Tot School Revisited!

This week I didn't change too many of our tot trays, as we weren't as thorough with them as I would have liked.  We were away visiting family so we didn't spend any time over the weekend with them.  I revised a few trays and presented a few others differently and the others we just played with again.  I have noticed over the last week that Tootsie is able to recognize the number of small amounts of items and is getting better at tagging and counting.  She has been counting on her fingers a lot lately too!  Isn't it awesome to realize that the play/work you do together really makes an impact!

The clothespin activity as well as the popsicle sticks below came from a post about busy bags on second story window.  Tootsie loved the pinning.  At fist I held the felt clothes and she pinned.  After she figured out how to do both she was so excited she did a little victory dance!

Victory dance!  She was giggling like crazy!

Tootsie wasn't really interested in the popsicles the first week so I began hiding the colors around the living room and kitchen.  Once she found them, she matched them to the sticks.  We talked about the colors as she found them and listed those that were still hidden.  We've did this quite often.  Tootsie really liked hiding them for me and then "helping" me find them!

I made up this game a few years ago for my preschool class from an idea at prekinders I think.  Each small container has matching items.  Tootsie wasn't overly excited about this so the next week, I hid one of the matches in her bean sensory bin.  She liked it much better this way.

The Iowa Farmer's Wife blogged about this project found here.  Each color has just enough popsicle sticks to make a different shape.  Tootsie really liked playing with the popsicle sticks but just wasn't interested in making shapes.  I might try an idea I saw on Pinterest that adds velcro to the ends of the sticks.

We finished up the letter A by sorting and gluing upper and lower case A onto this printable from Confessions of a Homeschooler.  

After sorting some of them, Tootsie painted the rest with water colors.

Tootsie loves any game that involves food!  This fun one came from Criss-Cross Applesauce.  The trick was keeping her from eating all the Goldfish before the game was over!

Tons of Fun came up with this great idea.  It was so easy to set up.  I had a few wooden blocks from Michaels and I just used the Do-a-Dot Art Brilliant (set of 6) we already had.  Tootsie rolled the dice, we counted the dots if she didn't know the number and then stamped that many times.  

We've done a lot of painting over the last couple of weeks.  I have noticed that Tootsie is sticking with art projects longer than before.  Many times it took longer to set up the paints than she spent working!  I have been suggesting ideas for extending a project and adding new tools to keep her at it.  Recently, she has begun adding to the projects on her own too.  Clean up takes longer but she is really enjoying herself!

We squirted a ton of paint into a ziplock and added a pieces of paper.  She moved it around with her hands and then used a roller.

We put the bag on the floor after adding more paint and Tootsie stomped around for while.  

Tootsie wrote all over her paper with a white crayon and then painted it with water colors.  I added her name when she wasn't looking.  She loved finding it!

Tootsie made apple prints and then added streaks of purple with a paintbrush.  You can't tell from this photo but the apple has a bite out of it.  She tried to sample it while painting!

Easel painting.  Tootsie asks me to draw shapes a lot for her to paint.  I added a butterfly made out of capital Bs.

Thanks for checking us out!  We have lots more to share in the next few days!
Kate