Looking for fun Weather Activities for Preschool? This set is packed with weather charts, activities, and weather worksheets you'll love.

A great lesson for beginning Artist. I was inspired by a post I saw on Instagram by Alison Gerke (@ghouseart) showing some very sweet frogs by her Kindergarten. That sparked this lesson for me... Day 1: Students practiced drawing frogs. First on whiteboards and then on their watercolor paper. It's important to have a high quality paper for this lesson... Watercolor paper or Mixed Medium paper works best. I have a FREE step-by-step resource page on my TPT page. Day 2: Students first colored their background with crayons. This included the sky, water, and lily pad. We talked about craftsmanship quite a bit. Students were instructed to do a peer assessment getting 3 people to say 'no white-spots' before considering themselves finished. Student then used two 'juicy' markers to add two colors of spots all over the frog. The more dots the better!! We briefly talked about color theory and the color wheel using colors that are 'neighbors' to each other. Then students used water to blend the spots together with a brush. This is always magic for the students. And then the final results...

Make some rainbow coloured Kindness Potions Sensory Bottles to learn about what makes a kind and caring heart, after reading The Story of the Kindness Elves book! This is such a fun way to learn a little science, PHSE, literacy and a sprinkling of awe and wonder. The kindness potions sensory bottles make a wonderful...Read More »

Yesterday my daughter played doctor game with a friend. The doctor set was her friend's toy. She saw "the doctor set" for the first time . She got sick recently and the doctor was very scared and cryi

Make working on letter recognition FUN with these free printable Robot Letter FInd. Print the Find the Letter pagesand complete with bingo daubers.

Did you know that pine cones play a huge role in nature? Our Parts of a Pine Cone worksheets are the perfect way to introduce their special features. Plus, we give you some fun facts for kids!

Kids can practice scissor skills, sequencing, and creativity with this mix and match robots printable to help children to grow and play.

Toddler Friendship Bracelets are a fun way to teach children about the gift of friendship and promote hand-eye coordination.

Add a touch of luxury to your outdoors by installing a modern and stylish glass veranda. Create an outdoor haven that you and your family can enjoy!

Our latest science experiments for kids is all about leaves! We used colored water to observe how liquids move through the leaves of plants. This post also includes a free printable recording sheet. NGSS: Disciplinary Core Idea LS1.C Follow our Science for Kids Pinterest Board! With all the new growth in our yard this spring, …

This storm cup luminary is a perfect craft for learning about the seasons or the weather. The kids will love watching their storms come to life.

I am not Super Woman… yet I am the lucky mama to three super heroes. Does that make me Wonder Woman? My life is full of life, adventure, and movement. My three super heroes thrive on movement an…

Put kindness in play with our fun Kindness Bingo game.

The past few weeks in my classroom, my students learned about Community Helpers and they loved it! We were fortunate enough to have several visitors, including a police officer, fire fighters, a nurse, and a baker. Aren't those reindeer cupcakes adorable?! Thank you to Rhonda Jones at Main Sweets for making this experience so much fun for our kiddos! In addition to our wonderful visitors, who all did a fantastic job, we also read books about Community Helpers and made bubble maps of each kind of helper that we studied. I began by making a Bubble Map Anchor Chart, and then let my kiddos head back to their seats and fill in their own version to take home and share with their families. The Bubble Map Pieces that you see here can be downloaded for FREE from my TpT store here: Community Helpers Bubble Map and Graphing FREEBIE In addition to our whole group learning, we also completed Community Helper themed math and literacy centers. Student versions of the Community Helper Bubble Maps and these literacy centers plus a lot more can be purchased at my TpT store here: Community Helper Math and Literacy Centers plus More! This unit includes 150 pages of Math and Literacy fun that can be used over a 2-3 week period in your classroom. Today, during Math, my students completed a graphing activity to wrap up the unit. As you can see, they were most excited about the possibility of becoming a police officer! I hope that you'll head on over to my TpT store and grab this graph and the bubble map anchor chart pieces! If you do, please remember to leave feedback--it really means a lot to me! --Amy

