Elastic Painting

I made paintbrushes out of elastics today! Here they are . . .

It was so simple I whipped up six of them in about ten minutes (the first one took almost half of that as I figured out the best way to do it!) and the best part is that all of them together cost like a dollar to make! I used elastics from the dollar store and pencils we had in the center already. The instructions I found on line suggested using elastics that were about the same size but the bag I got had a variety and I kinnda thought it would be more interesting that way anyway. So, I just grabbed a bunch of elastics and hung them over my finger so one end of each would all be together. Then I wrapped a small elastic around that end until it was tight and jammed a pencil in there. I think I am gonna remake them with sturdy sticks instead of the pencils because I think it will look better and I am thinking at some point I am gonna need all of those pencils back!

 

Than I just put them out on the table with paint and let the kids go nuts! Here is what some of them made . . . .    

 

 

Open-Ended

 

So right now the children have a favorite toy. Although I can’t say it is that new as these toys have always been around the playground!! I am not talking about the blocks, or the cars, or the bikes. I am talking about the bowling pins!

 

That’s right bowling pins! These items are always being carried around the playground. They are turned into food, microphones, weapons, something to throw, and things which are not immediately clear to adults watching. They never seem to go out of style. We will have days when the bikes or the balls are ignored. The chalk will go weeks with no one getting it out but not an outdoor time goes by when they bowling pins are not out and about.

The best part of the bowling pin popularity is that they kids have no interest in actually bowling with them. The couple times I have tried to impose my adult sense of what things are for the children have politely watched me set them up, threw a ball in the general direction and then took off with all the pins. They have never spontaneously set the pins up for themselves. It did not take me long to forget about bowling and just stand back and marvel at how an object that in the adult world has one purpose is one of the most open-ended toys we have when in the hands of the children. I guess it goes to show that anything can be open-ended if you stand back and let it.  

Cars, Ramps, and Gravity

I have to admit that I will shamelessly raid the construction site next door (with permission) for their odds and ends. This time we got some sections of pipe to add to the pipes we already had. I was happy because the new pipes were wider than the old ones and they were different lengths. I often use the pipes we have as car ramps by setting them up against a chair outside (that is when the pipes are not taken apart and in the sandbox for the kids to build with.)

 

This time I set up the old pipes and the new pipes beside each other. The kids started by putting the cars down the ramp. Now putting a car down a pipe is not as easy as it sounds! First they needed to notice that the cars needed to be wheels down in order to really go. They noticed that some of the cars went better than other cars and they noticed that sometimes the cars got stuck in the pipe and had to be shaken out! It was all going well but soon the ones without cars started to look for other things to send down the tubes.

They tried pinecones, balls, and even a bowling pin! Some of it worked and some of it didn’t. It was also interesting to watch them notice that some things would only fit down the bigger tube and that they needed to change the angle to make everything slide down faster. They still wanted to stick to the cars by the end of the day since I think they all decided that no matter which tube they used the cars just worked better!    

Painting with Balls

 

This week we used balls and marbles to paint. I rolled out a couple pieces of paper to cover the whole table and filled a large basin with paint mixed with water. I used two different sizes of marbles and some larger plastic balls that had flashing lights in them that went off when the kids hit them on the table. The idea was to have the kids grab the balls and roll them across the table to leave tracks. As usual this is not what happened in most cases.

This is the first activity I have done that left the kids no choice but to touch the paint if they wanted to participate (stamps, cars, sponges and brushes all have some surface area that they can touch that has no paint on it) At first the kids looked at me like I was crazy when I presented them with a bucket of paint covered balls but after I started playing with them some of them inched closer to the table. I had to hand out the first couple marbles as the kids were not willing to reach into the bucket but once I got the first couple kids going I took a step back to see what the kids would do.

 

 In some cases they never got past just holding a paint covered marble and then going to wash their hands.  A couple kids just wanted to empty the marbles one at a time out of the bucket onto the table. Some kids did roll the balls across the table (as the track marks on the floor showed.) and some of the kids got really into the idea of touching the paint and just finger painted on the paper.  We even had some kids who never touched the paint or the paper but they stood close to the table and watched what was going on.

