Free Preschool Activities

Spiders aren’t insects (they’re arachnids) but they can be a lot of fun to learn about. I think most kids are fascinated by spiders, which explains some of our favorite nursery rhymes!

Here’s an activity to help your children learn the rhyme, Little Miss Muffet, and have a healthy snack too.

You’ll need:

• A nursery rhyme book. I’ve also posted the Little Miss Muffet nursery rhyme for you here.
•  Small pillow for each child
• Cottage cheese
• Cut-up fruit
• Small paper plate
• Spoon
• Soft toy
• String

Before you begin this activity, tie a soft toy to the piece of string and put it out of the way until you’re ready to use it.

Show your preschooler a picture of Little Miss Muffet in your nursery rhyme book, and read each line out loud.

Then, encourage your children to act out the rhyme. You can give them a snack of cottage cheese and cut-up fruit (curds and whey) and they can sit on smell pillows (tuffets).

After the children eat their snack,  and put away their plates (so no one makes a mess) help them repeat the rhyme, and dangle the soft toy in front of each child to pretend to “frighten them away,” as a game.

Can your preschoolers tell you what happened to Little Miss Muffet in their own words? Being able to describe something in their own words in an important part of listening and understanding.

Today the kids and I watched two ants carry a dead spider across our driveway. Those tiny creatures are amazing!

One way to watch insects up close is to buy a bug cage, or make one yourself.  Then you can watch those critters for hours. Remember to let your guests return home when you’re done watching them!

To make your own bug cage, you need:

copper wire screen

2 aluminum cake pans

Roll the screen so it fits around the cake pans. One cake pan will be the top of your cage, one will be the bottom.

Join the edges of the screens by sewing them together with a single strand of copper wire removed from the cut edge.

Here is a fun art activity to do with your preschooler while you’re studying insects - fingerpainting caterpillars and butterflies!

Get out your finger paints, or make your favorite finger paint recipe . Don’t forget the smocks!

Your child can paint caterpillars using the tip of her index finger. Place several finger prints in a row to make the body of a caterpillar. When the caterpillar is dry, you can add the legs and the antennae with a crayon or marker.

The caterpillar will one day become a beautiful butterfly! To paint butterfly wings, have your preschooler press the palm of his hand, including the fingers, into a tray of finger paint. Now make a handprint on the paper. You just painted a butterfly’s wing. Add a wing on the other side. When the paint is dry you can add the butterfly’s body and antennae with a crayon or marker.

Yesterday I wrote that insects have only 6 legs. After bug hunting, your preschooler might wonder why caterpillars have so many more than 6!

The answer is that all adult insects have 6 legs. A caterpillar is actually a baby butterfly - also called a larva. Here are some free activities to help your preschooler learn about the life cycle of a butterfly.

After your bug-hunting adventure, visit your local library to find some preschool books and videos about the insects you see. Maybe your child would even like his own library card! Our local library gives free library cards to children 12 and under as long as the parent has a library card.

Here are some of my family’s favorites:

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

The Grouchy Ladybug

The Very Clumsy Click Beetle

Summertime is the perfect time to learn about insects with your preschoolers. All you need is a sunny day and a magnifying class. A magnifying glass like this one adds a lot of fun to bug hunting adventures!

It can be hard to get a preschooler to sit quietly for anything, but when you go insect watching, see if you can get him to sit for a few minutes and count how many different insects he can see.

What does an insect look like? Adult insects have these characteristics in common. (See how many creatures you can find that fit this description!)

• All adult insects have 6 legs. (Spiders are not actually insects, but arachnids.)
• Some insects have wings, but not all of them do!
• Insects have two antennae attached to the head.
• They might be hard to see, but insects have compound eyes. If you can look closely, you’ll see that their eyes are made up of many lenses put together.
• They have an abdomen. This is the segmented tail area that contains the heart, reproductive organs, and most of the digestive system.
• They also have a thorax. The thorax is the part that connects the insect’s head to the abdomen. The legs are attached to the thorax.

by Rachel Paxton

ROCK PAPERWEIGHTS

Give each child a rock that has been washed with soap and dried. Have the children decorate the rocks with craft paint to create their own unique paperweights.

