Preschool – Search For Seven

Water Bead Funnel Fun

April 9, 2022April 21, 2022 Keira

Dear Reader,

I can’t believe spring is already here! I mean, I’m not complaining – I’m not a big fan of winter – but I am not ready for the busyness that comes with spring when you’re an avid gardener. I haven’t finished all of my winter projects yet! Plus, my preschooler has decided that spring means extra busyness, too! She has been wanting to do *all the things.* Which doesn’t exactly match with my need to get things done. So I needed to come up with something for her to do that was fun and exciting but didn’t involve me. I grabbed some water beads and a funnel and the pans we use for sand dough.

We filled an old juice bottle with water and watched the beads grow throughout the day, and then I poured a few in her tray and handed her the funnel.

Her OT and I have been talking a lot about retained palmar grasp reflex, and I can see it. Especially when we do fine-motor tasks like playing with small, slippery things. I Don’t know if tasks like this will really solve anything, but they definitely take concentration and focus, so I feel like they’re good for that aspect. And aiming for the funnel (especially the small end) takes hand-eye coordination. Just make sure you have a funnel with a big enough hole. This funnel was the only one that fit that bill besides our canning funnels, so I handed those to the toddlers (and watched them much closer) while I worked across from them and transplanted lavender.

Age Range

Prep Required

lay the groundwork
(buy and prepare
the beads)

Time Needed

20 minutes

Supervision

3/10

Educational, Kids Need Play, Life Lessons

Sand dough place values

March 26, 2022March 19, 2022 Keira

Dear Reader,

I know that place values are way above what my preschooler is ready for… but is it, though? I mean, do I actually expect her to understand and grasp entirely what we were talking about? No way. But she is has an incredible sense of numbers that I did not have at her age. And when the opportunity came up, I definitely seized it.

Anyway, I digress… today we played with sand dough. We play with sand dough regularly, but my preschooler got a set of letters and numbers for Christmas, and she is very proud of that ownership. And since she always loves numbers, when she made the one and the zero, she got excited about it making the number 10. And then the wheels started turning and you could see it. “What happens if I add another zero?” So, I told her to do it and see! Then I said, “look, you just made 100!” and it grew from there all the way to one million.

I know this wont be the only time we talk about it, because she’s not ready to completely grasp the concept of place values, but I loved seeing the brainwaves happen. [nerd fact: From a science perspective, it’s called myelination – reinforcing thought patterns in our brains. Basically the more you hear and see something, the more you will understand the concept. And from a teacher perspective, it’s called scaffolding – basically that when you introduce a new concept you need to build up to it].

Age Range

Prep Required

on the fly

Time Needed

less than 5 mins

Supervision

9/10

A Day in the Life, FHE, Spiritual

Conference Activities

March 22, 2022June 24, 2022 Keira

Dear Reader,

An unspoken thing that I personally think is amazing about conference is that there are so many family traditions involved in how each household watches conference. If you feel like you need a new tradition in your family, here are are some resources I have found from the Church (while planning our FHE lesson for this week) that are totally free to you!

Watch videos sharing the personal testimonies of the Apostles.
Print off and fill out conference notebooks (for older or for younger kids; or one of these pages one, two for in between)
color by topic pages (I personally think this one is worth it! love it). There is this one, as well, but a) it’s outdated, and b) it’s not as pretty. But it is still a good resource!
Conference Bingo! This is what our family does! we have pages my aunt made when we were kids, but the topics have shifted slightly and it’s getting harder to get bingos! So I think I’m gonna print these off, instead, this year. Before conference, I go to the dollar store and pick out little toys and party favors. I buy things that are less than a dollar (so multiple things in a pack) for bingos and then 1 dollar prize per session per kid for blackouts (I might have to make the “sustaining leaders” a free space in order to do that on this print-out). I try to pick prizes that are projects or crafts, so that my kids have some form of entertainment during conference, as opposed to a figurine, but even little figurines have value while entertaining kids for so long. Here is another page, but it has President Monson represented for “prophet,” so it’s a little outdated.
Here are some awesome coloring pages of the General Authorities! See if your family can recognize them and know their names.
There are a lot of picture searches within the church’s website, but these two (one, two) deal particularly with General Conference.
Same thing goes for coloring pages. I found 5 in particular that are about conference (but I bet there are more hidden in the “internet cracks.” Some of these have President Monson, but he was still a prophet (one, two, three, four, five). And here is one about King Benjamin teaching his people, in case you’re following along with our FHE lessons.
Here’s a poster with kids coloring for conference.
This page has a blank bingo sheet, but I like the idea of drawing the ties given on the bottom.
Challenge your family to listen for key words and keep a tally of what is said.
If you told your family about King Benjamin teaching his people, this activity about his people pitching his tents toward the temple will have deeper meaning.
Here is a connect four game based off of listening to key words.
This one seems fun, too. Color in a square for each clue you see or hear.
assign a small treat to key words and each time that word is heard, the hearer can get a treat.
Here is a dot-to-dot of the prophet (and a picture story).
There is nothing to print here, but this story talks about watching conference via a tent, like King Benjamin. You could build a fort like they do in the story or a real tent. If it’s stable enough, you could even allow your family to sleep in it one night!
This activity involves 1 word for each letter of the alphabet and suggests writing notes about each word.
Here is a rope code game that has a hidden answer at the bottom of the page.
For kids that can read, they could cover these words as they hear them.
The second page of this story from the friend gives a nice way to take notes on a talk. If your note-taker can read but isn’t ready to take that thorough of notes, they might be able to follow this outline.
Here is a 2-week countdown of activities to prepare for conference.
And this is a crossword search with conference words.
If you want to update the pictures, this is a fun mini-conference setup with chairs and a pulpit that you can have the speakers walk to. But it’s from 2012.
This coloring page is similar to some others already listed, but a little bit simpler. It would still require reading, though. Or there is this one, tied to the talk before it.
Here’s a wiggle break rhyme to get kids up and moving, if needed.

