Magic Pencil Game for Kids!




Our final activity in our "Back to School" preschool@home theme is this: A fun & simple activity using a box of pencils!

Supplies:

Prep Work:
  • Take out all the pencils and choose one (or 2, or more depending on how you want to do it).
  • Color a dot on top of the eraser with a permanent marker.
  • Place all the pencils (including the one with the dot on the eraser) in a cup and get ready to play!


How to Play!

These ideas can be adapted to however many kids you have. With a group of kids you might want to have more than one pencil with a dot, so more people get a turn:

  • Sit everyone in a circle and pass the cup around.
  • Everyone takes a turn choosing a pencil.
  • Whoever chooses the "magical pencil" (the one with the dot) gets to do something magical. Here are some ideas:
    • Everyone in the circle gives that person a hug
    • That person gets to say their favorite color, or food, or toy, etc.
    • That person gets to jump up and down 10 times
    • That person gets to run to run around the circle and sit back down


Whatever the "magical" reward is, 
have FUN! 


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School Bus Spelling




I came up with this easy activity to go along with our "Back to School" theme this week.
LB(3) had fun with it, and it was a good way to practice the sounds of letters with him.

Supplies:

Prep Work:
  • With the yellow paper, cut out a bus shape.
    • Then draw on 3-5 windows and cut them out.
  • With the black paper, cut out:
    • 2 circles for the wheels
    • 1-3 rectangles the size of the windows
  • With the white paper, cut out:
    • appx. 10 rectangles the size of the windows
    • appx. 10 strips (to write the words on)


  • Glue the bus onto the blue piece of paper & glue the wheels on.
  • Draw a rectangle on the bus. This is where you'll place the word strip:




  • On the front and backs of the strips of paper, write some simple words. We used some sight words, and some word-family words. Here are the words we used:
    • the, and, then, at, 
    • bad, had, mad, sad, 
    • can, man, tan, 
    • bat, cat, hat, mat, sat



  • If you use the same words we used, write the following letters on the 10 white rectangles:



Everything's ready. Time to play!



How to Play:

  • Sit down with your child and lay out the bus, the words, and all the letters.
  • Have them choose a word and place it on the bus.
    • Count the letters, if it's a 3 letter word, then place a couple black rectangles in the windows that you won't be using.
  • Then have your child find each of the letters in the word, make the sound of the letter, and place it in the bus window:


LB(3) thought this was pretty fun.
But like most 3 year-olds, his attention span was short. We did about 3 words and he was done. :) But there's always tomorrow! I also want to write the letters of his name so he can practice spelling his name too.


Have Fun!



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Crayon Scribble Match




It's always fun to buy and use a brand new box of crayons!
We bought several on the back to school sales this year, so I decided to use a box for a fun activity with LB(3)!

Supplies:
  • 1 box of crayons
  • 2 pieces of white paper

Prep Work:
  • Fold the 2 pieces of paper up so you get 24 squares (or however many crayons you have).
  • Unfold one paper & cut on the folds so you end up with 24 small squares.
  • Unfold the other paper, and take 1 crayon and make a scribble in one of the boxes. Do that with all the crayons so you have 24 scribbles on the paper of all the different colored crayons.



Time to Play!
  • Have your child choose a crayon from the box:



  • Then have them scribble with that crayon on one of the small paper squares:



  • Have them place that scribble on the matching colored scribble on the big paper!
  • Then do it again until all the scribbles are matched!


LB(3) had fun with this one. He got to use his amazing scribble-skills and recognize all the different colors!
As an added bonus, I had LB run back and forth from scribbling to matching. 
Any ways I can get some energy out is definitely worth it! :)

Have Fun!

Apple Buddy - Back to School Craft for Kids!




Supplies:

Get it all ready:
  • With the red foam or paper, cut out a a big apple shape. 
    • (an easy way is to cut out a circle first, then trim the top and bottom inward to make it look like an apple!)


