With the exact same purpose as a Busy Bag, a Cutting Busy Box is essentially a box of supplies and materials designed to keep little ones busy.

What is a BUSY BOX? A busy box is a box or bag containing pre made activities that children can do on their own or with an adult. They usually have an activity that focuses on a skill, here are a handful of ideas for your own busy boxes* Shape blocks and pattern strips: I traced the shapes and colored them, have the child continue the pattern. I made many different pattern strips. Or they can make their own pattern Magnet wand, pipe cleaners (did you know they were magnetic!?), washers and small cups. Let children explore with what is magnetic and what is not. Brown Bear "head and tail" matching I found these cute printables here Painting and 'bingo' markers: explore with colors and create This is by far my favorite busy box I made. I was walking down the office supply isle and found "finger protectors" they have little bumps on them, I instantly though ***finger paint*** Small stamp pads, finger protectors and paper. My son had a blast with this one* Magnetic Letter matching. If you want to see what the book looks like that I got this print out from click here To see where I got these sheets click here and to see how to make magnet pom pom balls click here on a previous post also in the office supply section I found these colored circles, they fit perfectly on the circles from these sheets. Ours are laminated so the stickers peel on and off easily. Colored sand, toys and small bowls for scooping. To see how to make colored rice click here Want more busy box ideas??? click here to view more busy boxes that focus on fine motor skills*

When it comes to introducing scissors, this typically begins around 3 years old. When we purchased Emmy's first pair of training scissors, the activities were exactly as explained above; I simply gave her a piece of paper and let her get familiar with the hand motions needed to work the tool.

This Montessori inspired Printable Preschool Cutting Busy Box is a perfects scissor cutting activity for toddlers and preschool kids for fine motor skills.

Don't throw out your dried up markers! Turn them into homemade liquid watercolours for your kids to paint with! They're vibrant, safe, and easy to make!

A fun penguin felt busy box to mix and match colors while dressing the penguin and have fun learning on-the-go!

Here is another great idea for a felt busy box, a build a bug busy box, your toddler or preschooler will love it!

Looking for some Quiet Time activities for your toddler or preschooler? You have come to the right place! To any mama, dad, or caregiver with little ones at home, there is no sweeter word than... NAPTIME (at least in our home). A time to recharge, relax, and get (a little bit of) work done while

With the exact same purpose as a Busy Bag, a Cutting Busy Box is essentially a box of supplies and materials designed to keep little ones busy.

These busy boxes have been my lifesaver for no tv in the mornings. They were also my lifesaver when I first had Hanna and was looking for something quick and easy to entertain Hazel. I love these busy boxes. I love that they encourage learning, thinking, and self-help. I love that Hazel enjoys playing with them and that it has become her go to on most occasions. What is your go-to when it’s time for your toddler to learn and play? If you’re looking for ideas on what to put in your busy box I […]

September fine motor task boxes are perfect for preschool and kindergarten students. Use these fine motor activities as busy bins, for early finishers, or as morning tubs. There are 10 activities that easily fit into 4 x 6 storage bins! Here is a look inside this pack!! September Fine Motor Task Boxes -Spin and Cover- Spin a spinner. Cover the correct picture with a button or counter. -Build a Letter- Build each letter (uppercase) with pom poms. -Count and Clip- Count the apples in a barrel. Clip a clothespin with the correct number on the card. -Count and Link- Count and link linking shapes onto each number card. -Lacing Patterns- Lace beads onto pipe cleaners to create and extend each pattern. -Clip a Sound- Use alphabet clips to clip each letter to the correct beginning sound. -Count and Build- Use cubes to count and build towers. -Cutting Lines- Practice scissor skills by cutting along each line. -Color Match- Use pom poms and tweezers to match each color. -Count and Punch- Identify each number. Count and hole punch holes into each apple. Tracing Lines- Use dry erase marker to trace each line. You can grab this pack in my TPT shop! September Fine Motor Task Boxes For more preschool fun, follow along with us @michele_dillon

These toddler activity ideas might be fun, BUT… would you let YOUR toddler do them? I think other parents will know exactly what I mean when you look at some...