Kids Need Play

Mini School: /t/ sound

March 19, 2022March 19, 2022 Keira

Dear Reader,

This lesson was definitely a learning curve for me! I’m not very familiar with plaster of paris… But I just couldn’t resist the alliteration in “tractor tire tracks!” When I originally came up with this idea I figured we’d do our tractor tracks in sand dough, but it’s just so muddy outside, I decided to be more authentic. I think sand dough would have been less of a learning curve.

Anyway, we did lesson 7 out of 100 Easy Lessons, and worked on Lesson 3 of Learn to Read, then we mixed up the plaster, put on our shoes, and headed outside to the mud!

Then we waited… and waited. The package says half an hour to cure and then 24 hours to dry. So we left it in the mud until the afternoon and then I tried to pry it out of the mud… and may have cracked it…

She definitely learned the /t/ sound making the plaster. and loved the activity… but I couldn’t really see how I was gonna get this letter sound to stay nicely in her book, so I grabbed a tire and some brown paint and painted a t onto some white paper. I mean, if you wanted to, you could just skip to the paint, but she was so excited to do the plaster and the tactile aspect really stuck. I’ll keep the plaster T by her book until she’s done with it or it really breaks, so she can keep tracing it (the whole point).

Anyway, apparently I need more practice with plaster of paris, but it served it’s purpose. “t” says /t!/.

Age Range

Preschool

Prep Required

run to a store

Time Needed

20 mins for lesson
3 mins for activity
1-24 hrs to set or dry

Supervision

10/10

Kids Need Play

Pipe Cleaner meets Wiffle Ball

March 12, 2022March 18, 2022 Keira

Dear Reader,

We’re focusing on pincer grasp again in OT lately so we’re pulling out a few of our favorite hand-eye activities. The pipe cleaners help her remember to focus on her pincer grasp and the wiffle ball holes are great for hand-eye coordination. Plus, these colors just make me happy!

Sometimes we just weave them through the holes, sometimes we make loops and connect the balls together. The pipe cleaners are all different textures and they have been used over and over again so they’re all different shapes, too.

Plus, sometimes my preschooler just needs an activity to sit and reset. This is a great activity for that! Sometimes we all could just use a quiet activity.

Age Range

Preschool

Prep Required

throw together

Time Needed

20 minutes

Supervision

1/10
but you could play, too.

Kids Need Play, Uncategorized

find the rhyme

March 5, 2022March 18, 2022 Keira

Dear Reader,

While planning for our learning activity and looking at the rhyming worksheet in the dyslexia activity book, and seeing the paint bags I’ve been trying to decide what to do with now, I had an idea and decided to add a tactile element to today’s lesson. So I made my own worksheet! If you have the dyslexia workbook, this activity will work with it, too. (To see what workbook I’m talking about, click to read what books we use).

After creating the worksheet, I took an alcohol wipe to the logo on the ziplock bag of paint. It was really easy to get off, actually! And then I taped it to the worksheet and taped the worksheet to the table (I suggest painters tape but I took the risk since my painters tape is currently packed up while my craft room is under construction (don’t ask. It’s taken way too long). The tape is pretty important, since the bag is kinda slippery.