A class up in Canada (Joysofkinder) started The Kindness Ninja movement and sent us an invitation to become Kindness Ninjas! It included a guide written by them, directions, the Kindness Ninja Pledge, a Kindness Ninja Master, a plaque, and two headbands. I went out and bought a 3’ x 3’ piece of felt and made ninja headbands for the class, then presented the kids with the kit! We read their guide, put on our kindness ninja headbands, took the pledge, put our thumbprint on the plaque to seal our pledge and voila! We were now official Kindness Ninjas! The kids could not wait to do our first RAK (Random Act of Kindness)! I mentioned they could change the world with kindness and they were very doubtful. “We can’t change the world,” was heard over and over. We read the book Ordinary Mary’s Extrordinary Deed. It’s about how one girls random act of kindness in the end affected millions of people. One little girl ended up changing the world through her on little act. It really helped them understand how powerful their acts of kindness can be! It was Mrs. Rigg’s Birthday so we decided to RAK her! They were so excited! They painted a banner to hang outside her door. She was so surprised and said she felt so loved. She also wondered who in the world the kindness ninjas were! What was really cool was our act of kindness inspired her to have her class do an act of kindness for another teacher. When I told th skids, they saw how there acts of incense was already spreading kindness around our school! Our next act of kindness was to make a book for Miss Reese filled with kind words about her! We got ready to deliver it to her room without being seen! We had been practicing our stealth ninja moves! We had brainstormed kind words when we made Miss Reese’s book. I set up an area where they could write notes of kindness to friends and family. This was a very popular station with good authentic writing! Our Next RAK was to create posters that would encourage others to choose kindness. We used our stealth ninja moves to hang them up where there was a lot of traffic before anyone could see us! We often repeat our pledge to help us remember to choose kindness that day! Next, we decided to RAK our beloved Literacy Lab Teacher, Mrs. Coberly! They painted hearts and wrote words of kindness on them to Mrs. Coberly. More authentic writing experiences! That is when they always do their best writing! Using our stealth ninja moves, we taped them all to Mrs. Coberly’s door. She was so happy! She came up and told us that it made her day and she planned on spreading the kindness, but wondered if we had any idea who the kindness ninjas were? The kids all said they had no idea! They really want to keep their identity a secret! They came up with the idea of sending out Kindness Ninja kits like the one we had received! It was perfect because I had been getting requests on social media for kits. We studied maps so that we could figure out where we were sending the kits and keep track. They painted Kindness Ninja Masters. We made “A Beginner’s Guide to Becoming a Kindness Ninja (more authentic writing happening!) and I typed up directions, the pledge and made plaques, then cut headbands. I put them in envelopes to send off. Unfortunately, the ones going out of the U.S. were going to cost $10 to send and I had fourteen that needed to be sent internationally. So unfortunately, I had to take the Kindness Ninja Master out of the international ones. The ones sent within the U.S. came with Kindness Ninja Masters. We told them to tag us on social media when they did their Random Acts of Kindness. We can’t wait to see how we have helped spread kindness all over the world! I am so thankful to the class from Joysofkinder who sent us our invite and started this wonder wat to teach kids about how kindness affects the world! We will keep you updated as we continue our Random Acts of Kindness!

If you are ready for summer activities, such as a family camping trip, these fun camping crafts for kids are a perfect way to introduce the adventure. Warmer weather gives us the freedom to do so

Once you have selected your northwest Native American spirit animal, here are some links for images. Notice the use of ovoid and U-shapes: Key symbols of West Coast Native Art Click on the small pi…

Community Helpers activities and centers for preschool, pre-k, and kindergarten. Plus FREE community signs & fire finger painting printable.

A different kind of Flannel Friday to kick off the New Year! This is my hugely successful, used in nearly every toddler storytime, song cube. The first time I saw this prop used was from Melissa at…

