Tot Spot

I've renamed this weekly feature.  "Tot Tuesday" was so limiting... okay, okay!  It was very much misnamed!  "Tot Spot" is much more... flexible.  :)

So this week, "J" hasn't been much interested in school.  She starts with us, but doesn't last much longer than 10 minutes.  That's okay.  At least she knows the option is there for her.  Here are a couple of activities in her box this week:

This one was her favorite (as in, she spent 9 out of her 10 minutes doing this activity).  She first put the tees into the triangle, then balanced the marbles on top.  She was a bit distracting to "N" and "A" when the marbles went rolling all over...

This is the activity that took up the remaining minute of her interest in "doing school".  Stacking cubes on top of each other.  

Not pictured, but also in her box this week, she had an animal bingo game, but instead of playing it right, I had her match the cards to the pictures on the bingo mat.  Her other activity was gluing foam shapes and letters onto paper.  She did actually like that one, but I didn't get any pictures of it.

Tot Tuesday?

Maybe I should title this post "Tot Sunday".  At least it's here, right?

One of #3's boxes this week had pipe-cleaners, shoelaces and yarn, along with a canister of beads and a bowl.  I showed her how to pour a small amount of beads into the bowl, then then thread the beads from the bowl onto the item of her choosing.  The first day she really enjoyed stringing the beads.  After that, she enjoyed pouring the beads into the bowl, then back into the canister.  Over and over.  Very carefully.  Works for me!

Another box had a number puzzle in.  After the first day she didn't choose this box again.  I can understand why.  The pieces don't fit really well.  I haven't liked it since the first time I used it (with #2).  I think I'll yard sale this puzzle...

This activity wasn't in her boxes, but was one that we did together.  #3 can sort by colors like a champ, so this time we did it by shape.  When we came to a shape that didn't have a place, I would ask her what we should do with them.  She would then designate a spot.  She thoroughly enjoyed this activity.  We'll probably see it again in the near future...

Tot Tuesday Beginnings

I have a goal to post what "J" is doing, so that when "S" gets to be the age she is now, I don't have to figure it out all over again.  So, this hasn't been all we've done, but it's a start...

Clothes pins on a cup.  These were mini-clothespins, so they came apart more easily.  She like the activity, though.

I put a bunch of containers with lids in one of her boxes.  She loved it!  It was her #1 choice all week.

Jenga blocks.  She sorted, stacked and built.  Not a favorite, but it was chosen a few times during the week.

Transferring Water...

with medicine droppers.  The kidlets had been carrying them around, playing all morning.  When J went to down to nap, I set up a quick activity for transferring water, adding food coloring for fun.

When the kidlets started mixing colors, we expanded a bit to allow for more color mixing and not so much fighting, as well as maintaining a true container for each color.  They had a great time and only stopped because J was waking up and I didn't want her to get involved this time.  When we do it outside (next Spring/Summer) she will love it!

These ice cube trays (from the Target $ spot) were a great size, having lots of holes for a lot of color mixing.  The only down side was that because of the colored bottoms, they were hard to see what color had really been mixed.  

Sidewalk Paint

I saw this idea over at Shannon's Tot School and, since our girls have had similar interests in the past, thought I'd give it a try.  

I mixed up a double batch (2 cups water, 2 1/2 cups cornstarch, and a few drops of dish soap), then separated it into the our craft muffin tin.  Using our 8 colors of food coloring, I was able to make 12 different colors for the kiddos to paint with (one I left white).

It was so pretty!  I found some of my less favored paint brushes and let the kiddos have at it.

"A" told me this was a fish and the spots above it were the bubbles.  I love that he's started to create and not just scribble!

"N", who I thought would love this, since she loves all things art (as long as it's open-ended), lasted 10 minutes (maybe).  Not a big hit with her.

However, "J" loved it!  We were outside for well over an hour and she was constantly painting - though not always the sidewalk!  After washing she had some color left on her legs, but it only lasted a day or two.  And most importantly, she had fun!

Overall, we will definitely do this again, if only for "J"!  And maybe next time I'll bring out some paper.  The texture of the paint when it dried was chalky and that would be fun to feel and rub into paper.

I'm not sure how it washed off.  We went out of town the next day and apparently it rained A LOT during the 5 days we were gone.  What I do know, is that there was no sign of paint on the sidewalk (or children's legs) when we got home.

Birds

We've been learning about birds.  In a very laid-back, easy going way.  We've read books and done fun activities.  We took some things from the Bird Packs found here.  I pull out 3 activities a day and we rotate through them.  Some are too easy for N and others are too difficult for A, and J doesn't really have a clue about any of them, but she likes to be included.

We had fun with the bird watching idea found here.  I laminated the birds and the guide, so that we could do the activity multiple times.  The kiddos had fun making the binoculars, but didn't really use them.  The had fun trying to find all of the birds though, and marking them off on their guides.

I made them a new felt board, but forgot to put it up until today.  J has taken to just taking it all off and scattering it around the house.  We'll see how it goes...

We've read a lot of books about birds and the kiddos are all noticing the birds around the neighborhood.  A can recognize robins and finches, and N is especially excited when she spots a quail.  It's been fun to get back to doing school, and have some fun together learning.

Grow Capsules

I recently purchased some grow capsules (I'm not sure that's what they're called, but I hope you know what I mean) at the target dollar spot, thinking they'd be fun to use with our animal school we've been doing.  Today we had some antsy kiddos, so decided to use them.  

I showed them the capsules and told them that they were going to turn into sea creatures, and then we made a list of possible animals they could be.

We then placed each capsule in it's own muffin tin filled with warm water and watched to see what they were going to be.  All the kiddos loved watching it!  Afterwards, we revisited out list to see if we had guessed/predicted any animals correctly.  Fun, quick, frugal and easy!  N has already come up with several plans of how we're going to use the sponges!