. 

My son is a total tinker/builder/creator so we had an Erector Set with a motor in it. We simply taped the motor onto the top of a plastic cup and taped markers to the sides of the cup.  I covered our kid table with paper and taped it down.  Then we set the robot on the table and turned it on.  It was so cool!  My son was thrilled!  There really isn't much for the kids to do once it is set loose on the table, but we had fun predicting what shapes and patterns it would create and if we moved it what would happen.  It was a great experiment!  We will be doing this often!

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Stringing Eggs

I saw this idea on Pinterest.  I was thinking this would be a fabulously fun, fine motor and math activity for my snake happy son.  We used plastic eggs and a pipe cleaner for ours, but you can see the original idea HERE.  I made a small knot at the end of the pipe cleaner so the egg ends wouldn't slip through.

I was thinking they looked a little like caterpillars, but Tayler saw his as a cobra snake.  So he stuck one of the eggs on the opposite way to create it's "hood".  Then he added eyes and left the pipe cleaner sticking out for the tongue.  Pretty dang cute cobra to me!

Another great fine motor skill.  You could incorporate patterning and counting into this as well.

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Stacking and Patterning

Here is a great way to use those plastic eggs.  Seperate them and use them to stack and pattern.  Easy, peasy, cheap and fun. 



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Get Crackin'

My kids love to crack the eggs when we are cooking.  So, it gave me this idea. I poured a small amount of (watered down) paint into plastic eggs..  I didn't match the color of paint to the egg just to add to the element of surprise, but you could certainly do so.  I put paper in a box lid just to contain the paint.  Then I handed them over to the kiddos!  This was a blast and I couldn't fill up the eggs with paint fast enough.  A fun way to strengthen those muscles needed for writing along with some great creativity. 

Deborah over at Teach Preschool  had this same exact idea.  Her kids extended this a bit with some rolling and dabbing.    Such a great process.  Hop on over and check out their work too!

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Fluffy Stuff

After seeing Lisa Murphy do THIS I had to try it.  All you need is a bottle of shaving cream and a box of corn starch.  This was enough for two tubs of this wonderful, fluffy stuff!  We poured about half the box of corn starch in each tub and then just squirted the shaving cream into them.  We used the entire bottle between the two tubs.  The incredible thing about this is that after a bit, it's moldable!  The kids LOVED it.  Now to replenish my shaving cream supply.  Next time we will try adding some color too.  So fun and a great fine motor and sensory experience!



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Silly Face Egg Matching

We saw these silly face eggs at the grocery store and I couldn't pass on them.  We came home and I plopped them into an egg carton.  The children quickly began sorting and matching them by the facial expression.  The funniest part was watching them try to make the faces themselves!  Haha!  "This one is mad, this one is scared".  Fun and easy, math, matching, language, colors, and sensory!

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Spear It

We saw this experiment over on Steve Spangler's Website. I knew it was one that my kiddos would flip over.  You will need:

 5 or 6 sharp pencils

 Zip lock baggie

 Water

towel or bucket to do experiment over

Push the pencils through the baggie without pulling them back out or you will have a water spout experiment.  Push the pencils all the way through the baggie to the other side.  The bag will seal around the pencils and will not leak one drop.

The plastic bag is made of polymers which give it it's stretchy quality.  The polymer molecules seal back around the pencil so that the bag doesn't leak. 

Cool, huh? 

 My kids ask to do it all the time now and show their friends the "Spear It Experiment". 

Go ahead and try it, I know you have everything you need!

 



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Monster Truck Derby with Smashable Aluminum Cars

Recently, we went to a Monster Truck show, where the huge trucks were jumping over and smashing into junk cars.  Ever since then, my son has been creating his own monster truck shows.  The issue was his little cars would not smash!  So my husband came up with aluminum molds to jump and crash over.  Genius!!  He cut a small piece of aluminum foil and pressed it on top of the car, creating an imprint of it.  Then, my son lined them up and smashed away.  The super thing about this is that the cars can be "created" over and over again.  Serious fun!

Let the Smash Up Derby Begin!!!

