Tongs & Foam Letters - Australia Day Sight Words

The girls and I did some Australian themed sight words today using foam letters and water. It's summer here and the weather is lovely and warm (28'c and climbing!), so a water activity was perfect. We also threw in some tongs in honour of the greatest Aussie tradition of all - BBQs :)

WE USED:

* foam letters

* plastic tub full of water

* window

* various tongs

* paper and pen

* blutac (sticky tack)

We thought up some Aussie words together and spelt them out on flashcards cut from paper.

Then we filled our tub with water and foam shapes and I put out a tray with different types of tongs for the girls to experiment with.

We then used blutac to attach the sight words to an outside window. 

The girls had a great time fishing around in the water with the tongs, picking up each letter and sticking them to the glass.

This was a great fine motor activity and a good way to learn some patriotic words for the day :)

Australia Day - Jumping Kangaroo Races

Happy Australia Day to all of our Aussie readers! 

We have been doing lots of Australia themed activities today in celebration and this one is by far the girls favourite.

We actually did this activity years ago with aeroplanes (link to Elastic Aeroplanes post here) and I thought the girls would enjoy an Australia Day version using kangaroos instead. Squeak was only a baby when we first played this game so it was a first for her and she loved it!

WE USED:

* paper

* pens/textas/crayons

* scissors

* glue

* thin elastic

* dining chair or barstool

To start with I drew some kangaroo outlines on paper for the girls to colour in. You could print them from the net but I just traced them from the computer screen.

 

Once the girls had finished colouring their kangaroos we cut them out with scissors.

We folded some paper to make our launcher (see Elastic Aeroplanes post here for photo instructions on folding your launcher) and glued the kangaroos to one side. On the other we wrote the names the girls had given their kangaroos.

To make our slingshots we upturned some bar stools and tied our elastic around the legs. You could use a small table or chair for this too, or use an actual slingshot.

* Be sure to place the elastic way down the legs so it doesn't slip off when they pull back on it.

We set up one slingshot station for each of the girls so they could race their kangaroos.

They slid their launchers over the elastic, pulled back and let go to watch their kangaroos jump right across the room!

Squeak loved this part and would give herself a count down before letting her kangaroo go.

Once all the kangaroos had jumped we would check to see who had gone the furthest and who had done the fanciest 'jump'.

Streamer Volcano - Scissor Skills

Bubble and Squeak have become interested in volcanoes again after a recent visit to a museum in the city. There are a million questions from both of them; "why is there smoke?", "can you go inside a volcano?", "where does the lava go?".

Today we incorporated some fine motor practice for Squeak and some imaginary play into our volcano theme by making some from streamers and cardboard tubes. 

We also made some more Play Dough Volcanoes, because the day wouldn't be complete without a bicarb and vinegar eruption, would it :)

WE USED:

Streamer Volcano

* cardboard tube

* length of red streamer

* scissors

* tape or blutac (sticky tac)

Play Dough Volcano

* playdough 

(great recipe here)

* plate

* shot glass or similar

* bi carb soda

* white vinegar

* red food colouring

Previous volcano activities:

Jelly Volcano Balloons 

Bottle and Balloon Volcano

 

Triangles and Pyramids

We had a look at how a volcano works and what happens when they erupt.

I gave the girls a toilet roll tube, a pair of scissors, a long length of red streamer and some tape each and they got to work snipping their streamer into short lengths to make 'lava'.

Squeak needs a bit of practice with her fine motor skills and despises practicing with scissors, so this activity was a great way to get her interested in using them. 

Both the streamer cutting and the taping part of this activity were a really good fine motor workout.

 I was interested to see that Bubble (almost 6) stuck all of her streamers inside her tube while Squeak (almost 4) stuck hers on both the inside and outside.

One streamer volcano.

Both of the girls also love dinosaurs and they wasted no time setting them up with their volcanoes for a play.

To make our play dough volcanoes we made up a double batch of uncooked play dough. 

Then we placed a shot glass in the middle of a plate and moulded play dough around them to create our volcano shape.

The girls loved that the play dough was still warm. After they were happy with the shape they decided to decorate them with toy snakes.

We took our volcanoes outside onto the grass and the girls spent ages filling the middle of their volcanoes with bi carb and then pouring in the vinegar (coloured with red food colouring) to make it 'erupt' over and over.

 The girls always love this activity, I'm pretty sure they'd still be out there if we hadn't run out of vinegar!

