Children's Learning Activities: October 2012

Welcome!

This blog is here for you to find fun learning activities to do with your children. We share great ideas we find and love on the Internet, as well as ideas we come up with on our own! We also like to share resources we find helpful.

To find ideas for your child, click on the age range blog label or on the theme/topic you are looking for (on the left side of the page). In each post, we try to list optimal age ranges for the activity, but you must judge for yourself if it is appropriate for your child. When you try an activity out, please comment and let us (and everyone else) know how your child liked it!

Monday, October 22, 2012

Monster Family

Here is a fun way to make monsters.

Have your child splatter blobs of paint on a piece of paper. Before it dries, add eyes. Then she has made her own monster family :)

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Bringing out the artist in your child

One of my daughter's extra-curricular type activities is an art class at the co-op we go to on Tuesdays. Each week they learn a little about a new artist and do some sort of art project. I was thinking about easy ways to extend what she has learned to help her remember and I came across a website (I wish I could remember where....) that took famous works of art and turned them into color sheets for their kids.
So, along those lines, I came across a fun activity that used Picasa (a free photo program) to change photos into pencil drawings. Like this:

So, I googled Georgia O'Keeffe, let Charis pick a flower she liked, and turned it into a pencil sketch via Picasa. You can do straight coloring, or work on colors, shading, etc.

Or..

Or take your own picture of flowers outside (of a goldfish if working with Matisse, etc).

Monday, October 15, 2012

Go Away Big Green Monster! (book and activity)

Go Away, Big Green Monster! is a fun book to read this time of year. It is also very helpful if your child is having fears of something scary being around (like monsters). It helps give the child the idea that she is in control, not the monster.

Here is a fun activity to go along with reading this book.

Your child can make her own monster.

Supplies needed:

construction paper
paint
paper the same color as the paint

Have your child put a blob of paint on the paper--right in the middle. Then have her fold it in half. This will make a shape for the face of the monster. Then have her add pieces of paper for eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and whatever else her monster has. Then she has her own monster to tell to go away!

Friday, October 12, 2012

Seasonal Clouds

I don't know if you've ever noticed before (I hadn't until my husband pointed it out), but the sky seems to change as the seasons change, too. The Fall and Winter sky looks different than the Spring and Summer sky. We've had many night already to just stand in awe and watch the amazing colors and cloud shapes.

My personal experience is that the summer sky seems to be great for cloud shapes and the "What does that cloud look like?" game. The fall and winter skies, though, are my favorite. The color show we've seen, sunsets, and patterns of light have been amazing. So take a look---take your kids out, watch the skies, and compare. These pictures were all taken on the same night. Every few minutes we'd get a different view from the same portion of sky. So, go out, lay in the grass, play ball, play "Captain Hook" (which is why my little one is running), take a walk, and talk about it!