Learning Station - Monster Starter

I thought I'd work the kiddo's creativity today.  I glued eyes on a paper and encouraged them to create a monster or two.

 Here are two of my youngsters monsters...

Learning Station - Math Monsters

The kiddos first needed to draw a face on their math monsters, then they got to feed them.  They rolled the die, counted the dots and put that many pastas in their monster's mouths.

I made the monster mouths from two small paper plates (which happened to be pink).  I stapled around the outside, then added some washi tape to protect fingers and for fun.

I got this fabulous idea from this blog. Check it out!

Learning Station - Abc Monster

This monster LOVES to eat letters (kinda like Cookie Monster) but he'll only eat them after you tell him the name of the letter and the sound/s it makes.

The container I used is from Cascade dishwasher soap, craft foam for the teeth.  The kiddos did want to be able to shut his mouth, so perhaps I should have made the teeth differently.  But they had fun with it.

Friday - Toddlers - Earth Day

Learning Station - Shape Match - I just pulled out my baggie of shapes that I regularly punch out of scraps.  We talked about the colors and the shapes as they glued them.

Bean Bin -  I added a new bag of beans, so it was even more fun to dig in and sink themselves in up to their elbows.

Dr. Kit and Legos - The kiddos were checking the health of the Lego animals today.

 

I Heart The Earth - The kiddos watercolor painted their earth. 

 Tunnel - The kiddos enjoyed some tunnel time today.

 

A week on the Earth for Earth Day

Seeing how Tuesday is Earth Day, I figured this week would be a great time to get all earthy.

Nature Walk - We grabbed our buckets and headed outside for a nature walk.  The kiddos were to take a look at all the nature around them, find cool stuff and collect items for their nature mobile.

 

We found cool rocks and neat smelling bushes.

 We were quite curious to find letters on the sidewalk.  The kiddos told me what each of the letters were and I told them what word was.  I told them that peace means, no fighting & be friends.

Nature Mobiles - The kiddos picked out 5 or so items for me to tie onto their mobile.  They turned out great!  I hope they weren't too tangled in their bags.

I just had each kiddos find a big stick.  We tied, with yarn, all their treasures to it.

  
Spider! - Apparently when we brought in our nature treasures, we brought in a living treasure as well.  We watched him for a bit, then I caught him and we took him back outside.

Earth Filter - We colored coffee filters blue and green to create Earths.  Then we took them outside to spray them with water.  Once our Earths were sprayed, we sprayed each other!

Snack - The kiddos got to peel their own Easter egg, slice it and eat it!  They thought that was pretty awesome.

Happy Earth & Sad Earth - We chatted about different things we do that makes our Earth happy or sad.  Some of our ideas were throwing our trash in a bin versus littering, cleaning up our toys from the yard, playing outside instead of watching tons of tv or video games, recycling items...

Shaving Cream Rain - Another cool idea I found online.  I squirted shaving cream (clouds) in the top of a glass of water then dripped "rain" (food coloring) on the clouds.  Our first attempt we had way too thick of clouds and the rain couldn't get through.

So I scooped some of the clouds off and we tried again...it worked!

Blown Trees - The kiddos blew watered down paint across their paper with a straw to create a tree trunk and branches.  Once they dried we added fingerprint leaves.
Here we are adding leaves....

 

Water Beads - As I was looking around the Dollar Store for supplies, I came across water beads. We started "growing" them today... 

 The beads plumped up quickly!  We are excited to see how big they will be tomorrow!

Water Beads - Next Day - Look how much our water beads grew since yesterday!  Now we're going to let them dry out over the weekend and see if they get back to their beginning size.

Cotton Ball Clouds - Science Experiment - We chatted again about clouds and how they carry water and when they get too heavy with it,  they rain!  So we stuck cotton balls in water to soak it up, then they "rained" (squeezed the cotton balls) into these little cups.  I saw this idea on this blog.

Learning Station - Math with Shapes

Today we were working on tessellations (a pattern of shapes that fit together with no gaps or overlaps).  I cut squares, rectangles and triangles for the kiddos to use to create their tessellation.

Learning Station - Cloud Letter Puffs

These are crazy funny.  I found online this idea (not sure where, sorry), I covered cotton balls in goo (equal parts flour & water) and then baked them (at 300 degrees for ~40 minutes).  The kiddos had to choose a letter, tell me the letter name and sound, then they could squish it.  It was lots of fun.  

 I think I cooked them a smidge too long because they were a bit tough to smash, but with a bit of muscle the kiddos did it.  I wrote the letters on with Sharpie.

Learning Station - Play Dough Bean Count

Today I made "mud" play dough for the kiddos.  (It's actually chocolate play dough.)  The kiddos were to fit play dough into our number puzzle then press that many beans into each number.

Learning Station - Ping Pong Abc Toss

The kiddos drew a lettered ping pong ball out of the bag, told me the letter name and sound, then tossed it into the bucket.  Just reviewing and cementing letter names and sounds.

Friday - Toddlers - Easter

Bubbles - There was a light breeze this morning when the kiddos came.  They loved blowing bubbles and watching them swirl away.

Learning Station - Opening and Shutting Eggs - I pulled out this large bucket of eggs for the kiddos to enjoy.

Baby Chick - I traced the kiddos hands for wings on their chick, then they glued all the pieces together and added the eyes. 

Dr. Kit - Always a favorite.  Today the sick patients were a baby doll and a froggy.

Some More on Princesses and Knights

Stick Warriors - So I saw this cute idea online (on this blog.) to create stick people using washi scrapbooking tape.  (I have tons of it because I love it.)  I started setting up the craft and the kiddos came right over (passing on free play) and began creating these wonderful warriors and warrior princesses .  They worked for quite a long time.  I love it when they really get into an activity. 

 

 A couple of the kiddos wanted to create a giant to battle their warriors.

Outside - We decided to take our warriors to the backyard to do battle.

 

Paint Stick Swords - A knight needs a good sword.  Here are ours, complete with jewels.  Paint sticks & jumbo craft sticks.  I saw this idea on this blog.

I had my three year old class paint their swords with watercolors, then I hot glued on jewels as they instructed me.

 
  
Sword Belt - One of my kiddos just happened to be wearing a belt today, which was perfect to hold her sword.   

 

Sandpaper Castle - I cut some basic shapes and the kiddos created their own castle. 

Catapult - I put together these catapults for the kiddos last night.  They are pretty fun.  I hope you enjoy them too.  They shoot a pom pom really well.  I think marshmallows would also be fun.  I got the quick, easy design on this blog.

 

Dinosaur down with a direct hit from the catapult!