I made these "light houses" from used milk boxes. The little secret is that you have to make many little openings so the plastic inside will not be burned.
g Summer Boredom Buster Science Experiment Ideas to do With the Kids: Summer Boredom Busters for Kids What a great way to make memories with the kids this summer. These all look like Epic Fun! I just love doing science experiments with the kids. Lucky for me, I’ve noticed some really cool ideas on Pinterest. All …
Having a pen pal helps promote many key developmental skills. Sure we can hop online any time and be in contact with someone from the other side of the world, but having a snail mail pen pal has it's perks too! The most obvious skills practiced with sending and receiving letters in the mail are reading and writing. This is a great opportunity to focus on practicing punctuation, capitalization, and long hand writing as in not short cutting phrases like "that was funny" into "LOL." I'm sure any ch
Make an ordinary sheet of paper come to life with origami! This ancient Chinese tradition will be easy to learn with this how-to worksheet.
Teach your kids about having the right attitude with this family night lesson inspired by Nephi and his bow and arrow. Get all the details on the blog!
Wondering which artists are featured in Art School for Kids? More than a third of the 42 lessons in the online art school feature a famous artist that I feel most resonate with kids. Some lessons are
Have you seen those floating ball toys where you blow into one end and the ball "magically" floats above in place? Here's a way to create your own!
How about a little Fun with Money! My daughters thought I was pretty magical when I broke out my money tricks. After I showed them, they must have played for a couple hours trying to do it on their own and preparing to show dad when he got home. They wanted to have the secrets perfected! This takes no preparation except maybe digging pennies out of the couch. #1 Magical Linking. Goal: To get the paper clips to stick together magically. Items needed: A dollar bill 2 Paper Clips Fold the dollar and place clips as shown. Grab the ends
A colour combination challenge is always a great way to step outside of my comfort zone and these colours have done that. These are not my usual go to colours, but I really thought the Hey Girlfrie…
We're done hearing "Mom! I'm bored!" Here are some ideas to help you fight the battle against the B word!
Last week we had parent back-to-school night, and I knew I needed something on the wall that would WOW my parents. So I decided to do one of my all time favorite art projects: Sunset Silhouettes These are great because they are so easy to make, but they look like some hard work went into them! I break the project into two days. First start by gathering your materials: Day 1 1.) Gather your materials: White Construction paper cut to {Read More}
Weather Project - Topic is Wind. Ideas: Discuss how wind power was, and still is, used for milling to make flour and for producing ele...
remember HERE when i talked about a mutual idea and some young woman's personal progress printables? don't have a clue what personal progress is? go HERE ANYWHOs...it's time for more.... first...a fun mutual idea we
Hello! My Dt piece for Creative Expressions this week features these gorgeous daisy stamps by Heartfelt Creations (well actually they're called Asters..but I've never been one for knowing my flower species!!) I've used them in a simple way today.... but brace yourselves for some all out flower explosions to come, these just lend themselves to being used LOADS on a project! Anyway, I made this..... Very simple in terms of colour palette, and a nice simple background too! I took a size 8 Kraft tag, and did some stitching around the sides, and a little in the middle.. I smeared cream paint in places, and splattered black paint over it. That's the extent of the background, told you it was quick! There are four sizes of lower on the stamp plate, but I chose just three to use this time. I stamped them onto book pages using Archival ink, cut them out then adhered them to the tag... The stem of the flower is twine, very in keeping with the Kraft look. I also threaded twine through the hole in the tag.. The final tough was a tiny Remnant rub on...LOVE these!!! Hope you like it, a muted start to what will be a very colourful month with these stamps I think!! Love Trish xxx
Regardless of the differences in background, attitude, or experience, garden play is great for child development & health. Read about how to engage them.
What to keep kids engaged at home? Check out these helpful tips for encouraging after school creativity with Bunchems!
