Free Preschool Activities

by Rachel Paxton

If you are doing preschool at home, or even if you are just doing some extra preschool activities with your child from time to time, you probably have a lot of papers and craft supplies taking up space on your countertops and closet shelves.

It was hard for me to get excited about doing preschool activities without being organized first, so I set out to go through all of our supplies and set up an organized storage system that works for me.

Flash Cards and Card Games

I store all of my boys’ flash cards and card games in a small plastic storage container.  This container is kept up in a closet where only I can get it down for them.  It only took one time of me putting all the cards back in the boxes to realize they couldn’t handle getting into this container on their own!

Art Supplies

Most of our art supplies are stored where my boys can get to them.  I purchased a three drawer plastic storage container that works great for art supplies.  One drawer holds their crayons, colored pencils, scissors, and glue.  The second drawer stores a variety of painting supplies.  The third drawer stores miscellaneous items, such as felt pieces for the felt board and plastic letters for the magnetic board.  This plastic container is kept near the kitchen table where my boys do their art projects. This keeps it within easy reach when they want to color, paint, or do some other art project.

Craft Supplies

I have a separate plastic storage container just for craft supplies.  Most of these supplies aren’t used unless we are doing a special craft project, so the kids don’t need to get in there every day.  This container stores things like google eyes, pipe cleaners, crepe paper, etc. This is also where I store the ink pads I don’t want them getting into by themselves.

Worksheets, Workbooks, and Project Instructions

If you like to collect preschool craft and activity ideas like I do, you probably have a lot of piles of paper that need to be sorted and organized.  I purchased several plastic file folder storage boxes for all these papers, and they have worked great so far.  I sorted my papers into categories like Christmas, Thanksgiving, spring, animals, alphabet, etc.  I combined several categories together in one container, and then labeled each container so I would know exactly what is in it.  I also placed all of our workbooks in these containers.  It’s nice to have a place to put all those miscellaneous papers I always seem to run across.  If I cut out an article from somewhere, or photocopy an idea from a book, I have a place to file it away where I can always find it again.  You can put away the containers you don’t currently need and just leave out the ones you are currently using.

Preschool Manipulatives and Puzzles

Hopefully your preschooler has a lot of math manipulatives and puzzles to play with.  These items should be set out where they can just pick up when they are bored.  All of our puzzles are stored inside of benches we have around the table in our kitchen.  When our boys want to do a puzzle, they can get them out themselves.  Our math manipulatives are stored on a shelf in our entertainment center.  Again, the kids have easy access to them and often pick them up when they are bored.  We have sewing cards, patterning and sorting activities, and several number, matching, and reading games. I love to see my boys reaching for these great learning activities when they want something to do.

The preschool years are a fun time for you and your child.  Whether you are doing preschool at home or your child attends preschool, make sure you have lots of stimulating activities for your child at home that are organized and ready to use when you need them.

Rachel Paxton is a freelance writer and mom of five. For resources for the Christian family, including parenting, toddler and preschool activities, homeschooling, family traditions, and more, visit http://www.Christian-Parent.com

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

by Rachel Paxton

Children love turtles. This turtle paper plate craft is a fun, easy preschool craft project.  To make this craft, you will need:

• Two paper plates
• Brown construction paper
• Green craft paint
• Google eyes
• Scissors
• Glue
• Dried beans (optional)
• Felt tip pen

Your child will need two paper plates to make one turtle.  Have your child use the green paint to paint the bottom side of both paper plates.  Allow to dry.

Next cut out the arms, legs, etc.  Using the scissors and brown construction paper, cut out four small rectangles for legs, a small triangle for the tail, and a circle for the head. You can outline them first with a pen if you wish, but it isn’t necessary. I just cut mine out freehand.

Glue the edges of the arms, legs, tail, and head to the top edge of one of the paper plates.

If you wish you can put some dried beans onto the plate so that when you glue the plates together the turtle will rattle when your child shakes it.  This step is optional.

Next glue the second plate to the first plate.  The tops of the plates should be glued together so that the painted sides are facing out.  The arms, legs, tail, and head should be sticking out between the two plates.

