Sunday, September 30, 2007

Finger traps

via Geekdad

Instructions for how to make a finger trap over at Instructables.com

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Paper school

2007_09_21_paper_school_2

(This idea came home from school.)

Materials:
  • large sheet of construction paper
  • markers
  • scissors / x-acto knife
  • photo of child
  • magazine pictures of children playing with toys, reading books, colouring etc
  • glue
Instructions:
  • fold sheet of paper in half length-wise
  • decorate front to look like this
    2007_09_21_paper_school_1
  • have an adult outline and cut the doors and windows such that they fold open outwards
  • open up sheet of construction paper and have child glue images to be seen through the open window and doors
    2007_09_21_paper_school_3
  • be sure to place photo of smiling child's face to occupy a window
  • fold the school "closed" and open the windows and doors to show children playing and your child's smiling face
    2007_09_21_paper_school_2

Tuesday, September 25, 2007

recipe: Sidewalk paint

We were first introduced to commercial sidewalk paint when it was given to us as a gift. Toddlers and pre-schoolers love this stuff, so I was delighted to find this easy recipe for making sidewalk paint in Andrea's post "How to play hopscotch."

sw_paint_sample


Materials:
  • cornstartch
  • water
  • food colouring (for white paint, don't use any food colouring)


Instructions:

  • mix equal parts cornstartch and water
  • add a few drops of food colouring
  • paint!



Notes to self:

sw_paint_hopscotch

Sunday, September 23, 2007

House collage

house_collage


This was created at our local Ontario Early Years Centre.

Materials:
  • a sheet of paper cut like the shape of a house
  • pieces of coloured construction paper cut into squares, rectangles, circles
  • optional: cut out pictures from magazines (doors, windows etc) or stickers
  • glue stick or white glue


Instructions:
  • put house shaped paper down
  • apply glue and cut shapes / pictures to decorate the house

Monday, September 17, 2007

Paper crown

2007_09_14_paper_crown

(This idea came home from school.)

Materials:
  • construction paper approx 26" long by approx 6.5" high
  • scissors
  • stickers
  • invisible tape
  • optional: markers, crayons, sparkles, paint
Instructions:
  • have an adult cut the points in the crown (the ones in the pictures are about 3 inches high
  • have the child apply stickers or otherwise decorate the crown
  • wrap the paper around the child's head and tape on the outside
  • remove from child's head and add additional tape on the inside
  • NOTE: people often uses staples in lieu of tape to hold the crown together. There is a risk of hair getting caught in the staples. There is also a risk of children cutting themselves if a staple should open up part way.