In our Five In a Row co-op this week we read the book Another Celebrated Dancing Bear which takes place in Imperial Russia. I believe this is the first book we've read with that setting; so I was pretty excited to see what kinds of crafts I could find to illustrate Russian culture. 1. Printable nesting dolls. I love these adorable Russian nesting dolls. You can print them out in full color or in black and white outline to color them yourself. 2. Faberge eggs. I am honestly shocked that I have been unable to find any children's nonfiction books containing the story of the Fabrege eggs. Their history is all about riches, surprises and lost treasure- just the kind of thing kids love, and such a great way to teach about Imperial Russian and the 1917 Revolution. If you want to tell your children the story and show them a few pictures, this link from PBS has a pretty good summary. We used a really fun silk technique to dye the eggs. They don't actually look all that similar to the historical Faberge eggs, but they're fancy- which is basically what we were going for. I'll be writing about how to make them in an upcoming post. 3. Russian Architecture- The colorful onion domes on the Orthodox churches in Russia are so striking. I thought it would be fun to let the kids design their own churches in this style. My husband (who has a much steadier artistic hand and loads more patience for historical accuracy) sketched some historically accurate domes and spires for me on a piece of card stock. I used those as templates for cutting out lots of domes and spires from different colors of construction paper, along with some other basic shapes. The kids could then arrange them like building blocks on their page and glue them on once they found an arrangement they liked. They used markers to draw on details like windows, stripes on the domes, and crosses. Any other ideas for Russian kids' crafts?

This fun and colorful Magic Rainbow Toothpick Star kids' science experiment is quick, simple, and will have little jaws dropping at the finish!

Children explore sound and homemade shakers with this musical sensory bin. A few simple materials and an easy set up leads to hours of fun!

Try this popcorn 5 senses activity with your preschoolers for a fun, culminating lesson on the Five Senses. Free Printable included!

Easy to set up obstacle course straw game will keep your family entertained for hours!