Growing up, I spent countless hours making colorful friendship bracelets. Their resurgence prompted me to rediscover this summer pastime. Here are instructions for one of my favorite patterns ̵…
I’m excited to be participating in Stamp ‘N Hop Blog Hop again this month, which we are focussing on showcasing our favourite bundle and mine is the Whale of a Time Suite. If you are new or have ne…
I have wanted to try making a St. Brigid's cross for years, but never got around to it until now. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be, and we had a lot
An expert knows just what you should say when they start asking questions...
My 3D class created this assemblages inspired by the artwork of Louise Nevelson. The more I read about Nevelson, the more interesting...
You'll find many variations of this activity, some more sophisticated than others, throughout the Internet and in numerous books. This one is very basic - it's simple to set up and can be effective in helping students visualize the processes occurring throughout the water cycle. You'll need a glass jar with a metal lid. Fill the jar with about an inch of hot tap water (the hotter it is, the faster you'll see something happening). Flip the lid upside down and set it on top of the jar. Fill the lid with ice cubes. Wait, watch and observe. The hot water will evaporate. As it rises, it will cool. The cooled vapor will condense into drops, which will accumulate on the underside of the lid and eventually drop.
A funky side profile artwork to do with your students.
Simple physics science experiments for kids! Explore force and motion, Newton's laws, simple machines, magnetism, and electricity.
This Yarn bracelet is so easy to make! Even little hands can create some amazing designs with supplies you already have around the house!
How to Make Clothespin Puppets for Shy Singers - Fun and easy student craftivity for prek, daycare, or primary elementary music class. Free printable template included. An engaging activity for non-music sub plans or a rewarding activity for a class party. You can even use them as a favor/craft for a kid's birthday party and use them to sing "Happy Birthday."
and insisted on having the sword on the nose and not on the forehead, because then he would be a unicorn and not a swordfish...
****There is still time to enter our Potty Time DVD and Music CD giveaway . Click on the link to go to that page. All of our acti...
FOOD IS ONE OF THOSE TOPICS IN WORLD LANGUAGE CLASSES that gives a lot of bang for the buck.. we all like to talk about food, and there are so many ways to make it part of our lessons. Since I am a huge advocate of hands on learning, I use both plastic and paper play food whenever I am doing activities related to food- not only do they give little hands something to engage in, but it also provides visual support for my students. And this applies to all age groups, not just the littles- when I was teaching Russian to adults, I frequently incorporated manipulatives to support learning. Here are some ideas for using play food in your class: *CATEGORIZE ACCORDING TO PREFERENCE: This is a simple way to practice expressions of preference, even if your students don't know the words for all the food items. For my younger students, I make up ziploc baggies or an envelope with approximately 10 foods in them along with a set of cards indicating 'I like', 'I really like', 'I don't like', and 'I don't know' (for those foods they've never tried) and divide the class into pairs. Each pair gets a baggie and takes turns categorizing the foods based on their preferences. After a few minutes, I have them leave the foods in a pile, and they move to the next set (each baggie has different foods in it) so they can categorize again. I encourage them to say how they feel about each food in Spanish as they place it under a preference card-this is the focus of the activity, using the preference phrases themselves. For older kids, you could have them add reasons why they like or don't like a particular food- It's too spicy, It's sweet, It's gross, etc. This makes for a great (and simple!) Interpersonal Activity, particularly for novice speakers! *MY FAVORITE MEAL: Use paper plates to provide the starting prop, and have kids "fill" their plate with their favorite meal- could be breakfast, lunch or dinner! You could also title this: A MEAL I REALLY LIKE, since sometimes kids have a hard time deciding between multiple favorites. Kids can then turn and talk with the person on their left, then switch and turn and talk with the person on their right. I love activities where kids share with one another, it builds community