Stamping Game for Counting and Pre-reading Skills

Have you seen the oh-so-cute pencil-top stampers in the dollar spot at Target lately?!?  We love stamps so I grabbed some of the monster kind.  We call them “sillies” here, because M is not at all comfortable with the idea of monsters.  ;)

I made a quick and simple game with these to go on our activity shelves.  All you need is a couple of stamps (or you could use buttons or some other manipulative as markers), a number die (we made ours from this template), and a simple grid with 20 spaces.

{I created a grid game a while back to go with a Bible story lesson, and the large grid for that game can be printed from here.  I also made a smaller grid – 2 to a page – and that can be printed from here, then cut.  You could simply draw some on some scratch paper also.}

To play, take turns rolling the die, then stamping that number of squares on your grid.  The first to fill their grid is the winner.  Fill your grid going from left to right, and top to bottom.  This helps develop the habit needed for eventual reading. 

M is having a lot of fun playing this – it’s such a simple way to make counting fun and he has no idea he’s learning pre-reading skills too.

This morning while I was lying in bed being lazy, I heard M begging Daddy to play this game with him.  So cute!  And, again, a quick lesson for me that the things which are simple and quick for me to put together are always more popular with him than the things I spend hours on.  Kids! :)

Here’s a shot of the used grids from yesterday afternoon.  I’m not kidding – M loves this game!
Have a beautiful day! :)

P.S. Happy Birthday, Honey!!  I love you! (my hubs :) )

Tot School – October 11, 2009

M is 37 months old

We began this week by moving an old TV stand / media center to M’s reading spot. Tuesday morning I grabbed some kitchen plastic ware and filled the shelves with activities.This worked so well with M, even better than I expected. He was able to pick and choose which activities to do (or not do) and many of them were things he could do independently (which gave me a little time to check the laundry, tidy things up, etc).

We worked on putting one activity away before getting another one down, and I was ok with him quitting an activity whenever he wanted. I’m trying to concentrate on having fun more than anything else right now in regards to tot school. And M woke up with a horrible cold that morning, so I wanted to go easy on him. Just cleaning up one thing before getting another one down was enough in the way of rules for us this week!

First, he strung some pony beads onto a length of yarn, using a plastic needle.

Next, matching up some paint sample strips with clips.We are working on learning the gradation of color shades. I thought the clips would get him a bit more interested in this. They did, but only a very little bit. He did the blue and then that was enough. This post from Shannon at Growing and Learning by Leaps and Bounds gave me this idea. Maybe next time we will work on just one color like she did.

He also did this super-fun activity that I whipped up for him over the weekend – an ABC tube with stickers to match: I simply took a cardboard tube and wrote the alphabet on it in random order, and put it out with some foam letter stickers. M would pick a sticker, then roll the tube around to find the matching letter. The idea for this came from Sophie’s mama in this post. I just added stickers! It was a big hit for M! I plan to do one with numbers sometime soon too.

M did some scissor practice pages:

In one of the plastic tubs I placed a piece of green construction paper, scissors, a glue stick, and some pages from a toy catalog. For this activity M had to cut out any toys that had green in them, then glue them to the construction paper and make a collage.He liked the idea of this, but didn’t work on it for very long. We put it back on the shelf and he can pull it out some other time to finish it.

One of his favorite activities was this:I wrote the numbers 1 through 4 on bottle lids, then made cards to match them up with. The cards also have the corresponding number of X’s to put any small manipulative on. In this case, it was m&ms, which is why M loved it. :)

He did a little pom pom transferring with tweezers:He made this into a game and I had to use his pliers. :) We would each grab a pom pom, say “cheers!” while clinking them together, then drop them into the ice cube tray. He’s a funny boy sometimes. :)

Hands down, the all time favorite of the week was this *I spy sensory tub* activity. It was inspired by the many posts in the blog world about making I spy bottles, but I knew M would never be happy just looking for small objects – he would want them in his hands where he could examine them and get to know them. So I photocopied a bunch of small objects, then hid them in a mixture of rice, macaroni, and lentils. He had so much fun with this, I was amazed.He did this 7 times that day. Sometimes he would hide them, sometimes I would. He was totally enthralled. Which made for a very happy mama. :)

I worked the hardest on this activity, and it was the only one M was not even mildly interested in:I’ve been seeing this book everywhere - and just love the idea of it… so I made my own! I cut some foam shapes to use, and made letter templates for them, which I then laminated. I thought M would love this, but he was absolutely. not. interested. Ah well, we’ll try again another day! I’m still showing you because I’m just so proud of it. :)

We did one more sensory activity – packaging peanuts and water. If you get them just a little bit wet they stick together and you can create things. If you get them a lot wet they dissolve. M had fun making them dissolve. :)

One day we made this pretty autumn tree:

And we learned more new songs and poems. First, from Preschooleducation.com:

(tune of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”)

All join hands and circle around
While we watch the leaves fall down.
See them twirling to the ground.
See them skipping here and there
See them flipping in the air.
Autumn leaves so peacefully
Falling, falling from the tree.
(I would have loved to have sung this one outside while twirling M around, but his cold and our rainy weather just didn’t cooperate.)