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Smashing Balls (baked cotton balls)

I saw these awhile ago on Kiboomu and then was reminded of them again while I was poking around at Play Create Explore (seriously, such a great place to spend some time!).  They are BAKED cotton balls! So fun.  All you need is some flour, water, food coloring and cotton balls! Place them on a greased cookie sheet or aluminum foil, bake for about 45 minutes at 300 degree's. Yep, that's it.  Maybe a hammer too. 

Pretty, huh? 

mix 1 cup water, 1 cup flour

add some color (we used food coloring)

toss in the cotton balls and cover with mixture

place on cookie sheet (I covered it with aluminum foil because I didn't feel like chipping the mixture off).

Hand 'em on over to the kids!  Enjoy the action!

Update:  Apparently some people who tried this felt that the bottoms were flat and a little sharp.  Mine also had some edges on the bottom but I simply cut those edges off with scissors.  I would LOVE to hear what you did with them if you tried making them!

I also get many questions about what exactly to do with these.  For me, I think they are amazing.  You can use them the way we did, which helps improve hand/eye coordination, a great sensory and science experience and a nice lesson in cause and effect. Many people have asked me "What is the Point?" My answer is, why ask? Just try it.  There doesn't always need to be a "point" or end result for a kid to explore, create and just play. Part of playing is cleaning up, so I don't have any issues with the kids helping me clean the mess they created.  I also like to use trays when we have experiences like this, as it helps define the space they are using and contain the contents. 

Here are some other folks that have made Smash Balls and how they use them.  Feel free to leave a comment letting us all know how you used them.  Inquiring minds want to know!

Tot Treasures used them to make Dino Balls.

Wonderbaby used them as a sensory experience here

Loving My Nest made them here,

Lil Mop Top used them to practice their sight words here

and

Artsy Mama Creative Kids made them here.

 

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Princesses (and Lego's) on Ice

So I saw this idea over on Play Create Explore and thought it looked like so much fun.  I put a cookie sheet in the freezer and poured in some water.  I asked R to choose which of her princesses she wanted to put on ice and then the same for T's Lego figures.  The princesses wouldn't fit in the ice cube tray so I used plastic bottle lids from our stash. The figures wouldn't come out of the lids but they still slid on the ice anyway.  It was a blast!  The kids played until the ice melted and then asked me to freeze them again. Thank you so much Play Create Explore for this FABULOUS idea!

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Robots using Recyclables

If you have been following me for awhile now, you know that my son LOVES to build and create.  Mostly he loves Lego's, but anything he can create and build with is right up his alley.  He asked if I would help him build a robot.  So we looked in our supply of recyclables for what he thought he might need.  This is what he chose;

- plastic lids

- tin cans of various sizes

- plastic bottles

- cardboard tubes

We got out the glue gun and began construction.  He began to get frustrated when his robot would not stand up (it was top heavy).  I suggested we add something heavier to the bottom of it.  He thought about it for a minute and then ran outside to get a couple rocks.  He stuck these in the bottom cans. He then named him Rock Robot and wrote that on the arms.  

I just smile looking at these cute robots. 

My kids worked so hard and did all their own construction and hot gluing. It took a lot of problem solving and truly enjoyed watching them come up with their solutions.

These were so fun to create.  I highly suggest you give it a try.

our supplies

Hot Gluing

learning about balance

language, writing, letters recognition, small motor

Rock Robot

 



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Fun With Kool Aid

I just love Kool-Aid.  It is so useful.  You can paint with it, color snow with it, put it in your play dough....oh, and drink.  So here is how we use the cool stuff!

Add a shake or two to some water to make water color-like paint

It snowed a few days ago, so we gathers some of that fluffy, white stuff up and brought it in. (You can also do this outside, using spray bottles). We added the Kool-Aid to water and this tiime we used pipettes (droppers). We squirted the colors onto the snow and at first it was quite pretty. Until it all turned brown from so much color. Not as pretty, but defiently fun! So if you happen to have snow where you live, give this a go. Kept us engaged for a long time!

 

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