Fun Learning Activities Kids
This week’s It’s Playtime is all about math. We home-school and as we have added new kiddos to our family we ended our “school time” earlier than normal and I am looking for ways to ease back into a form of “catch-up” school time with some fun games. These activities were linked up to our [...]
My son loves being outdoors – whether it’s digging in the dirt, playing in the sand, splashing in puddles, going for walks, smelling flowers, looking for wildlife, or just running around. Among his favorite activities are scavenger hunts. We’ve enjoyed photo scavenger hunts and sound hunts. This time we went on a hunt for shapes [...]
It is another Wednesday afternoon! Time for our weekly round-up and link party – It’s Playtime. Thanks to all the terrific bloggers who helped contribute to this list of fun, educational activities for our kids to enjoy this summer – ones to keep their brains alive and active – stop the summer brain drain! Link [...]
Do you have any picky eaters at your house? Do you have kids who would rather eat fruit snacks than any fruit or vegetable you give them? My kids are complete opposites with regards to food. My 18 month old daughter will eat basically anything and my 4 yr old son is very selective with [...]
Sometimes you hold onto an object to use a craft for a long time waiting for the perfect idea for a recycled craft to come to you. This cup holder has been in my craft bin for several months waiting for inspiration to come. I would look at it almost every time I opened the [...]
What makes water molecules stick together to form a drop of water? Surface Tension. What allows those cool water bugs to walk on water? Surface Tension. But what is surface tension and how to you teach it to children? According to Wikipedia, surface tension is a property of the surface of a liquid that allows [...]
Ramps are fun for kids to explore. Rolling objects down or pushing objects up them seems to fascinate them. While they are really conducting simple science experiments with the concepts of force and gravity, kids may just think they are having fun. Recently my son and I build a simple ramp using cookbooks found in [...]
“Play is the answer to how anything new comes about.” – Piaget. Dramatic play is one of the things that instills a sense of belonging and identity. Our children experience who they are and how to relate to others as pretend in various roles. Pretend play helps our children develop empathy as they practice putting [...]
It’s Springtime here (hopefully where you are too!) and with the warmer weather & sunny days, our family loves to take advantage of fresh produce with the openings of local farmer’s markets for the season. We like to go to the farmer’s market for fresh fruit, veggies, and baked goods. Getting to sample all of [...]
5 Earth Day Activities to Do with Children of All Ages Earth Day is a worldwide celebration of our beautiful planet. It is also a reminder that we need to promote awareness of Earth’s need for protection through conservation and recycling. It is important to teach our children at an early age to take care [...]
Do you find yourself constantly “tidying –up”? Do you feel like all your hard work cleaning is undone as soon as the kids walk in the door? Do you ever ask yourself if you live with a bunch of ‘whirl-winds’? As a mom of 3 busy kids, I felt like I was constantly picking stuff [...]
Did you grow up eating candy buttons? I used to love them and recently bought some giant ones for my son’s Lego birthday party. I cut the candy buttons into a variety of shapes and passed them out in goodie bags. I tend to overbuy for parties… so I still have a lot lying around. [...]
I try to teach my children about disabilities at a young age. It’s important that they have at least a basic understanding of disabilities and realize that although some people have more challenges in life, may look different or act different than us, that they are still just as wonderful as anyone else. I also [...]
We are excited to be participating in Tinkerlab’s Egg Carton Challenge this week! The goal of the Creative Challenge was to create something using an egg carton that is child-centered/child-directed. My son loves games, especially ones that involve throwing or bowling. For the last creative challenge (with paper bags), we created our own Paper Bag [...]
Are you looking for something meaningful to do with your children this Easter weekend? Last week a Quirky Momma shared how to encourage kindness in our children this Easter. This week, our family was inspired by Ann Voskamp and Multiple Mommy (who linked up her garden to our It’s Playtime, Kids Activities Meme) to plant [...]
We love simple science experiments. A couple of weeks ago the kids got to see a documentary about canals and how liquid is transferred from one “level” to another…. and this led to today’s post about siphoning. I know that most modern canals do not use siphoning as the method to move water, but our [...]
My boys have been obsessed with volcanoes for awhile. I think it all started on our road trips between Dallas and Colorado several times a year. Just off the highway in Capulin, NM is a volcano. Capulin, NM is interesting because it is the only “hill” for MILES and MILES. It is in the middle [...]
We love for our children to focus on others more than themselves and to seek out ways to help those around them. Easter is a holiday that we love to celebrate. My son is usually really excited about what he’s going to “get” from the Easter bunny, so this year we decided to focus less [...]
Play dough is one of our all-time favorite play materials. It’s great for children of all ages and provides a sensory play experience that can be adapted in so many different ways to encourage lots of learning. It lends itself well to exploring many aspects of math – through number recognition, counting, shape exploration and construction. [...]
We had fun this past week learning map skills together thanks to a recent conversation in the Horizon Healthy Families community. Caroline of Food and Art had the idea of hiding food all around a room for kids to find – sounds like fun! We decided to mix it up a bit and added a [...]
This week we’ve been having a lot of fun creating learning activities that also relate to some of our favorite spring topics- eggs, bunnies, and flowers. Today I want to share a cool counting game we created using buttons and some large foam eggs. Materials Needed for Egg Math: Large foam eggs (or some eggs [...]
Kids love exploring and experiencing cause and effect. Last spring we had fun creating fizzing sidewalk paint where the kids and I painted our patio with sidewalk paint made from baking soda and then sprayed the paint with vinegar, watching and listening to the sizzles and pops. This rainbow lava activity is an adaptation off of [...]
Red is popular in our house. Here’s an idea for a kids craft that makes use of all the odd bits and pieces of material left over from other crafts and creates a magnificent masterpiece, full of texture and contrast: a one color collage – featuring RED. The idea is to narrow down your selection of materials in one [...]
Legos, we are a lego obsessed family right now, might as well use that “love” to our benefit. We have begun incorporating legos into our education. In addition to the Lego lapbook we made last week, I wanted to incorporate creative writing & so I challenged my son to come up with a story about [...]
We recently had fun learning with this LEGO Unit Study & Lapbook, and my son declared that this was his favorite week of school we have ever done. A lapbook is made to be looked at over and over, & your child adds little snippets of information they learn throughout a unit of study. It [...]
There is so much for children to learn by spending time in the kitchen. It’s tempting to send my kids off to play while I’m fixing dinner. However, I often encourage them to stay and help me – even though it make take twice as long by doing so! Cooking is fun and educational for [...]
Does it Sink or Float? My husband and I were reminiscing recently about eating at the dining hall at the college where we met. We talked about our favorite meals, the nights we ate waffles with ice cream for dinner, and I remembered pouring sprinkles into my glass of Seltzer Water when I was bored [...]
What is a Leap Year? That is the question my 9 year old asked me …and I did not know…. So let’s learn for a second, shall we? Let me summarize my 2 hours of research for all of us: Every four years we have a Leap Year, which means we have a year with [...]
My son loves magic tricks. I love simple science experiments. Here’s a fun magic trick with a little science behind it. My son lifted an ice cube from a cup of water with just a string touching it. He was elated and in awe as the cube dangled in the air. All you need is [...]
For many, Spring Break conjures up images of playing on the beach somewhere warm or freezing your nose off while skiing with the family all day long. Well if you aren’t jetting off this School Break, I’m here to show you how to make it a fun & memorable one for the entire family! What [...]