And a poem, from childfun.com:

Leaves
Little leaves fall gently down
Red and yellow, orange and brown. (flutter hands like leaves falling)
Whirling, whirling around and around. (turn around)
Quietly, without a sound. (put finger to lips)
Falling softly to the ground (begin to fall slowly)
Down and down and down and down. (lie on floor)

I hope everyone had a wonderful week! Check here for more tot school posts!

Have a beautiful day! :)

Books of the Week – {#6}

We have 3 super-good books to share with you this week. These are books we’ve gotten from the library several times and are really such favorites that I should just go buy them.
Let’s start with one of M’s all-time-favorites first – Tractor Day by Candice Ransom.This book is about a child who gets to ride the tractor with her daddy all day as he plows and plants their field. There are some friendly black crows who come along, as well as a sort of sub-story shown in the background pictures of the mother, baby, and dog. This is a warm, fun story and would appeal to any child who is nuts about tractors like mine is. :)

Next, The Growing Story by Ruth Krauss (who is an excellent author by the way and has written many children’s classics).What a timeless story this is about a boy who wonders if he is really, truly growing or not. He sees the world about him changing and growing – trees, grass, flowers, his dog, the chickens – and continually asks his mother if he is growing too. The illustrations (by Helen Oxenbury) take the reader through the seasons beautifully and when fall comes around the little boy tries on his warm clothes from the previous winter and realizes they are too small and that he is, in fact, really growing after all. As the mother of a boy who is constantly trying to see if he can touch the ceilings yet (I’m not kidding) and keeps asking if he will be as tall as Daddy when he grows up, this book feels like the story of our life. :) I love this book.

Next, You’re Just What I Need by Ruth Krass (again!).

This is another mother and child book about the simple fun of hiding under a blanket and letting mommy make silly guesses about what the “bundle” could be. It’s just so sweet (sorry to keep using that word, but it really is!) and something all we mothers can relate to. In the end the girl pops out, of course, and the mother discovers that the bundle was exactly just what she needed! :)

Pop over to Mouse Grows, Mouse Learns for more book reviews!

Have a beautiful day! :)

Leaf ID sheet and a little Art Time

We are fortunate to have a yard full of trees, and lots of different ones to choose from.  A couple of days ago I went out and grabbed some leaves to make a leaf identification sheet for M. 
I simply arranged them on the scanner and copied them onto a piece of cardstock:Then I labeled them (I only picked leaves that I was sure of, but I clearly need to learn a bit more about the trees we have.  There are several I can’t identify). 
I gave the sheet and the leaves to M to match them up as I told him their names: I hope to have him gather some leaves on his own and use this sheet to identify them some time soon (he’s been sick all week, and stuck inside, poor guy!).
Then we did some rubbings of the leaves:We’ve never done rubbings of any sort, although it is something I’ve wanted to do for quite a while.  M enjoyed seeing the magic picture show up. ;)  I hid the leaves under the paper while he was out of the room.  When he started the rubbing he said, “I’m making a tree!!”.
Finished products (top pic is chalk, bottom pic is crayons): 

Have a beautiful day! :)

Open-Ended Art – Autumn Colors

It’s been a long time since we participated in the open-ended art mcklinky at Growing by Leaps and Bounds. We are happy to be back in our *art groove* this week! :) This week the theme is fall colors – orange, yellow, red, and brown. We added green in because we were working on another fall project at the same time and I felt like green added a little something (and there IS green in fall too!). :)

After creating his autumn tree masterpiece, M just wanted to paint and do his own thing on a blank sheet of paper. I love this, and we’ve gotten away from doing this on a regular basis, so I was happy he asked.

First he did this: “I’m covering all the white spots, Mommy!” Yep, I can see that. :) He is really into this painting-the-entire-paper thing lately. It’s his art, he can do whatever he wants!

Next, more paper, and he did this: It’s always a good time when the trucks get involved!! He must’ve kept himself occupied for at least an hour with all his painting that day. In my opinion, the cleanup is totally worth it!

Here’s his finished artwork:

Go here to check out more fun open-ended artwork!

Have a beautiful day! :)

Art & Craft time! Arm Print Autumn Tree (and stamping!)

