Dinosaur Diorama

The diorama! Can you believe I have been a parent for almost nine years and have not yet done a diorama? Truth be told, I am not all that "into" artistic things, and neither is my first born. My second born, now five, however, is a major artist. She loves, loves, loves to do art. She found this in a book and immediately wanted to create it. This is found in the book Cats Sleep Anywhere published by D.C. Heath and Company. (true...strange title for a book with a dinosaur activity in it?).

Supplies:

• shoe box
• rocks
• twigs or small branches
• bandaid
• paper
• scissors
• pencil
• crayons
• tape
• one straw

Make the Dinosaur:

1. Fold your paper in half.
2. Draw a dinosaur on one half of the paper. Make it so the top of the head and the back are on the fold of the paper.
3. Cut out the dinosaur. Do not cut along the fold where the dinosaur's back and head are.
4. Color the dinosaur with the crayons.
5. Cut the straw into four equal sized pieces.
6. Tape one straw piece to each leg of the dinosaur on the inside of the dinosaur.

Make the Home:

1. Cut one long side of the shoebox off so it is open at the top.
2. Color in the sky, grass, mountains, a sun...you could also make these out of paper and glue them in place.
3. Take your two twig pieces and adhere them to a large rock with the bandaid.
4. Put your dino and rocks in the shoebox. Ta-da!

Ice Skate Craft

This activity provides a fun winter decoration while working fine motor skills.

SUPPLIES

• Yarn or string
• Popscicle sticks
• Aluminum foil
• Construction paper
• Scissors
• Glue or tape
• Paper hole punch

METHOD

1. Cut out skate shapes (older preschoolers and older can do this step).
2. Punch holes for the "laces."
3. Have your child wrap the popscicle sticks with the aluminum foil. Tape or glue one to the bottom of each skate.
4. Have your child string the laces through the holes (tape down the string on one side--you can see that done on the skate on the right in the picture). Go through both skates with the yarn. Then tape it down on the other skate when done lacing.

Pattern Block Piece Picture

First off, sorry about my very long hiatus! I really needed a break from worrying about getting posts up here, so I took it. Sometimes you just need to let things go, you know?

We of course didn't let doing learning activities go, so on with the posting!

This is a great activity to work math skills. 

SUPPLIES:

• paper
• glue
• crayons (optional)
• scissors
• pattern blocks or pattern shapes printed off of your computer (you can make the shapes in a Word document and print them out)

ACTIVITY
Have your child trace the pattern block pieces onto a paper and then cut them out. If you don't have pattern block pieces, just create some shapes in Word and print them out. If your child isn't able to trace and cut, do this for your child beforehand.

Have your child take the pieces and create a picture. Older children can use their creativity. For younger children, you will likely need to give direction (like, let's make a cat with these shapes).

Have your child glue the pieces in place and use crayons to add some details to make the picture if desired.

Number Race

This is an activity you can adapt to work with any theme you have going on that week. This week, it was bugs (Kaitlyn did this at preschool). You have six different items that go along with your theme and assign them a number. You then give the child a dice and have her roll it. Each time she rolls a number, she marks that number on her page. The first number to be filled up wins the race! 

For older children, you can add some challenge by having the child predict which number will win. After the activity is over, have him write about which number he thought would win and which did win. 

Simple For Mom: Workbooks

One day while at Dollar Tree, I stocked up on workbooks they had. While we rarely use these, it has really come in handy during this pregnancy with my older two children (6 and 4). They both go to school, so they are used to having things to do. When I don't have a learning activity lined up, they love to do these workbooks. They will typically complete one workbook in one sitting, but they spend about an hour doing so. 

These workbooks are great for children who are older who want some sort of stimulation even when you are not feeling so hot :)

Christmas Wreath Ornament

Kaitlyn brought this home from preschool last week and it was one of those things where I thought, "Why have I never thought of that?"

Supplies

• green foam
• red ribbon for bow
• string for hanging
• glue
• desired decorations
• scissors

Prep

1. Gather supplies
2. Cut out wreath (you can use straight scissors, but decorative scrapbooking scissors will add some character)

Activity

Have your child decorate as desired! A simple and cute ornament!

Gingerbread Number Activity

As I shared in my post on Monday, we just finished up a week on Gingerbread men. This was our number activity. I found this at this website also: http://www.pre-kpages.com/gingerbread/. 

I made this page by googling "Gingerbread man coloring page" and chose this simple gingerbread man. I then opened it in Photoshop and put numbers in it. You could do it in Word or other programs, also. Here is my copy you are free to use.