"My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness." - H.H. the 14th Dalai Lama In response to some recent headlines in the news, I have committed myself anew to the practice of kindness, including intentional, random acts of kindness. There has been a lot of discussion recently about mental health care, gun control, violence in the media, etc. Kindness is a form of activism that can go hand in hand with political activism. A few days ago, I came across a video that really touched me and reminded me that you never know who you might inspire as you go about your day planting seeds of kindness - or who might inspire you if you keep your eyes open. My favorite recent, local example of kindness is Lorenzo, who directed traffic through a road work site close to my school. His smiles, waves, and greetings - given to every single person who passed by him each day - uplifted so many people that he was made an honorary citizen and given the key to the village for sharing his gift of "unbridled joy." He showed us the power that a smile and a few kind words can have on an entire community, which was a powerful lesson - one that inspired me to reflect on how I can channel more kindness and joy into my work and into the world at large. As an early childhood educator, I have an abundance of opportunities every day to offer a warm smile, a sincere compliment, and a listening heart. I remember how great it felt as a child to be noticed by and to connect with certain teachers. Simply running into them in the hallway and receiving a smile and a hello was such a treat! That kind of warmheartedness comes naturally to most early childhood teachers. However, I'd also like to cultivate a random acts of kindness habit in the New Year that requires more intentionality. The day before Christmas, I saw a picture online that made quite an impression on me. It was of a card a couple received on the windshield of their car when they came out of a hockey game. The card contained a $5 bill and a kind message and was given in loving memory of a certain child who died in the Sandy Hook Elementary School attack. I had heard of the new "26 Acts of Kindness" movement to commit a kind deed in honor of each victim of the school shooting and had intended to accept this challenge. However, the picture motivated me into action; a new wave of kindness already had begun! I decided to begin with a copycat act of kindness in our community with my son. I found a handmade card, wrote a kind message, and invited my son to select the child in whose memory we would perform this random act of kindness. His eyes widened in an urgent sort of way, and he said that there was a particular child who really stuck out in his mind. We looked at pictures of the 20 Sandy Hook students, and he found the child immediately. I wrote her name, age, and the name of her school on the card with tears welling in my eyes and slipped the money into the card. Focusing on that one child - learning her name and deciding to offer a kind deed in her memory - was a powerful, emotional experience. At the bottom of the card, I wrote, "Remembering this precious child through a random act of kindness that hopefully will make the world a better place. Please pass it on in some way." We drove down the road to our town's grocery store, selected a car, and left. After returning home, I felt compelled to learn more about this little girl. I read about her interests and considered the idea of future acts of kindness being related to what each child loved or something unique about him/her. For instance, we might decorate a tree with treats for the birds in honor of a child who loved animals or donate a book to a library in honor of a child who loved to read. Normally, I engage my kindergartners in a random acts of kindness project between Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Valentine's Day. We create a paper quilt detailing 100 acts of kindness performed at home, school, or in the community. The children color heart designs, and their acts of kindness are written in the borders around each quilt square. I ask families to email me or send notes about kind deeds their children perform outside of school. This year, I'm considering challenging each child/family to perform 20 acts of kindness - in honor of each of the children killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School. We are focusing on the numbers 0-20 in math, and there would be no need for the children to understand the significance of the number 20. I just love the idea of responding to tragedy by flooding the world with kindness and light and the message that love is stronger than evil, hatred, and ignorance. Acts of kindness in the classroom also count. Personally, I think I'd like to begin with the "26 Random Acts of Kindness" and then extend it by performing a kind deed every day during 2013. Here is the link to an article about kindness research underway in Vancouver: Random Acts of Kindness Can Make Kids More Popular. I have to admit to fantasizing every now and then about moving to Vancouver to study with lead researcher, Kimberly Schonert-Reichl, whose work I have been following for several years. (And I have some really awesome relatives in the Vancouver area...) But perhaps I can work to implement research-based practices related to kindness, empathy, and awareness in schools in my area. There are a number of resources online with ideas for random acts of kindness, in case you are so inclined and would like some ideas. Here are a few links: The Random Acts of Kindness Foundation 134 Ideas for Random Acts of Kindness 366 Random Acts of Kindness Gift of Kindness Secret Agent L And here are a few picture books about kindness that I enjoy reading with children: One Smile by Cindy McKinley Because Brian Hugged His Mother by David L. Rice Kindness is Cooler, Mrs. Ruler by Marjery Cuyler Crazy Hair Day by Barney Salzberg Somebody Loves You, Mr. Hatch by Eileen Spinelli There is another book about kindness that I refer to quite extensively in my classroom but must recommend along with a suggestion. The book is called Have You Filled a Bucket Today?: A Guide to Daily Happiness for Kids. The book explains that each of us carries around an invisible bucket that holds our feelings of happiness. When our bucket is full, we feel good, and when it is empty, we feel bad. We can fill other people's buckets by being kind and helpful, and in the process of filling their buckets, we also fill our own. However, we also can dip from other people's buckets by being insensitive or hurtful. But dipping from someone else's bucket does not fill our own bucket. The ideas of bucket filling and bucket dipping are easy for young children to grasp; however, there is an important element missing from the story, which is learning how to put a lid on our bucket, to prevent others from dipping into our bucket in the first place. This piece involves resilience and personal empowerment and ensures that our happiness is not dependent on the actions of others. Although this idea does not appear in the book, I have seen it presented on the Bucket Fillers website and feel it is a critical piece. Please let me know if you know of other good books about kindness! And then there's the movie, Pay It Forward, about a boy who started a kindness movement as a school assignment: Whereas the various issues being debated in response to recent acts of violence will take some time to work out, kindness is something each of us can do today. It is a way to heal the world more immediately. May it spread like wildfire! "Every kind act, no matter how small, is like a pebble tossed into the pond of human caring. The rings reach out far beyond the point of impact; the action of our kind deed acts more kindly toward the people around them, those people act more kindly toward the people around them, and so it goes, on and on." -Author unknown * * * * * * * * © Susan Meyer and River Bliss, 2012-2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material, including all photos, without express and written permission from this blog’s author/owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Susan Meyer and River Bliss (www.riverblissed.blogspot.com) with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

I just love this color changing flowers science experiment! It is really easy to do and the kids love watching the flowers change color. We think it is the perfect science activity for spring! I even created printable recording sheets that kids in preschool and early elementary can use to show their observations.

Have you ever done printmaking with young children before? From experience I can say it’s super fun, slightly crazy and a fantastic hands on art process for kids. We did printmaking this week at art class with the 3-5 year olds. I love the whole process, though it definitely veered in a different direction than […]

Learn the five ocean layers & which sea animals live in each zone with this colorful science experiment and habitat project for kids, tweens & teens!

10 Crafts From Around the World featured from Kid World Citizen - including asian, african, south american and more

Encourage some wild west learning and imaginative fun for your kids with this FREE Playdough Printable to use with their playdough!

Teach your little kids about Family & Pets with this Worm Families Preschool Monthly Theme Activity. It's so quick & easy using things that you probably already have at home or in your classroom. And

This warmer weather brings out everyone’s favorite pastimes: Bubbles!

Invite kids to create their own fairy gardens with this play dough invitation.