Reggio to Rainbow

I have always loved the Reggio approach to education.  I incorporated a lot of its aspects into my classroom once upon a time.  The above photo was on Pinterest and comes from atelierpourenfants.blogspot.fr  I was so inspired by it.

I went in search of clay and decided to go to my local dollar store, because it's inexpensive and didn't know how well the project would go over. They only had rainbow clay and that's okay. 1) G loves rainbows and 2) it was cheap. I didn't want to invest a lot of money in clay if G was interested.

But G WAS interested - intrigued even.  She loved molding the clay aka tree bases and adding different twigs to make the trees - big and small, straight up or "very branchy".

Roo, who is 20 months, also LOVED making the trees.  She spent about 30 minutes making her trees.  She likes to do everything that big sister does, but also this is her kind of project.  She likes to figure things out.

The above was my Rainbow Forest.

This above photo is G and Roo's Rainbow Forest.  G has plays to expand her Rainbow Forest.  "We need to make it big enough for all the animals of the world." She said.  I had to go pick up 4 more packs of Rainbow clay.  In between breakfast and preschool this morning, we were making more trees for the Rainbow Forest.  I smile, because I think in true Reggio fashion, we have a project lead by the child's interest and it is a project that it being added to and growing with the child's thoughts and imagination.

Have a fun and playful day
Mel

Water Beads

 So I was wandering around my local Dollar Tree and found this kit! It's a grow your own water bead kit.  Great for a mini science lesson and for sensory.  All for a buck.

 At first, they are teeny tiny, but, after a couple hours, they are marble size.  I couldn't resist taking pics of the stages - how colorful and happy they are.

 I also bought this mini fishbowl at the Dollar Tree.  It's the perfect size but glass.

 The above photo was taken after 20 mins...

 These photos were within 2 hours.

 They feel all wet and jelly like - super cool.

Yep, that's what I am doing on a Saturday morning!

Have a fun & play weekend
Mel

Math Games Mondays - Minions

BANANA!!!

Okay, who doesn't like the minions?  They are so funny!  My 3 year old nephew calls them BEE-BOs and even my 17 year old likes them.  One sure fire way to get your kids to learn is to center the games and activities around things they like.

When you think of minions, you think of math, right?  No?  Well, I cam up with a simple math game for Math Games Mondays series all about minions and math.

I found minions playing cards at my local Dollar Tree dollar store and the banana candies (because minions LOOOOVE bananas!) at a local toy store.  So, $1.00 for the playing cards and $1.99 for the candy.  You don't have to use candy.  You can use buttons, pennies, anything you want for counters.

It's a simple one to one correspondence game.  Your child needs to put one banana candy onto each spade or heart.  Have them count "one" then put the candy on, then count "two" and put the candy on.  Do this until they he has the correct number of bananas.  By counting out loud and one at the time, it is showing number value.

Repeat until all 5 spades are covered...

or all  hearts...

or all 3 clubs.

You can adapt this game for anything your child may be interested in at the time. Go with the flow and the learning will flow.

Have a fun & playful day
Mel