More Gingerbread Men

Quinn is still very much enthralled by The Gingerbread Man story. A few weeks back we made a simple craft that she enjoyed! We have a gingerbread man cookie cutter, so I helped her trace around it onto cardboard (back of a cereal box) and then cut them out for her. I put out different materials--sequins, buttons, etc. for her to make the faces on the gingerbread men. We talked about them needing eyes, nose and mouth. We are also practicing using "a dot, not a lot" when she applies glue from a glue bottle, so this was the perfect time to practice this skill.

I put the finished gingerbread men (after dried) on a little cookie sheet (from our toaster oven) in a basket along with an empty flour sack, the gingerbread cookie cutter, a spatula, and a big mixing bowl for some dramatic play. Quinn is still on the cusp of independent dramatic play, so she didn't spend much time with these props, so I decided to do something else with the gingerbread men. (will post about that soon)

I love any opportunity to extend book experiences through cooking, art, etc. This activity also promotes fine motor, as Q had to manipulate the tiny art materials, art skills such as tracing and gluing, and also the skill of placing the facial features correctly on the gingerbread men.

Lunch Packing Work

Our "theme" for August is going to be SCHOOL. Q is super interested in "teaching class" and loves sitting her babies in a row and drawing on the chalkboard easel while she teaches them. She'll be going to preschool two days a week starting at the end of August, so it's a good time to draw on her interest in school and extend it in our Kitchen School here at home.

Our first "work" for this unit is a lunch packing activity. She has a little sandwich making kit she got for her birthday last year. The pieces of the sandwich velcro together. I also put out a small bowl of strawberries. I saved an empty sandwich baggie box and put 4 bags in it. I washed out a small milk container. I also put out her lunch bag from last year which got replaced with one that fits her waterbottle (this one turned out to be a bad design for the containers I typically send so it's been replaced.). I showed her how to make the sandwiches and put one in each bag, and fill the other bags with strawberries, then put it all in the lunch bag. She likes to incorporate other objects from her little kitchen as well, and LOVES to pack lunch for her babies to take to school.

If you don't have the sandwich kit, any play food would work, or you could cut sandwich pieces from felt or even cardstock.

This pretend-play work is a big hit. It also promotes following steps to complete a task, practical life skills of packing a lunch, fine motor skills of zipping the lunch bag and the sandwich baggies, and allows for dramatic play.

Rock tonging

Because fine motor development is SO important for children to be successful writers/drawers, I almost always have some type of tonging work out. This work uses rounded rocks, which are a little tricky to grab with the tongs, since my little one is needing more challenge. Remember that we dump the rocks out on the left side and then tong them into the egg carton, working from left to right, top to bottom (the direction print runs when reading).

Letter Match/Memory

I made a simple memory game using the letters Quinn is still working to name. I didn't include all the letters because that would be too many pieces for her attention span and also because she already knows them.

I bought these round wooden discs at Hobby Lobby very cheaply using the great ole 40% off coupon. The letters are felt stickers from Hobby Lobby, as well. I made two of each letter (using the same colors).

To begin with we just practice finding matches with all the letters face-up.

Next we play Memory by turning them all over.

This game promotes concentration, memory, letter awareness, strategy development, and an awareness of letter features.

You could use any type of stickers or even write on the discs with markers.

This game could be modified to practice shapes, colors, words, or any other skill just by changing what is put on the wooden disc.

Equal sharing work

One of the most important math skills for young children is equal sharing of objects. This starts with one-to-one correspondance. I've been providing activities for Q to practice this since she was a year old--teaching her to put one object in each compartment. Now that she understands that task, we are ready to step it up a little. For this activity she will first put one glass mosaic tile in each compartment. Once that is done, there will be more tiles left over. We'll then show her how to go around and "deal" one more time to each compartment. This particular work task has enough for two tiles in each spot. Once she understands that, we can add more. Eventually we want her to be able to equally share various numbers of objects.

This skill promotes a counting awareness, builds the intial foundation for multiplication and division, encourages fine motor through the hand coordination needed for dealing, and extends a child's awareness of one-to-one correspondance.

Letter stringing work

These plastic beads came from Lakeshore. The string is a stiff cord that came with the letter beads. I love these particular beads because they are the actual shape of the letters--so little fingers can "feel" the characteristics of various letters.

Sometimes Q just strings letters randomly. When I work with her we make names of people we know or we string the first letters of all our family members.

She knows the key words of almost all her letters, now I am stating the letter's name for her as we come across it and she is really soaking this up. I believe that letter skills should be taught as children express interest. That time period may vary depending on the child. Q is VERY interested in letters right now, so we are taking advantage of this to answer questions she asks about letters, point out letters in her environment, name letters for her, and make letter learning into a kind of game.

Shell Counting Work

I have posted similar activities to this one before. I made this sheet using looseleaf paper reinforcers. The goal is for the child to place on shell (or whatever object you have available) on each reinforcer. You could use any sticker, stamp, mark, etc. on the sheet, as well.

This activity encourages one-to-one correspondance, fine motor (placing a small object precisely using pincer grasp), counting, and an awareness of number quantities.

I always make sure the bowl holds the exact number of shells that matches the reinforcers on the page.

This sheet has more reinforcers than the last sheet I posted--as I increase the difficulty of the task I add more objects.