I put a lot of work into this worksheet, so it is for sale over in my products. The products part of my site is still very much in its infancy, so watch for more products coming soon!

To get this worksheet, click here!

Anyway, she had to show everyone that she could find the rhymes and has gone back to it off and on all afternoon, so I think it’s a success! The nice thing is that you can do it over and over without having to have a grownup reset it, because as you move the paint around it re-covers the pictures. I was worried that would be an annoyance, but I think it helped reiterate which words rhymed as she rediscovered them.

You could still play with this worksheet like the original idea and cut 1.75″ squares and play it like memory match. Or you could just cut the pictures out, too. But if your kids learn kinetically, this is definitely a better idea than I ever would have hoped, and I intend to use this learning method again!

Age Range

Preschool

Prep Required

print and go +
throw together

Time Needed

she keeps coming back! 15 minutes is a good start.

Supervision

3/10

Help to hear the rhymes and then just let them play.

Kids Need Play

Mini-School Day 3: /a/ sound

February 26, 2022March 15, 2022 Keira

Dear Reader,

Today we made apples on an apple tree using… apple stamps. I mean, of course! The hardest part of this activity was wandering around Walmart looking for the darn paper rolls! For the record, the white paper is down the craft aisle, by the poster boards. And the brown paper was in the paint aisle. There was paper in the packing aisle, but it was a huge roll for a lot more money. I didn’t figure I needed anything heavy duty, so cheaper definitely wins.

The second hardest thing was carving the apple and ***REMEMBERING TO DO IT BACKWARDS*** yeah, don’t forget that. Ahem… Lucky I had a bad apple I could carve into.

Anyway, after reading day 3 of Teach Your Child to Read and lesson 1 of Learn to Read, I made a large plateful of paint and let her stamp the tree we had drawn up together (Maybe cut the trunk out ahead of time, but honestly it wasn’t too time consuming that she got antsy). Then I handed her a white piece of construction paper for her to stamp on for our book of sounds.

Age Range

Preschool

Prep Required

run to a store
+
time to cut and glue

Time Needed

15 for the lesson
about 10 for the apple

Supervision

7/10

Kids Need Play

Rainbow Smoothies: because she kept asking

February 19, 2022February 19, 2022 Keira

Dear Reader,

Okay, so this was on the fly… And it was a lot of work and mess so I probably won’t do it much in order to perfect it… so this is a super rough and casual draft.

Today, we made smoothies! Rainbow smoothies. Because I have been asked every day for a month if we could try it.

Purple: it was still way too red, but there wasn’t any fixing it. I started with my base of liquid, banana and pear. Then I added blueberries and huckleberries. I added 2 raspberries and that was a bad choice. Don’t do that. But honestly it was too red even without the raspberries because the huckleberries are pretty red. I added a blue little Gatorade powder and it made it good but tart. Not much purple-er.

Blue: let’s be honest, this blue is purple. It is almond milk, baby cereal and fresh blueberries because I hate frozen blueberries. And the pear and banana again. I can’t explain why, it is a texture thing. So the cereal is there to thicken it. If you like frozen blueberries you could skip the cereal. Or if you wanted to add oatmeal powder, that works too.

Alternative blue: I googled how to actually get a blue smoothie and there is something called spirulina powder. I might try that. My husband wouldn’t though. He’s not an adventurous foodie. Especially if it’s deemed healthful.

Green: by now everyone knows how to make green smoothies. Spinach is great for color and doesn’t have much flavor. Then I added lime juice (go light on that… I added too much), banana and pear.

Yellow: the easiest. Lemonade, mangoes, banana, and pear again.

Orange: I’m not sold on the orange. I did pineapple juice, mangoes, bananas, pear, and 2 strawberries. It was too light. But I wasnt about to open another juice with so many in the fridge. maybe no pear this time? Or no banana but I need bananas in my smoothies. I’m pretty picky. In a mango smoothie I probably wouldn’t notice it missing as much. I thought about adding peaches but tried to stick to few ingredients instead of opening everything.

Red: the juice from the can of pears, strawberries, raspberries banana, and the last pear. I though it was too pink so maybe no pear next time. I could have done straight raspberry but I don’t like all the raspberry seeds, lol. See? picky. Actually, one year when I had extra raspberries I made myself smoothie ice cubes that I’d strained all the seeds out of. That was when I was consistent at making smoothies for breakfast.

I made her fill her own cup with droppers to strengthen her pincer grasp. She got bored so maybe next time I’ll use the turkey baster? And it kept the smoothies separated by color instead of mixing together.

