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Color Hunt

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Here’a fun activity for the next time you walk around the house with baby: turn your exploration into a color hunt!

I painted four squares on a piece of cardboard, choosing red, blue, green, and yellow. It was easiest to strap Veronika into the Ergo carrier so my hands were free, and off we set on a search around the house.

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When we came to an item, I paused and held it next to the appropriately colored square.

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Name the color first as you point to the object, and then as you point to the square on your cardboard.

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When we returned to her playroom, I set down the cardboard and made piles of toys alongside each color.

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I stuck with similar objects – blocks, stacking cups, cars – so she would have a strong visual of the color in each pile.

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And of course she just loved playing with the items. This game is a great way to get your little one hearing the names of colors and understanding the difference between shades, so enjoy!

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Exploring Patagonia

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Here was a very different lesson plan from Raddish Kids, in conjunction with the Comida Argentina recipes Travis has been cooking up. My kindergartner got to learn social studies, all about one region of the world!

Truth be told, the unit was quite simple compared to many Raddish lessons. I showed Travis the Patagonia region on a fantastic map we have featuring elevated surfaces for mountains. He immediately picked up on how mountainous the region was, and also how close to the ocean.

We read a few fun facts about the area, including the discovery of dinosaur fossils. Then it was time for a video!

Raddish provided a worksheet for children to draw images of what they learned in the travel video. Travis immediately paused it and said, “Mom, there’s water!” His delight was infectious, pausing the clip every few seconds to draw the glaciers (“silvery mountains!”), desert, flies, or any other things that jumped out to a five-year-old boy.

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There are numerous ways to continue the lesson from here. Children are encouraged to present their knowledge while pretending to be something, be that an archaeologist, chef, journalist, or artist.

Because Travis loves YouTube clips, I suggested he be a travel blogger giving his review of Patagonia. But first, he wanted to make those glaciers! He raided the craft bin and wrapped Styrofoam balls in aluminum foil. These were glued to a sheet of shiny cardstock as “ice”. He added dowels as “desert”. All of this received lots of glue on top as snow.

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Without further ado, here’s my little travel blogger, enticing you to Patagonia!

Texture Track

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This was admittedly an ambitious game with a ten-month-old, since it involved lots of tempting materials. But Veronika loves vrooming cars on the floor (she’ll do so for ages, going “vvvvv”), so I knew she’d enjoy the game!

To set up, fold a piece of cardboard in half. Cover half in shiny aluminum foil.

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Next, I filled a shallow tray with just a thin layer of sand. Definitely keep the amount small if you’re worried your little one will spill it.

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I set up the ramp to go up and into the sand tray. With Veronika watching, first I chugged a car sloooowly up the ramp.

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Then I let it zoom (“fast!”) down the shiny side. It comes to a stop in the sand.

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There is so much to talk about as you play the game (the textures of the materials, different paces). Don’t be surprised if your baby wants to grab at the ramp or the foil!

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Soon Veronika wanted to try her own hand at zooming the cars up and over.

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The sand was her favorite part by far.

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She loved running her fingers through it, and the crunchy sound that the cars made when we simply drove them back and forth in the bin.

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Stacking Rings

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Stacking rings are such a simple and classic baby toy, but they bring such joy and fantastic learning! Your baby is problem solving as he or she figures out how to stack the rings, as well as honing fine motor skills. Because many are brightly colored and ordered in size from largest to smallest, they are also great for language development.

Today, Veronika and I mixed things up to bring new life to her standard stacking ring set! Instead of threading them onto the provided post, I gave her a wooden spoon to slot them on to (you could also try the game on your arm).

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She was immediately intrigued.

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The spoon itself was fascinating to her, and I think she believed herself to be Queen Veronika, brandishing it like a royal scepter and chatting to the spoon for quite some time.

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Eventually I coaxed her into adding more rings onto it.

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She was delighted when she saw that her spoon now had three fun rings, not two.

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She loved to stand up holding it, as well!

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If you want to challenge your baby with smaller rings, try stacking on shower curtain or window curtain rings instead! How do you and your baby play with stacking rings? Please share in the comments.

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Floor Art

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Veronika is entering such a fun stage of development. No longer are projects and crafts simply things I make for her, but she’s old enough now to get involved in the process. To wit, today I gave her a crayon for the first time. The moment was, quite simply, beautiful.

I laid a long piece of craft paper down in the playroom, securely taping it at all four corners. If you prefer, or worry that your little one will rip up paper, use cardboard instead.

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I set out a box of jumbo crayons, the perfect first crayon for the under-age-one set. She took to it more immediately than I ever imagined, not putting the crayon in her mouth, but instead testing out a few scribbles.

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I thought I might need to guide her hand..

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…but nope! She delightedly began scribbling all over the paper, and even stayed on it instead of wandering to the floor by accident.

