Buttons

 I keep an old Ball jar of my grandmother's buttons that I received after she passed away on the windowsill in our living room.  I use them for crafts and activities Tootsie is working on but I really like to just look through them from time to time.  Some are rather ugly like the brass looking nautical themed buttons.  Others are romantic and antique looking and you can definitely tell those from the 60's and 70's.  Of course there are your run of the mill extra buttons and a ton of small white ones littering the bottom of the jar.  I've looked at them so many times I know them by heart and it makes me happy to see one on a project that I have given to Tootsie or one of my nieces or nephews.  I was secretly thrilled when Tootsie wanted to dump them out one day and explore.  We got a tray, dumped and I let her take the lead.

After sifting through them for awhile, she started picking out those that match. 

 By the time we were done an hour later my Tupperware cupboard had been raided and lots of sorting had been accomplished!

  

We did this activity a few more times over the next couple of days.  It was a good lesson in sorting, counting and comparing and contrasting but mostly, I loved sharing my grandmother's buttons with my daughter!

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Letters Of My Name!

I've been wanting to share for awhile all the activities we have been doing to help Tootsie learn the letters in her name.  We were trying a letter of the week type of theme but I found that we were spending A LOT longer than a week on a letter and Tootsie really wasn't that interested.  When it comes to the letters of her name, my name or her dad's name she is very excited so I decided to instead focus on them.  I have a few ideas still to try out but here is what we've done so far.

The letters of her name written on index cards for her to hang with clothespins.

I trimmed some foam sticky letters to make lower case ones.  She "wrote" her name in marker above.

I taped colored hand prints with the letters of her name on them to our wall.  She "high fives" a letter or color as I call it out.  Underneath, we used water colors (food coloring and water) to paint coffee filter flowers.  Tootsie added the circle centers to spell her name.

I wrote the letters of her name on small stones and Tootsie puts them in order.  We tried just lining them up on a small square of paper first but they slid around a lot so then we pressed them in play dough.  It works much better!

Check out Read. Set. Read! for so more great name exploration ideas!

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March Madness!

Things have been a little crazy around here lately!  Mid March brought us some of the best weather I have ever experienced in Northern Michigan!  It got so warm that we drug out the wadding pool for a couple of days and Tootsie ran around the yard in her bathing suit!  Unfortunately, it didn't last.  It snowed all morning on Friday.  I don't know if it has been the change in weather driving us inside more or what but we have all been a little crabby with each other!  Tot School has been hit or miss but I have been trying to record the fun times and the activities that go well.  Here's a look at some of the things we have been doing.

Graphing M & Ms.  I've mentioned before that Tootsie loves any activity involving food - especially M & Ms!  We did this several times and she really enjoyed it.  We counted each row and discussed more, less and equal.  

I found this really cool puzzle recently at Goodwill.  The train cars are made up of three pieces each - wheels, top of the car and an inset with the number that corresponds to the number of creatures riding in each car.  So there's small motor work, color recognition, counting and number recognition all in one puzzle!  It's called the Numberland Express Puzzle and can be found at Amazon by following the link.

I can't remember the blog this idea can from but we really liked it.  I cut words out of magazines containing the letters "B" and "A," glued them on card stock and laminated.  "A" words are on the back.  I laid out the upper and lower case felt letters that I made and gave Tootsie a magnifying glass to locate the letters in each word.  While she liked searching for the target letters, she really liked identifying the letters in her name, my name and her dad's name better!

If you haven't visited Little Hands Big Work you totally should!  She has some great ideas, including this color wheel.  I used a computer generated pie chart to make the color wheel and then colored clothespins to match.  The back side has just as many wedges with star stickers to count.  The reverse of the clothespins contains numbers.  I haven't introduced the number side yet.

I made Tootsie some large pattern blocks out of felt and we spent a morning playing around with them. First I called a shape and she would jump to it.  Then I had her place different body parts on a shape.  We tried colors too and then I showed her how to make a rectangle out of two squares and a and a diamond out of two triangles.

We made sidewalk paint out of cornstarch, water and food coloring and headed outside on one of our warmer days.  

After painting the sidewalk for awhile, we painted each other's feet and made foot prints!  As a side note, sidewalk paint does not wash off your body on the first try :)

This is an awesome idea from Teach Preschool!  Tootsie had fun with it and it's been a big hit in my preschool classroom.  I covered one side of our easel with contact paper, sticky side out.  We have used colored strips of paper, foam shapes and straws to decorate the board.  

I made a few shapes for Tootsie to see what she would do with them.  She filled a few in with corresponding colored foam shapes and others she just matched strips of paper to.

I will be posting again soon about a few other projects we have worked on so check back soon!


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Sensory Bins

Tootsie really loves sensory play - water, beans, sand - anything she can pour and scoop.  I've tried several different things recently but we always come back to the simple.  I've noticed that she will not play with a bin that is too busy.  Her winter bin was just too overwhelming.  I collected lots of blue and white items including pom poms, flat glass marbles, pipe cleaners, beads, table scatter, a couple of containers and tongs as well as a few other items.  She didn't use it much.  The Valentine's bin had white beans and an assortment of Valentine themed items.  She removed a lot of things and gathered items from her kitchen to use instead.  So for now, we'll skip the toys and figurines and stick to the pouring and scooping.  Here are a few of the bins we've used lately.