It tasted good, so there’s that. A little too tangy with the blue Gatorade and too much lime juice, but the flavors blended well together. The little girls liked it, too. They drank all of mine! And since their throats are pretty sore (sister gave everyone her cold because she hasn’t figured out how to cover her mouth…), They haven’t wanted much else to eat.

you may need to make a shopping list, though.

Educational, Kids Need Play

Mini School Day 2 /s/ sound

February 12, 2022March 15, 2022 Keira

Dear Reader;

I am so giddy at how well these little mini lessons are going! I always told myself that “someday,” I’d do fun letter activities but I just never felt good enough or like I had the time to do such fun things. But I made a goal to spend more time with my kids, and then I made the goal to focus on letters. And it’s been so rewarding.

This activity was about the /s/ sound. And squishy slimy rainbow-colored spaghetti was just so fun to make! My kids wished I would have let them help, but I was the mean mom that did not feel like cleaning up food-colored clothes or kids or carpet.

To make rainbow spaghetti, just cook the spaghetti to done, add 20 drops of coloring and 2 tbs of water into a sandwich bag. mix it up and then add some spaghetti into the bag. It was about 2 pinches full of spaghetti, but really it’ll depend on how much spaghetti you cook.

For red, I simply did 20 drops of red.
For orange, I did 15 drops of yellow and 5 of red (and I could have favored the yellow even more than I did.
For yellow, it was easy peasy. 20 drops of yellow.
For green, I did 12 drops of neon green, and 3 drops of true green. it was such a pretty color!
For blue I did 15 drops of my cyan from the neon set and 5 drops of straight blue.
Purple was made by 12 drops of the neon purple, 5 drops blue, and 3 drops red. Honestly it was dark, so maybe it doesn’t need all 20 drops?
I had extra spaghetti so I decided to make some teal (12 drops cyan, 2 drops blue, and 5 drops of green) and some magenta (I only did 10 drops on this one because I wanted it to be more of a pink than a red. 7 drops neon purple and 3 drops red). You can look for them in the picture above if you want.

You’re supposed to only leave the spaghetti in for a minute… but I have kids. Yeahhhh, that spaghetti was in there for more like 5. And it didn’t end up all evenly colored, because ideally I would have at least mixed that spaghetti around every so often. But eh, my kids didn’t care and honestly, I didn’t either.

After it’s been in for the “minute,” rinse each color individually. after rinsing, I dumped them all back into the pan, and I’m telling you not to do that. Keep them all in their own bowl until right before serving/giving to your kids, them to keep the blues from dying the yellows.

Now that that is done, time for our little mini-school! We read the second lesson in our Teach your Child book, the letter S from the activity book, and then we made s shapes and traced them with our fingers. then I just let her and her toddler sisters play in the spaghetti (after they washed their hands… because I totally intended to count the munching I knew would happen as lunch)! Sensory play for the win.

I pulled out a few noodle colors and let them dry in S shapes so she can have something to trace throughout the week. I tried to dry them onto the paper so they’d just glue themselves to the paper but the noodles shrink as they dry and the paper got all curly. So before they ruined the paper and their shapes, I pulled them off and flipped them over to dry the rest of the way. As the lessons progress I’ll have her trace them with her fingers to include kinetic input into learning.

Educational, Kids Need Play

Mini School Day 1 /M/ sound

February 5, 2022March 15, 2022 Keira

Dear Reader,

My preschooler is great at counting! Numbers just click in her head. Letters, however… they might as well be some ancient Hebrew text. They just don’t compute. Although I am definitely an advocate for children learning at their pace, I was curious if we couldn’t aide her a little bit better just by doing a set of activities that were more 3d than just the standard color/cut/glue paper activities. My Family has a history of Dyslexia, and reading is so 2d! So, we made it tactile! And we are focusing on sound and not letter names. Starting with /m/.

I started with /m/ mostly because I’m using Teach Your Child To Read as our baseline. We do the lesson out of that, then we do the Learn to Read Activity Book of the same letter, because they involve movement. Then it’s onto the fun!

This week, we glued pipe cleaners and googly eyes onto our monster! And “teeth” that ended up being horns because they’re above where she put the eyes. When I called to talk to my mom this afternoon, she asked if we used M&M’s and I’m kinda kicking myself for not thinking about that! What a missed opportunity! So if you’re reading this, remember that M&M’s are totally an option.

After the pipe cleaner dried, I had her trace the letters with her fingers. With the pipe cleaners, she’s getting a sensory input while saying “mmmmmm.” Then I kept it handy because we review the sounds throughout the week.

Next lesson will be on the /s/ sound.

only involved because of the story. could be free play