Here’s a brilliant collection of easy to make busy bag ideas for babies, toddlers, and preschool age children. 22 brilliant busy bags for babies, toddlers and preschool Have you heard about busy bags? They’re a brilliant idea that you can use when you need a quick and easy play activity. The basic idea is to: […]

These busy boxes have been my lifesaver for no tv in the mornings. They were also my lifesaver when I first had Hanna and was looking for something quick and easy to entertain Hazel. I love these busy boxes. I love that they encourage learning, thinking, and self-help. I love that Hazel enjoys playing with them and that it has become her go to on most occasions. What is your go-to when it’s time for your toddler to learn and play? If you’re looking for ideas on what to put in your busy box I […]

Learny McLearnerton’s printables have been moved to my new lifestyle blog. Click here to go to the printables!

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I'm obsessed with busy bags. TONS of ideas for busy bags with some free printables to go along with them! Also some ideas for hosting a busy bags swap party

Teaching isn’t a one-size-fits-all endeavour. Every child learns effectively in a different way. There is one thing in common among all kids though, their

Here are 20 free printable busy bags full of fun kid's activities! Perfect for traveling and quiet time.

Teach your little student how to sort colors and discriminate shapes with this Button Graph, a preschool hands-on math activity.

Create sensory self-portraits to learn more about facial features and body parts during your preschool All About Me theme.

These are my toddler's busy boxes and quiet time boxes to keep her occupied and keep toy sets organized! Organize using plastic bins on a bookshelf.

Have you noticed that I write a TON about quiet time activities in this space, but not a lot about busy bags? There is a reason for that! Quiet time in our home is about resting and allowing little ones some mindful time. Quiet time is FAR more than simply keeping little ones busy. I

Let's turn up the heat on box decorating with these 4 simple tips! Turn box decorating into a full on, long lasting toddler activity using these easy ideas.

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Ideas and resources for preparing Montessori continent boxes after children work with the Montessori continent map

Cute fingerprint counting activity that creates art with counting to 10 worksheets. Lots of themes in this toddler and preschool math!

DIY Counting Dinosaur Game Along with sharing various toddler friendly crafts on my blog, I want to start sharing more toddler themed busy bag activities

Games make learning fun, so print out and play Superhero Memory to learn contractions. Who knew grammar could be so exciting?

Back when I taught Kindergarten, center time was one of the favorite times of the day. It was the time I met with guided...

These free printable busy bags are super simple to make--just print and play! Perfect for travel or as quiet time activities.

Grab your silly straw and some beads to make this awesome activity for toddlers. Create an easy threading busy bag activity for preschoolers that will

(This post contains affiliate links) Updated 5.21.14 I created a Teachers Pay Teachers store to hopefully eliminate some downloading issues. For now only the original version (with a few edits) is available. You have to sign up, but it is free. Check it out here **UPDATED** A-Z paths ~ D’Nealian font (I used a free font called Block Letters Tryout) A-Z paths ~ Zaner-Bloser Font Go to my "printables" page for individual letters C had to dot over the letter A's along a path using our dot markers. I told her the lower case "a" (which was first) had to find the upper case "A" at the end. Idea similar to this idea at A Mommy's Adventure, which C also did. I also printed out the letters of her name multiple times, upper and lower case, randomly on a piece of paper. Then she had to follow my directions "Mark the letter "C's" green" and "Mark the letter "o's" yellow", etc. **Updated 11.12.12 ~ if you are looking to do a similar activity, check out Little Miss Glamour Goes to Kindergarten, she created a free printable that includes all letters. *You can find dot markers here I made this fridge magnet chart, idea found at Chalk in my Pocket. After she completed it, I mixed up the letters for her to fix. She thought that was pretty silly and enjoyed fixing my mistakes :) I also made some word charts. This idea is from Camp Slop. I also made these block puzzles for C, idea from Activity Mom. I used 1 inch foam blocks I found at Goodwill. I found these on Amazon, but they are pretty pricey. You could make this activity to fit what you have on hand. C thought the puzzle she is doing in the top picture looked like hopscotch, so I made her an indoor hopscotch using painter's tape (since it still looks & feels like winter here) And that's about it, my mom visited us Wed-Fri, so we took a few days off.

This is the best resource you will ever find for easy to assemble busy bags, that you can do mostly from home. Use all the free printables and enjoy!