Dried Peas

Dried peas, a few Saint Patrick's Day coins, tongs, funnel, measuring spoon, pitcher and a few different shaped bottles.  The round one is a special Coke bottle salvaged from a family gathering.

Princess and the Pea!  Dancing dress and fancy shoes required!

Chocolatey Mess

This was an experiment in throwing things together based on Cloud Dough.  I guess you could call it chocolate sand/dough.  

We mixed flour, cocoa powder, a little salt, a lot of oil thanks to Tootsie's heavy pouring hand and sprinkles.

Dishes from her kitchen were quickly brought in. 

Not too long after that the dough migrated to her kitchen so she could cook it.

Worked ok until Tootsie took the sink out, filled the dishwasher and spread it around the stove.  This was a really messy project but luckily it swept up easily.  By the end of the second day, I had snuck a lot of it into the trash.  It was getting tracked everywhere!  We will definitely do this again because Tootsie loved it but I will wait until it's warmer and we can take it outside.

White Beans

After Valentine's Day, I removed the themed items and added some I Spy items (see here or a little more info) to white beans.  

Tootsie also liked using her dishes - were these ever a great investment!  She cooked the bean and then we filled up lots of the dishes, added some felt food and had a party.  It was a make up party as I had just had some friends over for an Arbonne party, in which she got to participate.

I loved the Barbie shoe drinks!

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

Valentine's Day and Letter A Activities

Valentine's Day and the letter A kept us busy for quite awhile!  We had the Valentine theme trays out for a little more than a week and I think we were both a little tired of them - well maybe mostly me.  Tootsie was still wanting to play one that allowed her to eat conversation hearts!

Here's what we were up to:

I received a gift certificate to Kaplan Early Learning Company and one of the items I chose was these Geoboards.  There are quite a few in an order so I was able to take some to school and leave a few at home for Tootsie.  They have been a hit in both places.

Once she got the hang of the using the rubber bands, there were surprisingly few finger snaps!
 

This activity wasn't a favorite at all.  I added small figures and Model Magic to the tray.  I recently put this activity out in my classroom and it was the most chosen one for at least a week.  I figured Tootsie would like it too but not so much.  She immediately swapped the Model Magic for playdough and only played with it for a very short time. 

This was by far the most favorite tray!  I really wish I could find where I printed this from so I could give credit but I haven't been able to.  If I find it I will post!

I cut the sheet apart into individual cards and then spread them across the floor and set a baby food container (I am SO glad I saved some of those) on top so Tootsie had to move around to sort the hearts.  

After she did it once, I gave her a small dish of conversation hearts to sort.  She loved it!

After we sorted into dishes for awhile, I gave her a graph to sort them on.  We continued to talk about how many of each color there were, which had the most, which had the least and if there were any colors that had equal amounts.

I found this little Valentine tree at the Target Dollar Spot.  Getting the heart ornaments on was pretty easy for Tootsie but taking them off took a little more work!

The heart sticks came from the Dollar Tree.  I collected pink, red and purple beads from several of our activities and added them for stringing.  

Tootsie strung them a few times and thought they looked "beautiful" but then decided it was more fun to stack the biggest beads and then knock them down.

I don't have a photo of the finished product but I hung the pink piece on the wall and Tootsie ordered them by size and glued them on.  

Our Valentine sensory bin contained white beans of two different sizes, heart containers, a heart ice cube tray, pitcher, bowl, scoops and a few other odds and ends. 

Tootsie filled up the ice cube tray and a a dish and decided to cook them in her kitchen.  She is still cooking beans.  I have a feeling I will be finding these for quite awhile.

I also made Tootsie a letter A sensory bin.  I have taken a three drawer storage bin and turned it into alphabet activities.  The top drawer is this pom pom bin, the second is an "A is for Alligator" magnet page and a sand paper A, the third drawer contains her Animal ABC's binder from 1+1+1=1 as well as her Tot Time Notebook and some dry erase markers.

Here's a little better look at what's in the drawer with the pom poms (we just remove the whole drawer when she wants to play with it).  I collected upper and lower case A's made from different materials.  Below are the ones that I sewed from felt for her.  There are alligators, angels, airplanes, apples, tongs and a few dishes and bottles.  I wrote the object's name on the back so she could see that all items start with A.

I'm planning to make an entire alphabet of these stuffed felt letters.  Very simple and quick and it gives Tootsie another way to experience the letters.

We mixed Karo Syrup and food coloring to paint our
letter A.  It took forever to dry but the results
are very shiny!

Tootsie painted this heart with chocolate pudding!  Smells delicious and I didn't even mind if she licked her paint brush!  I noticed today that this heart is missing a few candies!

We made these cute Valentines that I found on Pinterest for Tootsie's friends at school.  She didn't break any of the glow stick - momma, however, broke four!

Hope you had a great Valentine's Day!

Kate