The activity is simple. You give your child a dice and something to mark with. You have your child roll and mark off each number as he gets it. My kids really enjoyed it!

For more of a challenge for older children, you could do larger numbers (7-12) and give them two die and have them add the numbers together.

Gingerbread Alphabet

We just finished up a fun week of Gingerbread activities. This was our alphabet activity. I got this idea from here: http://www.pre-kpages.com/gingerbread/. She had a free download of the pages, but it only had letters A-F, so I quickly made some of my own. You can download them here.

To prep this activity, I created the pages, printed them, then laminated pages and letters so they will hold up from year to year.

For my older children (4 and 6), I simply gave the child all of the gingerbread men pages and all of the letters (upper and lowercase) at the same time and told them to match them up. They put the upper and lowercase letters on the same man. This is something that helps them work on letter recognition and keeps them occupied for a good chunk of time. They don't need any assistance from you.

For my 2.5 year old, we did things differently. We did one sheet at a time. I gave her the upper and lowercase letters for the letters on that sheet. She could do the uppercase all by herself, so if you want a younger child to do this activity independently, you might want to just do uppercase letters. She needed help with the lowercase letters.

The way I helped her understand grouping the letters together even if they looked different is I told her the man on the page is the "daddy letter," the uppercase letter was the "mommy letter," and the lowercase letter was a "baby letter." This worked for her because she is obsessed with babies. It helped her grasp that the letters can go together even if they don't look the exact same.

I had her hold a letter up and tell me what letter it was, then match it. She could get all uppercase, and knew some lowercase, but didn't know them all. It was a great exercise in getting her to think about lowercase letters.

For younger toddlers, I would recommend doing just uppercase. For a pre-toddler or baby, you might hold the letter up and say what it is and then put it on the page or have your child put it on the page if possible.

Paper Plate Ghost

Paper plates are amazing. I think you can turn a paper plate into just about anything. 

Here we have a paper plate ghost. 

Supplies:

• Paper plate
• White paper (if arms are desired)
• White crepe paper
• Black paper
• Scissors
• Glue or stapler

Method:

This is a simple paper plate activity because the end-product is white. 

1. If hands are desired, draw and cut out the arms/hands. Either you do this or have your child do it if scissor skills are up to it.
2. Cut out black eyes and mouth. You can draw and cut out, or you can draw and have your child cut out, or have your child draw and cut out. You will know what is appropriate for your child.
3. Cut several pieces of crepe paper.
4. Glue or staple all pieces on. I like glue because the child can do it, but a staple has the potential to hold better.

Fall Shape Tree

Brayden made this fun project in first grade.

Supplies

• construction paper
• scissors
• glue

Activity

Have your child draw and cut out a tree trunk if appropriate. If not, do that ahead of time. Then have your child cut out various shaped leaves from different colors and glue to the tree. Again, if your child is not ready for scissors, you cut out the shapes ahead of time. Talk about the different colors and shapes as you go. When you are done you will have a fun fall picture!

Pipe Cleaner Bead Math

Brayden made these in Kindergarten and I thought they were genius. Something they learned about in Kindergarten was what numbers could be combined to make a certain number. For example, take the number six. You can get six with 6+0, 5+1, 4+2, and 3+3. These number bracelets make it very easy for the children to see what numbers you need to make other numbers.

Making one is simple. You take a piece of pipe cleaner and the number of beads you want on the bracelet/ring. You then connect the ends with a little twist, and cover up with tape or sticky paper. You can then write the number on the tape. Then you have a very tactile math activity!

Foam Fish

This is another cute craft Kaitlyn did at playgroup this past year. It is a foam fish. 

Age Range

I think you can make this work anywhere from 1 on up.

Materials

• Piece of foam
• Scissors
• Marker/pen/pencil
• Stickers, jewels, etc. to decorate fish with 
• Glue

Activity

1. You first need a foam fish. Depending on the age and ability of the child, either you draw or have the child draw a fish on the foam.
2. Also depending on the ability of the child, either you cut out or have the child cut out along the lines.
3. Now is when any aged child can participate. Time to decorate the fish! For babies, you can pull the stickers off and give them to her to put on the fish. Toddlers can apply glue and put the decorations on the fish. 

Companion Book

This activity would be fun in conjunction with the Rainbow Fish. 

Balloon Hacky Sack

I first must praise my camera. That is an awesome picture. I love my camera. I am no photographer and look what my camera has produced. I also love sunny days that help my camera.

Okay, so today we had our library craft day. This fun Hacky Sack ball was one of the crafts we made. 