As she “drew”, I drew along with her, including a few simple shapes I pointed out.

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I added a few simple patterns like black, green, black, green, or square, circle, square, circle. I chatted about these shapes to her as she continued to scribble.

Then I laid her down on her back and traced her! This got giggles.

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I guided her hand to show her where eyes, a nose, and a mouth would go on the resulting outline. As I drew on a purple shirt, she happily scribbled over this first “self-portrait.”

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For additional art fun, I drew a second human outline on cardboard and cut out a few clothes from construction paper.

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I let her help me glue these down with a glue stick, a slightly sticky but delightful process. Clearly she enjoyed this first art class!

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Play Dough Sensory Bag

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I’ve been on a recent kick of making sensory bags for Veronika, a great way to enable my little imp to play with messy materials that might otherwise end up in her mouth. Safely inside a plastic bag, even the messiest items are a go!

Normally for a ten-month-old I’d whip up homemade play dough for added security, but since it was going in the bag, I used the store-bought kind.

I added a few craft beads in fun flower shapes that she would be able to squish into the play dough. Now it was simply a matter of sealing and watching her squish away!

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Veronika loved grabbing at the bag.

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I showed her how to squish the hard beads into the soft dough, talking about texture as we played. The contrast seemed to really interest her.

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I felt comfortable leaving this one around for her to play with since there was no liquid to spill, even in case of a slight tear.

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A fantastic way to keep her busy, in sum!

Leaf Canvas Craft Challenge

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What was this month’s craft challenge from Highlights magazine? To use a leaf as the canvas for painting! You’ll want to use acrylic pants for the craft, which will hold up better than tempera paint.

No doubt there are fantastic artists who could create a whole miniature scene on their leaf. For my kindergartner, the project was more about the novelty of using nature as the canvas.

We found some giant leaves on a nature walk and knew those were the ones to use!

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At first, he painted along the lines of the leaf’s veins, which was great for reinforcing a recent science unit on trees and nutrition.

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Then he had fun blending colors and seeing how they mixed on the leaf.

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At the end, he liked making big blobs of paint.

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Whether your little Picasso makes something abstract, something highly detailed, or just has fun smearing paint, this was a simple and fun alternative to painting on paper.

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Shoot and Splash

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Following up on yesterday’s simple game of “boom!”, today I made a cause-and-effect game that was a little more sophisticated for Veronika. This game is also great for talking about words like in/out and fast/slow.

I filled a shallow plastic tub with water, and got out two small balls (golf balls or ping pong balls are about the right size) along with an empty paper towel tube.

I held the tube against the bin of water and let Veronika see me put the ball inside. “In!”

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Now tilt the tube slightly and let the ball fall in with a splash. There was a great element of surprise here for Veronika, who was wondering where the ball went!

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We played around with different variations for quite some time. Sometimes I let the ball fall fast from a steep angle, or sometimes held the tube nearly horizontal so it would roll slowly and build her anticipation.

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Soon, she was the one wanting to put the balls in the tube, making this almost like a one-shape shape-sorter!

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When we were done with the tube, the leftover balls and shallow water were a big hit.

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Boom!

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Cause-and-effect is big at ten months, and this simple game is sure to delight!

I sat down with Veronika in front of an empty plastic bin. Making sure she was watching, I tossed in a bean bag and said, “Boom!”

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Well she sure thought that was funny!

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I repeated with a ball, “Boom!” She immediately began mimicking the word. “Boo boo boo!”

Now it was her turn; I handed her a ball which she placed in rather than dropped into the bucket, but she had the idea!

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For some extra fun, I sprinkled flour in the bottom of the bin.

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The bean bags and balls made just enough of an impact for a light dusting to fly up when items landed, further enhancing the notions of cause and effect.

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And it was so fun that big brother wanted in on the action!

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Shall I Pour?

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Pouring dry items from cup to cup is a fantastic way to build the fine motor skills that will one day allow your little one to pour liquids. Don’t expect your baby to be pouring his or her own water and juice after this game, but it is great practice and cute fun!

I put a soft blanket down on the kitchen floor, then filled two cups with O cereal and left two cups empty (one set for me, one for Veronika).

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Once I had her attention, I showed her how to pour the cereal from a full cup to an empty one.

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“Watch me pour!” I instructed.

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Well at first she was simply delighted to discover that the game involved a snack. Yum!

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She also seemed to love the visual of the cereal trickling from one cup to another.

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After showing her a few times, her hand reached out to mimic me, which I had anticipated; ten-month-olds are fantastic mimics!

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She tried her own hand at pouring…

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…and then just wanted to play with Os and cups. As I said, don’t expect your baby to be a pro after the game (your play space will probably look like mine, below), but your little one will have a blast!

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