Help your child glue the google eyes on to the head.  Let your child use the felt tip pen to draw on a nose and mouth and to decorate the “shell” of the turtle, if they wish.

Rachel Paxton is a freelance writer and mom of five. For resources for the Christian family, including parenting, toddler and preschool activities, homeschooling, family traditions, and more, visit http://www.Christian-Parent.com

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

You already know that recycling is good for the environment and good for your preschoolers. After all, you would like their children to have green spaces to play in and clean air to breathe one day. In our family, Saturday is recycling day. Today we’re hauling all the recyclables from the week to our nearby recycling bin.

I thought I would share some of the ways you can get your preschoolers involved in recycling on your own recycling day, and every day.

Preschool Crafts - How to Build Your Own Recycling Depot

To help organize your own recyclables, get out some big boxes and the colored markers. Your preschooler can design designated boxes to sort your recyclable throughout the week. In our house, we have boxes for mixed paper, newspaper, milk jugs, glass, and plastics. You can show your preschooler examples of each to give them ideas of how to decorate the boxes.

You can also make recycling posters with your preschooler to decorate your recycling area.  Talk to them about why we recycle, and the benefits of it. Then help her draw posters to remind her (and everyone else in your family) of why recycling is important. For example, my daughter drew a picture of polar bears, because our recycling is helping to protect them. My son drew a poster of all the different objects we can recycle, to remind him of what not to throw away.

Preschool Activities for Recycling

Now that you have your own recycling depot at home, help your preschooler sort recyclables each day. This does more than keep the earth green - it also helps teach your preschool sorting, organizing, and classifying skills.

Recycling plastic milk jugs can be a lot of fun. In our city, we have to remove the lids, rinse out the jug, and squash it. You can turn this into a game where your preschooler shakes the jug to rinse it, and jumps on it to squash it.

On your own recycling day, bring your preschooler along to the big recycling depot and have them help you depot your recyclables into the big bins. This helps them understand that it’s not just your family, when they recycle they’re working with your community to make the world a cleaner place. It’s also really exciting to see the recycling truck show up and empty the bins.

If your recycling is picked up, you can still have your preschoolers help you get it out to the curb and have fun watching for the recycling truck to roll around.

If You Want More Preschool Recycling Fun…

If you want to have more recycling fun with your preschooler, I found the most adorable little book you might enjoy sharing with your kids,  The Adventures of a Plastic Bottle: A Story About Recycling. It will also help them understand the recycle process, and the part their own recycling plays.

Recycling is good for your preschooler, your community, and for the earth. Have fun teaching your preschooler how to keep the earth a cleaner place!

This morning I was looking for a new activity to do with the kids, so I spent some time looking for homemade soap recipes. I found some really easy ones (my favorite kind!) that I’ll share with you in a moment.

The reason wny I was thinking about soapmaking is because I’ve just realized that Mother’s Day is almost here. They wanted to make something special for their grandmothers and me.

Reasons Why You Should Make Soap with Your Preschoolers

Not only does homemade soap make a nice gift, it can become a preschool science project. And your preschoolers will be more likely to use it because… after all, they made it. Anything to make them happier about washing their hands!

There are a few more benefits to making your own soap with your preschoolers. The price, of couse, is one. We can make soap much cheaper than we can buy it.

Secondly, making it ourselves also gives us complete control over the ingredients, so youcan create a soap that’s perfect for your skin type in a scent of your choosing.

Customizing Your Soap

There are lots of different ways you can customize your soap. To make the best soap for your skin type, you may want to use different oils. Some that are commonly used include olive oil, coconut oil, cocoa butter and shea butter. The correct amount varies depending on which oil you use, so look for recipes online or in books until you get the hang of it.

Essential oils have therapeutic properties and add fragrance. Oatmeal, cornmeal and other grains can be added as exfoliants. And skin-safe colorants may be used to produce the desired color. These ingredients should be mixed together and added to a cup of the soap mixture, then stirred into the rest of the soap mixture immediately before pouring into the mold.