MASKS

Cut 8 ½ x 11 pieces of paper in half. Give each child a piece of paper and a crayon or marker. Have each child fold their piece of paper in half and cut a hole that their nose will fit through. Have them cut a small hole first, then adjust the hole to fit the size of their nose. Have the children try on their masks and let them try to figure out where the eyes should go. They can then cut out holes for the eyes. Let the children decorate their masks with different facial expressions.

JIGSAW PUZZLES

Give each child a piece of cardboard, a picture from a magazine, some scissors, and some glue. Have the children glue their pictures onto their cardboard. When the glue is dry, have them cut their cardboard into the shape of jigsaw puzzle pieces. When they have finished, have them trade puzzles and have a race to see who finishes first.

GRAPH PAPER DRAWINGS

Give each child a sheet of graph paper and a pen or pencil. Have each child draw a picture on the graph paper using only the lines on the graph paper. Curved lines are not allowed. Let the children color their creations. Have them share their pictures with each other when they are done.

COLLAGES

Give each child newspapers, scissors, glue, and notebook paper. Have each child cut words and sentences from newspaper pages and combine them to create a unique story. Have them arrange their sentences on the notebook paper and glue them in place. A theme for the stories can be decided beforehand. Let the children share their stories with each other.

FLUBBER

1 1/2 cups warm water
2 cups white school glue
1 1/3 cups warm water
3 teaspoons Borax
Food coloring

Mix 1 1/2 cups warm water, glue, and food coloring together. In a separate bowl, mix 1 1/3 cups warm water and Borax together. Pour the glue mixture into the Borax mixture and take out of bowl to knead until flubber is soft and consistent in form. Store in a zip-lock bag or tightly sealed container. This stuff is really fun! Enjoy!

Originally published at Suite 101. Rachel Paxton is a freelance writer and mom of four. For complete resources for the Christian home, visit her web site at http://www.Christian-Parent.com.

Article Source: http://www.wahm-articles.com

I’ll never forget the Christmas my son got a Fisher Price garage for Christmas. He was three years old. The garage was a gift from my parents.

The garage (which was in a box almost as tall as my son!) sat under my parents’ tree for weeks before Christmas. Whenever we went over to visit, my son would eye this big, beautiful present, and we encouraged him to imagine what was in it.

We couldn’t wait to see his face on Christmas Eve when he would FINALLY get to open it!

Christmas Eve eventually arrived, and after church we opened our presents. We made my son save that big present for last. We knew he would be so excited about this amazing garage - that came with gas pumps, cars, little people, and an elevator that really worked - that all his other presents would pale in comparison.

Finally,it was time to rip the wrapping off this fantastic gift, the one most boys his age could only dream about getting. Once the paper was off, and the garage was out of the box, we all “ooed” and “ahhed” over the elevator, the parking levels, and how real the little gas pumps looked.

Well, the adults did, anyways. My son’s favorite part was the box it came in.

Ho hum. That story probably sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

Eventually, he DID tire of the big box, and check out the garage. And he did play with that garage for several years after. But, we all learned a hard lesson that day. Some toys are created more for parents than for their kids!

Here’s someone else’s take on how to choose good toys for your preschoolers. And if you don’t like those suggestions, you can always try a big box instead!

Here’s an excellent article about how to choose the right preschool for your child.  If you’re planning on enrolling your preschooler next year, it’s a must read!

Yay! Spring has finally arrived in Calgary, which means…

… it’s raining instead of snowing.

We’re still having some fun in the garden, during the sunny breaks, but we’re also keeping busy indoors.

A good way to keep active preschoolers busy on a rainy day is to create a Craft Box and keep it well stocked. Even if you’re not a crafty person, you can still have fun doing crafts with your preschoolers. All it takes is a little preparation and lots of imagination!

You can buy a craft box, or just designate a kitchen drawer as the craft drawer and fill it with fun goodies. You can also use a plastic shoe holder to hold your craft supplies. Fill it up and hang it over the door. Everyone can see at a glance what supplies you have on hand.

Filling your craft box, drawer or bag doesn’t have to cost a lot. I like to visit garage sales and thrift shops for most of my supplies. Here are some things you can look for:

• Buttons and small pieces of colored glass.
• Lots and lots of paper, in all sizes, shapes and colors. Save scraps from other projects and add them to your rainy day collection.
• Colored pieces of felt
• Googly eyes
• Aluminum foil. (A must-have for building those ships from outer space.)
• Clean, old socks. Even socks with holes can become sock puppets.