  • With the green foam or paper, cut out:
    • 4 green circles (for hands & feet)
    • 1 leaf
  • With the black foam or paper, cut out:
    • 4 rectangles (for arms & legs)
    • 1 skinny triangle (for the stem)



Craft Time!

  • When it's all ready to go, sit down with your child and help them put it all together:
    • Glue all the foam & paper pieces on
    • Glue on the eyes & nose
    • Draw a smile with the marker


And there you have it! Your child's very own Apple Buddy!
Starting another school year is always fun.
Starting it with an Apple Buddy is even better. :)

Have fun!


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Easy to make: Car Race Game for kids!




originally posted 2-10-11


Last week's book was called Sputter, Sputter, Sput! LM loves books about cars, so you may notice that theme often. As we read, we came to this page in the book......


 .....and it gave me a good idea for this fun game!

  • I used 2 pieces of black construction paper and cut them into 8 rectangles. 
  • I used a white crayon to draw the street lines down the middle of each of them.
  • I used yellow construction paper to cut out the lines, and used double stick tape to stick them on the roads, creating squares out of the roads.
  • I used clear contact paper to "laminate" the roads so they wouldn't get bent in our game.

The game is simply to get from one end of the road to the other. We used toy cars for our game pieces and a big yellow toy dice. The funnest part is that since the 8 road rectangles are not connected, we can change the game-board each time we play!

AND it's great to practice counting & numbers too!


Make your own Cupcake Toppers!



I made these cupcakes when LM turned 6.
He told me he wanted Hot-Wheels cupcakes.
I searched high & low in the party store for Hot-Wheels cupcake toppers and found nothing. :(
So instead, I had an idea to just use stickers!
Worked like a charm and he (and his whole class) loved them!

Here's what you do:
  • Find stickers for whatever your child loves.
  • Using cardstock, cut out squares, rectangles, or circles in a shape that will fit the stickers.
  • Put the stickers on the cardstock pieces.
  • Tape each piece of cardstock to a toothpick.
  • Stick the toothpick into the top of a frosted cupcake!






There you have it! Easy, inexpensive, cute, and opens up many possibilities for special cupcakes for your little ones!

Frog Toss Game for kids!




A few weeks ago our church had a little carnival for the kids.
Each family was in charge of coming up with a little game for the kids to play, so I thought up this super easy Frog-Toss!
You could make this as a learning game too!

SUPPLIES:
  • an old box (I used one end of a big apple box)
  • bright green poster-board
  • black, white, red construction paper
  • knife
  • scissors
  • tape


HOW TO MAKE IT:
  1. With a knife, carefully cut out a great big smiley mouth on top of the box:


2. With the piece you just cut out, flip it over and trim the round part to make to bumps. These will be the frog's eyes!

3. Measure your posterboard (if you have a really big box, you might need 2 poster-boards). Cut them to fit on each side of the box (I didn't have enough to cover the back of the box. Oh well. No one see's it anyways!) :)

4. Turn the box over and from the inside, trace the mouth shape onto the posterboard so you can easily cut it out. THEN tape all the green poster-board onto the box. I used double stick tape at first, then packaging tape to keep the edges down:

5. Cut out 2 big white circles, and 2 smaller black circles. Tape together. These are the eyes.
   Then Use the "mouth" shaped cut-out to cover the eye-shaped carboard. Then tape on the eyes.
   Then use packaging tape to tape the eye piece onto the back of the box:

6. Cut out a long strip of red paper. Tape it onto the inside of the mouth and curl it on the end with a pencil:


7. I originally was going to use wadded up black paper as "flies" to toss into the frog's mouth. I had bought a bag of candy to give as prizes, and so I decided to instead have the kids toss the CANDY into the frog's mouth!
 
 HERE'S HOW WE PLAYED:

  •  Each child got 1 piece of candy. They tried to toss the candy into the frog's mouth. As soon as they made it in, they got to keep the candy!


(LB had fun practicing with the paper "flies") :)


Easy Frog Craft for Kids

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