Frog on a log science

FROG ON THE LOG by LEYLAND PERREE

Storybook inspired science. 

Tadpole observation and transformation is a great way to explore the life cycle of a frog.

http://littlebrightsparks.blogspot.co.uk/2016/05/a-z-science-transformation.html?m=0

Tadpole magnets.

We had some magnets that have a ball and a tail which were great for tadpoles. So this science sctivity is about exploring magnets.

http://littlebrightsparks.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/tadpole?m=0

Dragon puppet neighbourhood watch

The puppet dragons were taken out for a Tour of the neighbourhood.

We took a squirting water bottle to pretend it was fire. They had to squirt letters, numbers, shapes and objects.

M

Dylan even spotted 3D shapes like a cone and cylinder .

Then a role play with a knight on a 'castle' .

The boys loved this and didn't want to go on for dinner . 

Dylan 5.5 and Zac 2.9

Coloured Peg and Pipe Cleaner Match up

I was desperate for new pegs and saw these in the shop they are multi-coloured ones.I knew that they wouldn't end up on my washing line as the kids loved them.

This morning we had the pipe cleaners out doing a threading activity. Then I saw that we had a few colours that matched to the pegs and here we have the next activity.

I was quite impressed how quickly Zac (2.1) matched the colours and that he said the right colours.

Then I thought how can I extend this for a four year old....

He had to make a chain with the pipe cleaners using pegs to hold them together. (I had to twist the pipe cleaners in the end).

He made a big chain that he used to show shapes like a circle. We didn't manage to mage letters or numbers but this is a possibility for next time.




Dylan 4.9
Zac 2.1

Brown Bear Story Telling Bracelet

We follow the Virtual book club and have adapted Mama Miss' Storytelling beads http://www.mamamiss.com/2015/08/13/story-telling-beads/

for Bill Martin, Jr's book Brown bear.

 

We made a bracelet with the some beads and my son used it to tell the story.

Please excuse the PJs he likes to do activities like this in the morning.

 

The bead jars was a brilliant idea the only reason we did it this way was that we had to work with the equipment that we had at home.

 

Dylan 4.9

Days Out in Birmingham: Cannon Hill Park

The summer holidays this year have been 7 weeks long and this can get very expensive when you are trying to entertain the children even though there are loads of free activities and places to go. Although the days trips to places that charge are 'usually' worth the money for the experience.

 

Cannon Hill in Birmingham have once again put on a beach/ fair and entertainment. The entertainment  and sand play is free but the fair charges.

 

We visited today and these are the FREE activities we did. Played in the sand and watched the entertainment on stage.

Played in the multiple parks on climbing frames, swings, slides etc.

We took our bikes and cycled around to find our picnic spot.

 

Had a picnic and saved the crusts for the ducks, geese and swans.

 

Played hide and seek in the bushes

Climbed up the small trees.

We went with friends and there were a range of ages and all enjoyed the variety of activities.
Dylan had another 4 year old to cycle with as he much faster than Me a Zac on his bike. Although Zac is very fast and I have to jog to keep up if he is at full speed. He went down a few hills and he lifted his legs up to roll, getting very confident on there. Dylan's friend had no stabilisers and I think this has helped me to convince him to try his without any. We will be going there to try this! Scary thought but a vital learning curve.

Well recommended for day trip or shorter visit. There is a brilliant path that is very wide, flat and safe for small children with bikes.

Other free activities - some of they may need forward planning.

1. Bug collecting
2. Wild life tracking
3. Leaf identification/ match to tree- collect leaves as you go around and ask them match to another tree.
4. Leaf wax rubbings
5. Nature collage
6. Create a journey stick- find a stick and pick up items of your journey and attach the to your stick.
7. Scavenger hunt
8. Park watch- tally the number of red bikes, dog etc.
9. Sketch/ paint- you can take material to draw the scenery.
10. Photography- to give them a camera to take their own picks (obviously not expensive ones)
11. Sports/physical games like football, cricket or tig.
12. Sound safari- monitor sounds
13. Role play- act out favourite stories
14. Flower safari- search flowers
15. Sensory walk- blindfold them and get the to feel and smell objects
16. Bark rubbing
17. Create an outdoor sculpture
18. Twig shapes
19. Whistle the grass
20. Make a mud pie

Paid activities also include golf , boat rides and I think tennis.


Sarah
Dylan 4.9 and Zac 2.1

Board Game TOTB: Guess Who

 
 
 
 
 



This is the first of the Board Game Thinking Outside Of The Box series.
The inspiration for this is that both my son and I like to invent new games to play and using games that we already had is loads of fun.

This game was one of my favourite and most played game of my childhood. The age indicates 6+ but I brought it for my son when he first turned 4. I would say he soon learned what questions to ask and steered away from copying the questions. The only problem is that he needs another person who isn't playing to read the names to him.










Here are TEN TOTB ideas for Guess Who

1. We could do a scientific observation of the people. Link it to variation of the population and use numeracy skills to track the characteristics that are the most popular in the sample of people from the population. Two people could do it and then compare results and discuss reliability.
2. Also he could use oracy skills to describe the individuals and the other person can guess.
3. You could use drawing skills to copy the individual for the other person to guess.
4. You could draw your own Guess Who character maybe a self portrait.
5. With the animal sheet you can also do a scientific survey and tally according to group of vertebrate.
6. You could use the names for the people and animals and get them to write them on a piece of paper
7. You could do a literacy content analysis of how many names start with each letter of the alphabet.
8. This same idea could be used to analyse the colours of the rainbow.
9. Math coordinates could be used to signal the target i.e 2 across and 2 up starting from the bottom left.
10. Story telling we could use the characters as characters in a story that we are going to make up. We could also combine story telling dice to help derive the rest of the plot.


I will post how we get on doing these activities ASAP!
This is not a sponsored post!

Storytelling telling pyramid

We played a story telling game with storytelling dice.

Dylan made a pyramid out of the dice and then we used the pictures in the pyramid to make up a story.

I recorded his story. It was very strange but I'm sure with practise they will make sense .

Storytelling dice and flash cards game

After the Lego dice game we used the numbered dish and placed flash cards and storytelling dice in the sections. We rolled the dice to select and then he wrote or drew what was on them.

This one I helped to bilious confidence 

 

Then he searched through the flash cards to match to the dice .

We will try this again practising writing and making up stories. 

Chalking Mad

The other day we visited our local Sima warehouse and came across a pack of huge chalk . So today I thought lets blog hop and find ideas. 

I've just remembered brick dominoes 

So we started off just free styling on the drive and Dylan drew a maze , Zac scribbled over the shapes we drew.

Dylan's maze (zac called a ladder)

Then I drew a hopscotch grid and we played that. ( not neat on the blocks but was ok)

Then I got them to squirt trace the numbers .

Then the paint brushes came out.

And next the scrubbing brush.

We tried a maze but it was too bumpy. 

So we made a brick road.

So we drew a few white lines to look like a road.

Then came brick vehicles

A bus.

I made a rainbow brick but Dylan was still hooked on the road .

Zac started to match up colours then he rubbed it and coloured over it .

The easel wasn't a huge hit.

The chalk bodies on the shed was though.

I drew the outline and they added features.

Could get one together but the shed now looks like this ,,,

Finally the trampoline . I wrote nimbers and drew shapes and they had to Boyce on the one I said.

Then the drawing and name writing .

Then we had lunch . Not sure if we will be doing anymore today!