by providing opportunities to learn about each other! *PLAY RESTAURANT OR MARKET: Play food lends itself really well to activities involving restaurant or market vocabulary and provide a hands on component to the action. Students can "order" food which is then delivered to them (put the play food on a plate!), or the play food can be displayed as part of a market stand where students can "buy" what they need to make a dish or to get items on a shopping list. This is a fun way to integrate imaginary play for little kids, and manners expressions such as 'please', 'thank you' and 'you're welcome'. *"ILLUSTRATE A RECIPE": Provide students with an authentic recipe and a basket or bin of printable food. Have them read the recipe and line up the ingredients below the recipe. This is a great center/ station activity! ALTERNATIVE: Have multiple sets of play food available, pair students up and have one student tell his/her partner which foods are needed for a particular recipe or dish. This is an easy way to add CULTURE to your classes! *PLAY 20 QUESTIONS: Have student go out into the hall and choose a food from a basket or bag. Upon re-entering the classroom, the rest of the class tries to guess the mystery food by asking a series of questions that can be answered with yes/no. Is it a fruit? Is it round? Is it an orange? etc. Once guessed, or the 20 questions are spent and the food revealed, choose another student and play again! *PLAY 'I'M GOING ON A PICNIC AND I'M BRINGING...': I love this old favorite, but I find it is easier for students to engage in when we have the food visuals in front of them. It helps with recall, and provides some structure and limits to what they can choose from. I put out a bunch of play food that they know the names of and as one is named by a student, they put it in front of them so we can all reference it. This also helps keep the game moving, as the task focuses on remembering the Spanish vocabulary, rather than what someone said on down the circle. *WHAT'S MISSING?: One of my favorite games with the littles is this one- place 4-5 foods in front of you, on the board or in a pocket chart. Have kids close their eyes, and take a food away. Have them open their eyes again and identify the missing food. After a few rounds, take away two foods, then three, etc. The funniest is when you take them all away! :) *CATEGORIZE INTO...: There are so many ways students can categorize food- healthy vs unhealthy foods, groups based on the food pyramid, meals (breakfast, lunch, dinner), foods they've tried vs foods they haven't, types of food (fruits, veggies, drinks, desserts, etc), and so on. Provide a graphic organizer for students to use as a template, placing food in categories they write at the top (or have the categories pre-written), ideal for novice speakers! When focusing on the category headers, this also means you can use foods that students still haven't learnt yet since the key language being used is the set of headers, rather than the individual words, meaning you can extend the activity beyond the food vocabulary set you've identified as core. *LUNCH TALK... an every more popular activity for class, lunch talk is a great way to incorporate authentic communication in a personalized format. The essence of lunch talk is taking the opportunity to talk with your students about what they have for lunch (or what they ate), which also allows for practice of high frequency phrases such as 'I have/I don't have', 'I like/don't like (and all the other variants), I eat (along with expressions of frequency), etc. The tricky part of lunch talk, most especially for novice speakers, is their limited vocabularies, yet quite unlimited set of possibilities in terms of what they might be having for lunch. One way to support your students is, instead of expecting verbal output of what they have, have them SHOW you using PLAY FOOD! This then allows you, as the teacher, to facilitate interaction and reaction (oh, I like that too!, Mmm, yummy! I eat ___ that every day, too, etc) in the target language. You can then scaffold and support students in using some of the phrases mentioned above, and you can encourage more general words, like 'sandwich' (instead of peanut butter & jelly sandwich) or 'soup' (instead of chicken noodle soup) to keep it accessible for the Novice proficiency level. Don't miss our Sandwich Printable Props Pack for this activity! NEED PLAY FOOD FOR YOUR CLASS? Look no further! We have an ever growing set of play food in Spanish, as well as the same set unlabeled, as well as sets in German, French, Russian, and English! Visit our shop and grab it now- click here!