I read somewhere that adding a few drops of dish washing liquid to the bi carb creates a better foamy effect but we are yet to give this a try.

Simple Fairy Playmat

One thing the girls asked for on their Santa lists this year were Tinkerbell Fairies. They are both fascinated by fairies and 'magical' things at the moment so we spent some time after lunch today making a fairy land for some imaginary play.
This mat was really quick and easy to make, you can use just about anything you have lying around the house and it doesn't matter if it isn't perfect. It's all about prompting creative play, so keep everything simple and movable.

WE USED:

* small turf mat
(we ask for cut offs cheap from our local turf shop. You could use anything though; felt sheets, towels, coloured paper, fabric cut offs, the top of a table)
* felt sheets

* scissors

* corks

* pop sticks

* pompoms

* small stones

You can literally use anything you have on hand. Ribbons could be rainbows or rivers, bottle lids could be boats or stepping stones, make a lake using foil or use things from the garden like leaves, gum nuts and sticks.

We used a small piece of turf off cut as the base of our fairy land but you can use anything you have on hand. I cut the felt pieces and the girls added their own elements like stones, glittery pompom flowers and fairy houses made from paper.

The girls wanted toadstools for their fairies to dance around so we made some using corks and felt. None of the pieces are attached, they can be moved easily to become other things when they aren't being toadstools.

We made a lake out of blue felt and Bubble made a bridge using pop sticks and stones. The sticks kept sliding off so we added some blutac (sticky tack) later on to hold them in place.

We made a few different types of rainbows using felt offcuts.

The girls liked the solid arch rainbow the best because they could use the arches separately as other things (a sunset, a cave, a magic mountain).

Christmas Count Down - Whiteboard Bunting

It was the first of December here yesterday and we were busy putting up our tree and house decorations while listening to Christmas songs. Cheesy, I know, but still my favourite time of the year!

One of the first things to go up were our count down calendars, this year we are using our reusable felt tree calendar that we made a few years ago but I thought something a bit more interactive would be fun too.

This whiteboard bunting was very easy to use and both girls can practice their number writing over and over again. Best of all it can be packed away and used again next year!

WE USED:

* paper

* printer

* laminator and pouches

* scissors

* blutac 

(or string and tape)
* whiteboard marker

Other ideas:
Both Bubble and Squeak are good counters but if this is something your child is still learning you could add stickers to make this count down even more fun. Each day they could add the right number of stickers by counting them out and sticking them on themselves.

To make the count down bunting I made some designs on the computer and printed them out before laminating each sheet. Then they were cut out ready to be hung on the wall.
The templates to make the bunting are at the bottom of this post.

We hung up our flags using blutac (sticky tack) so we could easily take one down a day to do our tracing and then put it back up again.
If you don't want to use blutac you could easily tape the flags along a length of string instead and use removable hooks at each end.

Each bunting flag has a traceable count down number on it.

Bubble tracing our number one flag yesterday.
Because the flags are laminated and we are using whiteboard markers the girls can practice over and over again before we hang the flag back up.

 Two days into our Christmas Count Down!


BUNTING FLAG TEMPLATES
(right click to open to full size and print)

Mortar & Pestle Ice Play

When she was younger, Bubble was obsessed with ice cubes. Obsessed to the point where we had to put a padlock on our freezer door after finding it left open repeatedly from late night ice tray raids. We have managed to curb the obsession but her fascination is still there so ice play activities feature highly in our house.

One of the things she enjoys most is breaking ice into 'bits' so I thought she might enjoy trying out the mortar and pestle. Not only did the girls enjoy the process but it was a great motor exercise.

I knew Bubble would want to eat/lick the ice so I didn't add anything to it but this activity would be a great way to retrieve objects frozen inside (click HERE for our Ice Egg post).

WE USED:

* ice 

(we used small containers to freeze our water in)

* mortar & pestle

* small bowls

* absorbent towel/drop sheet

I chose some small containers from the recycling box that were roughly the same size as the mortar bowl to freeze our water in overnight.

The girls extracted the ice themselves and started experimenting with the pestle.

Their approaches were very different, Bubble pounded her ice and broke it into tiny pieces while Squeak was more cautious and kept turning her ice block over to bang on both sides.

As little pieces were chipped off the girls took them out of the mortar and placed them into bowls. They examined the ice bits with their magnifying glasses, laid them out on the towel to watch them melt and (of course!) ate some :)