After I introduced the first couple kids to the activity I left them to it. More kids came to the table but I left it to kids already painting to show them what to do. We ended up with blue paper, blue tables, blue floors, and blue kids but it was fun.    

Open them, Shut them

This song has been around my center for years but for some reason this batch of kids can’t get enough of it. It is of course Open them, Shut them!! This song is fun to sing and if you watch the look on other adult’s faces as you sing it it is also good for a laugh! It is absolute nonsense and I have been asked many times how I remember how it goes. In my case it is pure repetition! I was taught to sing it this way but I have not been able to find it on the internet so I thought I would share it here!   

Open them, Shut them

(open and shut hands in time to this)

Open them, Shut them

Give a little clap, clap, clap

(clap hands)

Open them, Shut them

Open them, Shut them

Hide them in your lap, lap, lap

(put hands in lap) 

Creep them, Creep them

Slowly creep them

Right up to your chin, chin, chin

(slowly crawl hands from lap to chin)

Open up your little mouth . . .  but don’t let them in

(as you say don’t let them in hid hand behind your back)

Ring on the bell. Bring, bring

(pull on one ear like a bell)

Knock on the door. Knock, knock, knock

(knock on your forehead)

Peek inside. Peek-a-boo, peek-a-boo

(cover and uncover eyes)

Walk right in. wipe your feet

(walk fingers from one side of your face to over your lip and “wipe your feet” with fingers)

Would you like this chair? No thank you

(walk fingers to one cheek)

Would you like this chair? No thank you

(walk fingers to other cheek)

I would like the rocking chair. Rock, Rock, Rock, Rock

(walk fingers to under your chin and rock head back and forth)

 

Five Little Turkeys

 I have been posting lots of the puppets I have made on here so here is one more set . . . .

Yup, turkeys! I use these guys for thanksgiving and in the off season for Old Macdonald.  The kids love when the turkeys gooble gooble gooble around the circle.

One of the songs I sing is this one . . .

 Five little turkeys sitting on a gate

The first one said “Oh my, it is getting late”

The second one said “There are leaves in the air”

The third one said “But we don’t care”

The fourth one said “Let’s run and run and run”

The fifth one said “It’s Thanksgiving Fun”

Oohhhh went the wind

And out went the light

And five little turkeys ran out of site

By the way you can now buy my felt puppets on Etsy here . . . so please go check it out!!!

The Goldilocks and the Three Bears Rap

Everyone knows the story of goldilocks and the three bears. However I found this version . . .

Once upon a time in the middle of the woods there were three bears

One was a papa bear, one was a mama bear, one was a wee bear

Along came a girl with a golden girl she knocked on the door but no one was there

So she walked right in ‘cause she didn’t care

Home, home, home came the papa bear

Home, home, home came the mama bear

Home, home, home came the wee bear

“Someone’s been eating my porridge” said the papa bear “Grrrrrr” (make hands like claws)

“Someone’s been eating my porridge” said the mama bear “Ahhhhh” (throw hands in the air)

“Hey-baba-ree-bear someone has eaten my soup” said the wee “hmmmmm” (cross arms and pout)

“Someone’s been sitting in my chair” said the papa bear “Grrrrrr” (make hands like claws)

“Someone’s been sitting in my chair” said the mama bear “Ahhhhh” (throw hands in the air)

“Hey-baba-ree-bear someone has broken my seat” said the wee “hmmmmm” (cross arms and pout)

“Someone’s been sleeping in my bed” said the papa bear “Grrrrrr” (make hands like claws)

“Someone’s been sleeping in my bed” said the mama bear “Ahhhhh” (throw hands in the air)

“Hey-baba-ree-bear someone is still in my bed!!” said the wee “hmmmmm” (cross arms and pout)

Just then Goldilocks woke up “AHHHHHHHH” and she beat it out a there

“Bye, Bye, Bye” said the papa bear

“Bye, Bye, Bye” said the mama bear

“Hey-baba-ree-bear this is the end of our tail” said the wee bear “hmmmmm” (cross arms and pout)   

And so I made these puppets . . .

And turned this old staple story into an interactive circle time activity!