I first saw the imaginabox range in a boutique children's store in Melbourne (Australia) and instantly thought what a fabulous concept it was! Cardboard boxes are loved by children everywhere and with the fabulous bright, reusable stickers and fun accessories that come with imaginabox, they can turn a simple object into a well loved toy, quickly, easily and with no mess. It is no wonder that director of On the Gro (and "Mumpreneur") Melanie has won not only the South Australian Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award but other awards including winning the mychildmagazine.com 2012 Excellence Award for Best new Product! I jumped at the chance to review some of their products because anything that can help develop and stimulate children's imagination leading on to role play and language development gets the thumbs-up from me! As you can see, my daughter was rather impressed when they arrived! We chose the oven and an aeroplane to try. They are really easy to make. Here's how we made the oven 1- Peel the backing off the stickers (keep the backing for re-using the stickers) and stick in place 2- Cut around the oven door so it can open (this is an adult job) 3- Poke holes where indicated with a pen 4- Screw on the accessories We loved how the oven came with a couple of interchangeable stickers. Maddie was adamant on adding the cake first. As you can see in the pics, the cardboard box we used was a rather tatty one that had been stored under the house for some time and it was a little warped and textured. This meant that some of the stickers started peeling up at the edges as they didn't have a good clean, flat surface to adhere to properly. If you're using an old box and this happens, you can either stick down with a small amount of glue so as to allow the sticker to still be taken off, or just add a tiny bit of tape to the corner like I did. The warped nature of the box certainly didn't discourage Maddie from using it. We have a play kitchen at home already (actually, a couple) but none of them have seen any use since she's had this one to play with. Something about it being made from a box just makes it even more appealing and having the knobs that move just add to the fun! She decided to put another box inside the oven for a shelf Maddie gave it the thumbs-up! We made the Aeroplane the same way but this one didn't require any cuts Who cares about the tatty box when you have this in front of you! There was mega excitement over the steering wheel which turns :) I'm not exactly sure where she went, but she was flying for ages! Why we love imaginabox Without mess and fuss you can quickly turn any size cardboard box into a fabulous toy Promotes Imagination and Role Play and through that Language Development All you need is a cardboard box (and a few basic tools you'd have at home like a pen or knife) Easy to follow instructions that the kids can help with Choice of just the sticker packs or with the stickers and fun accessories Great for the days where you just don't want a messy activity Reusable! When the box gets too tatty simply replace with another box Really reasonable price Great for a gift! On The Gro are giving 1 lucky Learn with Play at home reader their choice of any 2 imaginabox products. PLUS they are generously offering ALL our readers 15% off your purchase of imaginabox with the discount code "learnwithplay" How To Win Step 1: "Like" the On the Gro FB Page Step 2: Visit the On the Gro website and then leave a comment on this post here telling us Which 2 imaginabox products you'd choose and why? The most creative response will win their choice of any 2 imaginabox products. ***COMPETITION NOW CLOSED*** Congratulations to our winner Zoe Hayes (Zoe, we thought your answer could be their new jingle haha) Thank you for your entries. We wish you could all win! The 15% off code will be valid till the end of Jan so plenty of time to still get them at a discounted rate. You can purchase imaginabox here Terms and Conditions - Apologies but this giveaway is open for Australian Residents Only (Discount code is available for all readers) - Enter the discount code "learnwithplay" in the box provided at checkout to receive your 15% off. - Discount code valid until the end of January, 2013 - The competition begins Thursday 6th Dec and ends Wednesday 12th December at 9pm (EST) - The winner is chosen based on originality and creativity - Entrants will need to provide a valid email address - The winner will be contacted via email and announced on this post and via FB and Twitter. Winner will need to get in contact and provide their postal address within 48 hours or the prize will be redrawn. Happy playing, Debs :) {Disclosure: this is a post sponsored by On the Gro. We received the imaginabox oven and aeroplane to trial and review for the post. Opinions expressed in this post, as always, are my own}
Here is a simple nature weaving activity for Valentine's Day or Mother's Day. The contrast of the natural cardboard heart with the colorful flowers, makes