Age Range: 

This is great for children of all ages. As long as you trust your child with balloons and small seed-like things, you can do this with your child. At the activity, children one and up were doing this.

Materials:

• Balloons
• Scissors
• Funnel
• Hard wheat or bird seed. You could also use small plastic pellets.

Activity:

1. Choose three balloons
2. Cut the "neck" of the balloon off of two of the balloons right where it juts out from the round part of the balloon. One of these will be your outer edge of the hacky sack, so may sure your favorite color will be one of these.
3. Stretch and blow up the third balloon. Then release the air. This is just to stretch it out.
4. Put the third balloon over the small end of the funnel.
5. Fill the balloon with the seed/wheat/pellets. We used hard wheat, but if you don't own that already, I would do one of the other options.
6. Work it all in so it is out of the neck.
7. Cut the end of the neck off, but not the entire neck. Just the bulky end part. 
8. Fold the remaining neck so it is flat against the balloon.
9. Put one of the two cut balloons over the balloon now full of seeds. Put the neck portion of the filled balloon into the second balloon first so that the openings are not next to each other.
10. Repeat with the final balloon. You can always use more balloons if you want to.

You now have a fun ball to play with! I don't know about you, but my kids love balls. 

Avoiding Summer Setback

photo taken by Serra

I'll be honest. As summer approached and I was faced with my first child spending "the summer off" of school, I panicked a bit. As a child, I worried about losing my edge over the summer (and I was on year-round school, so I had 4 weeks off for summer), so you bet I worry as a mom.

So I sat down at my computer armed with my research face, my books, and my notebook.

As I read journal articles, studies, and opinions, it all came back to the extraordinarily simple task of reading.

Read to your child. That is the main and best thing you can do.

There are, of course, other things you can do to help out. Here is my plan for the summer:

1. Read Aloud Every Day: We already do this, and there is no way we could not do this unless we wanted a total mutiny, so this will easily continue on as it has. Some experts suggest 20 minutes a day, some 30. We tracked minutes for school this year and I found we were reading usually about 90 minutes a day total. Wow. I had no idea.
2. Sustained Silent Reading: This is described in The Read Aloud Handbook by Jim Trelease. The basics of it is that you sit and read what you want in the same room as your child, who is sitting and reading what he wants (comics, magazine...whatever he wants--so long as it is morally okay with you). You then silently read to yourselves for 30 minutes. We have done this off and on. It gets hard during the school year, but is so fabulous. Brayden loved it even before he could read, so I know he will love it even more now that he can read to himself.
3. Learning Activity: I plan to continue to have our daily learning activities over the course of the summer.
4. Visit the Library: I plan to continue to visit the library at least every two weeks. We will also be participating in our library's summer reading program.
5. Play Sports: We will play sports in our backyard together. A healthy body is part of having a healthy mind. We will also do swimming lessons, and we will attend sporting events. Watching a sport played helps you learn how it should be played.
6. Go for Walks and Bike Rides: In Reading Magic by Mem Fox, Fox really stresses the importance of the child having a knowledge of the world to make reading meaningful (a point Trelease also stresses). Going for walks or bike rides gets your child acquainted with the area around you. These are slow-moving activities (at least compared to a car ride), so the child can really pay attention to things.
7. Visit Local Museums: The benefits of this is the same as I mentioned above. This expands the child's knowledge of the world beyond his own neighborhood. This takes him into entire different worlds.
8. Family Vacations: We will do some family vacations, and most of those will be camping. Again, vacations expand the child's view and knowledge of the world. Do you know what we will do on our drive there? A big thing will be listening to books on tape/CD.
9. Attend Summer Activities: There are lots of local summer activities in a community. There are parades, fairs, and town festivals. Again, these expand the child's base knowledge. 
10. Free Play: We will also be sure to include plenty of free play with friends and family to allow for imagination growth. 
11. Structured Play: We will have structured playing time as well to help focus various skills.
12. Piano: Brayden will continue to practice piano and will take piano lessons for part of the summer.

I think the two main themes here are very natural for parents to do on their own. One is to read to children each day. Have exposure to books. Visit the library.

The second is to expand your child's knowledge of the world. Take advantage of the fun events of the summer. Go for walks and hikes. Remember, a child's view of the world is so small; you don't need to go to Europe to expand the view. Going across town can do so.

3D Shapes

This is a fun way to talk about 3D shapes. All you need are toothpicks and miniatures marshmallows! Brayden did this in his Kindergarten class this year.

Give your child some toothpicks and marshmallows. I suggest you sit and do this activity with your child while he works on it. Then let your imaginations run while you build fun 3D creations! Talk about the names of the shapes you create (like a cube).