Making your own soap is easy, and it can be lots of fun. Coming up with the perfect concoction for your skin is rewarding, and sweetly scented homemade soaps make wonderful gifts for any occasion.

Homemade Soap Recipes

Here are some homemade soap recipes I found that would be simple enough to do with your preschoolers:

Homemade Soap made with Ivory Snow Laundry Flakes

Bath Bomb Recipes

Enjoy!

With Easter approaching, some families are celebrating the biblical story of Easter with their children. If you’re one of those families, here is a free Bible coloring book you can print and give to your preschoolers.

If you know of any other free Easter coloring books or printables, please share the links to them below. I’d love to share them with my readers!

Do you ever feel frustrated because you’re changing your preschooler’s wet sheets in the middle of the night… almost every night? Does your child have to miss out on sleepovers with friends because she’s afraid she might wet the bed?

Bedwetting is a lot more common than most parents realize.It might be hard to believe, when you’re dealing with a crying child and damp bedding in the middle of the night, but you are not alone.

Bedwetting (also known as enuresis) is usually caused by an underdeveloped urinary system causing the release of urine during the night when the child is in a deep sleep. However, that probably doesn’t make it less frustrating for you, or less embarrassing for your preschooler.

If your child is wetting the bed, experts say the most important thing to do is not get upset with him. It’s not his fault, and he’s probably already feeling worse about it than you are. Instead, you can help by reassuring your child there’s nothing wrong with her, and that she’s not alone.

Then, you can start using these seven tips to use to help solve your child’s bedwetting problems:

• Limit the amount of liquids you give your child in the evening. Have her drink the majority of her liquids during the morning/day.
• Limit caffeine. Again, especially in the evenings.
• Make sure that your child goes to the bathroom before bed.
• Set an alarm to get up in the middle of the night & take your child to the bathroom.
• Reward chart. This will help encourage your child to keep trying. Place a sticker on the chart for every dry night.
• Bed wetting alarms. These are placed under the child and go off at the first sign off wetness.
• Pull-ups can be used for younger children.

It also might be a good idea to schedule an appointment with your family doctor or pediatrician to rule out any medical reason for bedwetting.

You can also find more information on your child’s bedwetting and tips to help stop it in this new e-book, Stopping Your Child’s Bedwetting.  It’s a very handy e-book full of tips and encouragement for you and your preschooler. When you purchase it, you can download it right away, and start using some of these ideas tomorrow.

If you’re looking for a fun way to teach the alphabet to your preschooler, you might enjoy this site . It has Charlotte’s Web Alphabet Flash Cards. How fun is that! Enjoy.

Here’s another free e-book to help you celebrate St. Patrick’s Day with your preschoolers. It has recipes and some Irish history to help your entire family celebrate. You can get your copy here, and remember to share it with a friend!

St. Patricks’s Day is almost here! Is your preschooler looking forward to wearing green?

Here are some free St. Patty’s Day coloring pages you can print out and share with your preschoolers. Enjoy!

Have you made time recently to sit down and color with your preschooler?

If you haven’t, you might want to take some time to do that this week. It’s a wonderful way to spend time with your preschooler in his or her own world.

Lots of important discussion can take place when you’re coloring with a preschooler.

That’s when you get to hear the real reasons behind their favorite color, why they really like  cats better than dogs (or vice versa) or whatever’s been on their mind lately that they would like you to know, but have been too busy to tell you.

When you sit down and color together, pick out your favorite colors from the crayon box, and find your favorite pictures in a coloring book, that creates the perfect setting for some quality time.

Here’s a site that offers a lot of free coloring pages. They’re on all kinds of topics, so you and your child are sure to find something to interest both of you.

Here’s another site I found today that sells downloadable coloring books. They’re only a few dollars each, and the pictures are really beautiful… especially if your child is interested in animals or dance.

The Magical Elegance coloring ebook is full of princesses and could be something nice to add to the Princess Party we talked about yesterday.

Here’s something really cool… If you scroll to the bottom of the front page, you’ll see you can order a custom coloring pages too. What a great gift to share with a child who loves to color!