May 1, 2020

One of our favorite toddler art activities is painting on foil paper. Using a paintbrush is fun, but for an additional fine motor challenge, they can also use cotton swabs, Popsicle sticks, and their hands. The aluminum foil makes the painting shimmer, and the interesting metallic surface creates a shiny and slippery appearance. 

Fine Motor Skills and Gross Motor/Color/Cognitive/concentration

The objective of this game is to drop the ball through the opening. Critical thinking is the key to making the ball or marble drop. Teagan appeared focused as she maneuvered the box side to side. She is discovering a technique that would help her make the ball drop. As children engage with different materials, they form ideas and techniques in how things work. Following their pace is essential to their development and their way of understanding things.

The children are learning about colors using recycled bathroom tissue rolls. Teagan used colored pom-poms, and Annabelle seemed to be using delicious colored jelly beans.

Color/Creativity/Imagination

Suncatchers cease to amaze children as they swirl the colors and see them change. As children swirl their colors or not, they can create abstract or specific designs. ​

Shape/Counting/Color/Fine Motor Skills/Eye-hand COORDINATION/COGNITIVE

Our environment is a learning tool; for example, shapes are everywhere. We see a variety of geometric shapes outside (street signs) and inside our homes. Annabelle and Teagan had a big circle shape ​made with masking tape.​ Then they had to investigate and look for different things that had a ​round circle ​shape. Incorporating ​natural​ materials to learn math enables us to implement ​fun and ​​hands-on activities. It also helps children to become more aware of their environment as they learn math.

​Using pipe cleaners to form different shapes or patterns allow children to use their imagination as they maneuver the pipe cleaners. They naturally focus on the sides of the shapes by connecting each colorful pipe cleaner.

Teagan used her Lego cars to create the line pattern!

Concentration/Cognitive/Language/Listening Skills

The children listened to a read aloud, The Dot by Peter H. Reynolds. The art class is over, but Vashti, the little in the story, has a blank sheet of paper. Her teacher smiled. "Just make a mark and see where it takes you." The words of her teacher are a gentle invitation to express herself. But Vashti can't draw - she's no artist. To prove her point, Vashti jabs at a blank sheet of paper to make an unremarkable and angry mark. "There!" she says.  That one little dot marks the beginning of Vashti's journey of surprise and self-discovery. I believe that there is an artist in every child. Aria's drawing is one of many art pieces that describe the artist in her.

Our Virtual Class and activities!

We played a color game.  I articulated the different fruits, and they had to observe and guess what color they all were.

Using felt material and different shapes, we created a face as the children pointed to their facial features. We counted how​ many​ eyes, nose, and ears they have. We did this activity twice during the week, but the second time we added eyebrows​ to the face. ​ 

 We were learning about colors using pom-poms. We listened to the Spanish song, Cual es to color favorite? We articulated the colors in Spanish and English, and then we counted how many pom-poms we had. 

Using our instruments as we sing. Janet created her homemade guitar using recycled materials. 

Singing and counting Five Little Monkeys using a felt material glove.

Counting how many spoons we have and then showing the number (six).

Learning about shapes as we explore our home environment!

Ophelia’s structure!

Ophelia: “A big house!”