I’m working at having an art, craft or sensory-type activity for M on a daily basis.  Today we made a pretty fall tree.
You will need:

• Paint in fall colors – we used orange, yellow, green, and red
• Brown paint for the tree trunk and branches
• paintbrush
• paper – we used cardstock
• leaf stamp
• pieces of felt
• something flat to use for a stamp pad.  We used saucers… more on this below.

First to make temporary stamp pads, begin by putting the leaf colors on the saucers.  We put two colors on each saucer. Next, place one small square of felt on top of each paint glob. Gently pat the felt down until the paint soaks entirely through. Optionally, you could use a sponge and let paint soak into it, but I have found sponges do not give as clear a print with stamps as does the felt.  To keep from wasting paint, you really don’t need to use as much paint as I did.  You could also use something like a cd jewel case to do this, then shut it (possibly wrap it with plastic too) to keep your “stamp pads” usable for future projects.
Now, the fun part! 
Paint your child’s inside forearm and the palm of their hand with the brown paint.  You may want to warn them that you are going to do this, apparently it can be a bit ticklish. :)  We talked about how the paint felt slick and cool on his skin.  Here’s M showing you his brown arm.  He really did love this although you would not know it by looking at his face.
Next, print the arm onto the paper for your tree:
Start stamping leaves onto the tree branches and some on the ground, or falling in the air: See how crisp the stamp is using the felt?  M wiggled the stamp some after he set it down sometimes, creating a bit more of a blurry leaf, but the felt worked really well as a stamp pad.
I let him put the stamp in different colors without wiping it off first, which turned out to be ok, because some leaves have a couple of different colors in them, just like real ones!
Here’s his finished tree:
The felt washed up nicely and so did the boy. :)
Have a beautiful day! :)

Tot School – Oct. 4, 2009

 M is 37 months old

We had a very laid back week.  I am working on getting some tot trays / workbox-type things set up that M can work on independently throughout the week, but they are a work in process and nothing is where I want it to be yet. 
M surprised me by finding things to do on his own this week anyway – most of which were never captured on camera.  He strung beads and pasta, played with his Lite Brite, laced up some lacing cards, and played with some of his favorite flannel board sets.  My husband had Monday off, and they played Bingo, tried playing checkers, and read a lot of books together.  They also got out their binoculars and did a little out-the-window bird watching.  Here they are mommy-watching :)
Tuesday was an absolutely glorious fall day and we ventured outside (with the binoculars of course).  M grabbed his “nature basket” and trotted off:
You can see our yard is still mostly green.  There is one tiny patch of leaves turning colors in an oak tree: I’ve been hoping to gather up some beautiful leaves for an autumn leaf identification project, but Mother Nature is not cooperating with me.  Actually I should be happy that the leaves aren’t turning yet, it means winter is still a little ways off.  M grabbed a branch blown down by the wind gusts we’ve been having and tried his best to knock some leaves down for me.
No luck, so he started building with some logs -
Another look around with the binoculars(by the way, I got these at Target for $1.00 – awesome deal!) :
We did do some fun school stuff inside too, continuing with the autumn theme…
We learned a new poem and a new song.  I found both at preschooleducation.com.  The song (to the tune of “The Farmer in the Dell”):

The leaves are falling down,
The leaves are falling down,
Red, yellow, orange and brown,
The leaves are falling down.

And the poem, which M absolutely LOVED and did over and over again…

5 little leaves so bright and gay
Were dancing about on a tree one day.
The wind came blowing through the town,
And one little leaf came tumbling down.
(Continue with the remaining 4 leaves)

We did this with 5 silk craft leaves (Dollar Tree!).  I held them up, made them dance around, then M was the wind and blew and I would let one fall.  This was a huge hit!  He then held the leaves and I blew them, then he asked for all the craft leaves, and his silly mama gave them to him and eventually this happened:
Look closely and you can see a couple of them still in mid-air. :)
We also tried  doing these harvest pattern strips from filefolderfun.com:
He is just not *getting* patterns at all.  So I gave up and made it into a quick file folder matching game to put on a tot tray for him.  There are several more pattern strips, these two are just the ones we tried doing.
We did a fun autumn matching game – played concentration style.  He did great with this.  I can tell he is really starting to get better at the memory games.  The cards were printed from DLTK.
We also did a flannel board story about the Little Red Hen (I associate it with harvest time).  This set was found here:

And we made a cute autumn wreath:

That’s it for us for this week!  I so enjoyed taking it easy and not trying to fit too much in.  We both had more fun just being together. :) 

Check out what other moms are doing with their tots here!

Have a beautiful day! :)