White as Snow

Let your little ones explore the color white with this sensory activity. Children dig through pretend snow to find white items that have been hidden.  For an added challenge, they may wear mittens to search through the "snow" and use a check list to mark off what they have found.

                                   

 

 Materials: Sensory tub, packing peanuts, small white items (coffee filter, napkin, straw, spatula, measuring spoons, measuring cups, cotton balls, etc.), mittens, pencil, white paper, clipboard

 Fill your sensory tub with packing peanuts to represent snow.  If you don't have a sensory tub, you may use a big box or tub like I did.

 On a piece of white paper, write a checklist of all the items you will hide in the "snow".

 Hide all the white items in the "snow".

 Let your child/ren wear their mittens and look for the items in the snow.  You may have a box or basket nearby for them to put the items they have found.

 Encourage them to find the item they found on the checklist and mark it off.  For younger children, make sure to use chubbier writing utensils. 

After they have found everything on their list, encourage them to count how many items they have found. Throughout the activity you will also be focusing on the color white. You may also introduce the word "camouflage".  Share with your child/ren that when something is camouflaged it is blending in with its surroundings.  The white items are hard to find because they are camouflaged; they blend in with the "snow" because the snow is the same color.

Favorite Foods Booklet

Help your child make an accordion-style booklet of their favorite foods.  This activity can be done within a wide range of ages from toddlers to elementary age just by tweaking a few elements; I will make notes as we go along on how to adapt it for various abilities.

 Materials: Grocery circulars, large index cards, scissors, glue stick, sharpie, scotch tape.

The booklet may be made by you or your children, depending on their abilities.  I used four large index cards for the booklet I made.

 Fold each index card in half.  If you are doing this activity with younger children, you might want to use more index cards and leave them unfolded.  The reason for this is that younger children might need more space to work with.  For toddler age you might even want to use an even bigger canvas that you can make from folding construction paper instead.

 Use scotch tape to connect all the folded index cards together.

 The booklet should look like this when you are done taping it together.

 On the outside of the first index card you may label the booklet.  I labeled mine Foods I Like.  If your child knows how to or is learning how to write, encourage them to write the title on their own.

 Have children look through grocery circulars and cut out their favorite foods.  For younger children, have some pre-cut foods that they can choose from.

 Glue one food to each half of the index card.

 It should look something like this.

 Depending on the interest and attention span of the child they may also continue to add pictures to the back side of the index cards.  I only did the front sides here.

 You may also label each picture and read it together with your child/ren.  If your children knows or is practicing writing, let them label each picture.  Another alternative to this activity is letting children draw pictures of their favorite food instead of cutting out pictures.

Encourage your child/ren to "read" their books to family and friends!

The Daily News

If you have been around young children at all, you know that they LOVE to share information with you! What better way to share than with a Daily News board. I have done this as a teacher in my classroom, but it can also be done at home with your child.  In the classroom setting you can either get each child's dictation as they walk in to the room or, call them to you one by one sometime througout the day. Basically, you just ask the child if there is anything they want to share and you write it on a piece of chart paper or posterboard.  Then, during your circle time you share out the "Daily News".  This can be done with all the kids sharing their news or picking out a few children each day, depending on how many children you have in your class.  If you would like to do this at home, you can either write down anything your child wants to share or funny things they might have said throught the day in a notebook or on a poster board and share them with your significant other when they come home at the end of the day.

I just used a piece of fingerpaint paper because that is what I had available and some Sharpies. I used different colored Sharpies so young children who are still learning to read can distinguish between each other's quotes.

I always like to underline the heading, again to help distinquish that it is seperate from their quotes.

I wrote their names here however, if time allows and the children are able, they may try to write their own name.  If they are able to write sentences then let them write their own dictations.  Also, if you want to conserve paper, you can make a laminated posterboard and write the dictations daily with a dry-erase marker. If you are doing this at home you may frame the Daily News and write on the glass; dry erase markers wipe right off:)