I would say this is for children 3 and up. Some more mature two year olds could do it, so long as they have the fine motor control to not poke themselves and to also create these items without getting frustrated in the process.

Pom-Pom Spring Chick

This is a fun little craft Brayden brought home from school at the end of his egg unit. It is simple and something you can use to decorate for spring with!

AGE RANGE

You could adapt this as young as a toddler, but the most rounded learning will come for the preschoolers and up.

SUPPLIES

• Yellow pom-poms--one small and one large
• Styrofoam egg carton
• Orange paper
• Black marker
• Glue

ACTVITY

1. Before you begin, gather supplies. Cut egg carton up so each section is individual.
2. Have your child cut the edges of the egg carton section to look like a cracked egg shell edge.
3. Have your child glue the large pom-pom in the egg.
4. Have your child glue the small pom-pom on top of the large one.
5. Have your child cut out an orange diamond shape for the beak and glue it on.
6. Have your child make two eyes with the black marker.
7. Let glue dry and then display it somewhere!

Paper Plate Elephant

Kaitlyn made this in playgroup. I thought it was super cute!

Supplies:

• paper plate
• construction paper
• scissors
• goggly eyes (or you could draw eyes)
• glue

Method:

1. If desired, have your child color the paper plate (gray if you want to stick to "reality," a color of your child's choice if you want to do "imaginative").
2. Depending on child's age and ability, either you cut out or draw and let your child cut out the elephant's ears. 
3. Cut out a circle on the plate for the "nose" (I would say this is an adult step)
4. Have your child decorate the plate further if desired. Add eyes.
5. Glue ears on plate.
6. Play with your elephant! Stick your arm through to be the elephant's nose.

Triangle Star Ornament

Brayden made this cute star in Primary this past Sunday. It is quite simple and a fun way for your child to make an ornament. This is perfect if you want to learn about the shape triangle at this time of year. It is also great for developing geometry skills in recognizing shapes within shapes.

Cut out two triangles. If your child is old enough, have him cut them out. This is excellent fine motor practice.

Glue the two triangles together so they form a star shape. Punch a hole in one point, tie a ribbon, and you are done!

This is simple enough for older children (preschooler and older) to do without your direct help, so you could have this be a Christmas activity while you are doing other things close by.

Ordering Objects

For math homework, Brayden was supposed to do some ordering games. The goal here was to teach about sizes and positional words. I decided our three little Christmas trees would work well for this game.

Supplies

Three items of distinct sizes.

Vocabulary to Practice

• biggest
• middle-sized
• smallest
• first
• between
• last
• next to

Activity

Have your child do different activities ordering the objects. Be sure to use your target vocabulary. "Put the trees in a line from biggest to smallest." 

Line the items up. Have your child describe what he sees. "The biggest tree is first. The smallest tree is last. The middle-sized tree is in between the biggest and smallest trees."

Fun and simple math!

Christmas Lamb

My version

Playgroup was at our house this week. Our learning area of focus happened to be the letter "L." I wanted to do something Christmas-y and was having a hard time with L. I was stuck on T for trees or R for Rudolph. I have lots of ideas for those! But L...

I did some brainstorming and was a bit disappointed in myself that it took me that long to think of "lights" and "lamb" as well as "Lamb of God." Okay, plenty of L things for Christmas. And thus, this idea was born.

AGE RANGE: Definitely works for 3 and 4 year olds. I also did it with a 5 year old (Brayden). I would guess most 2 year olds could do it. You might be able to get an 18-24 month old to participate, but watch closely because of the glue. If yours is like mine, she might try to eat it.

TIP

I have finally learned to make my own version before asking children to create it. Then they can see what they are doing without trying to see what is in my head.

SKILLS TAUGHT

• Religious discussion of Lamb in Christmas story
• Sensory skills
• Fine motor

SUPPLIES

• Paper to put stuff on
• Cotton balls (I used 10 per picture)
• Black paper for face
• Black marker/crayon for legs
• Glue
• Glitter for star

ACTIVITY

For the younger children, you might want to do the glue/glitter star yourself and let dry a bit before starting the activity. For the older children, you can let them do the star. 

After the star is on the paper, put an oval of glue on the paper and glue in the oval. Then have the child put the cotton balls on the glue. Have the child glue a face on, then draw legs on. Let dry completely before hanging up.

Be sure to talk about the lamb's role in the story as well as the emergence of a new star and what that meant. We also read The Something Wonderful: A Christmas Story by Karen Hill. It stars a little lamb, so it goes perfectly with this activity.

Brayden's version