artistic expression
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Making Leprechaun Traps
Designing and building leprechaun traps has become one of our favorite traditions. I think the planning and creating is just as much fun as the anticipation of seeing if they’ll actually catch anything! This is one of those projects that really evokes my favorite memories of the kinds of activities that I loved as a child – the opportunity to use any and all materials to create something that I can see in my mind. That’s definitely a major reason that this stays on my plans year after year. Here are some of the supplies that I make sure to have available when it’s time to build our leprechaun traps:…
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Loose Parts for Valentine’s Day
There’s something about tiny little pieces of pretty much anything that little ones just can’t resist – and I’m here for it because it keeps their attention forever! When it comes to Valentine’s day, I dive all the way into the red, pink, and glittery. Here are some of the loose parts that I love for a Valentine provocation: I put them all on a heart tray, and that helped make them even more enticing – don’t you want to play with all of this?! Here are some of the beautiful images that we created with these pieces – After I made a heart with a necklace that became the…
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Valentine Crafting for Kids
We had a snow day this week! As a teacher, that’s always welcome – as a parent it’s a bit of a scramble to find things to keep my girl busy all day. I had a good feeling that this particular snow day was coming, so I tried to plan ahead. Art projects are always a good option! After working on some of my own projects on Tuesday, I put my leftover supplies (along with some others from our craft stash) together so that they’d be all ready for some Valentine’s Day crafting. I started with this tray. It’s been one of my all-time-favorite purchases – it’s a heavy melamine,…
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Messy Art for Preschool – Rubber Band Snap Painting
I’m not sure that I’m in majority, but I love love love messy art projects. Yes, they are a pain to clean up, but they are such a fun experience for the children because they never get to do stuff like this at home, and it’s always a new way to experience the materials that you’re using. As for the cleaning part, the children are usually just as excited to help me clean up as they are to actually do the activity. Here is one of my all-time favorite messy art projects: Rubber Band Snap Painting doesn’t require a ton of materials. You’ll need some sort of tray or shallow…
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DIY Ribbon Rings
I have a hard time believing that I’ve never shared this easy DIY – It’s my all time favorite indoor movement activity, and I’ve been known to gift Toddlers and preschoolers on my shopping list with some favorite music and their very own sets of DIY ribbon rings. I’ve seen a number of varieties of ribbon wands over the years, but I’m partial to the rings because they are easier for little hands to hold onto, and they pose fewer opportunities for accidental injuries when the dancing gets wild. Rings also require no glue or tape at all because you can tie the ribbon right around the ring itself, so…
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Movement Art
I planned an entire series of posts for this week thinking “It’s February, everyone’s been cooped up inside all winter and we need to MOVE.” Ha, clearly the joke is on me because it’s supposed to be 60 degrees all week here where I am so, all the little ones I know will get plenty of outside time. If the same can’t be said of your home, then this week is for you! If you’re lucky like me and getting some warm weather then be sure to stash these activities away for cold rainy days that are sure to come your way before spring officially gets here. This particular activity…
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Teaching Children to Use Loose Parts
When you incorporate loose parts into your classroom for the first time, there is bound to be a learning curve. You’ll have to teach the children appropriate ways to use the Marian’s, and model how to be creative with them. Many of your children may not be familiar with open-ended materials like these and they may not choose to use them simply because they aren’t sure how. Here are some tips for teaching children to use these types of materials; Incorporate them slowly – start with one or two different types of loose parts that you use for planned activities, then leave these in the classroom for children to explore.…
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Storing and Organizing Loose Parts
Organizing all of those loose parts is important because they are usually smaller objects. If you don’t keep on top of that organization you can easily have a great big mess of loose parts. Here are some of the strategies that I’ve used to keep my loose parts organized; Bins with drawers – these are perfect because you can choose the size of drawer that works best for the items you need to store Tubs with lids – when I buy tubs with lids I’m very intentional to purchase the ones that my materials will fit in best. Storage space is a hot commodity and I hate to waste it…
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Where to find loose parts
As preschool teachers, it’s in our nature to hold onto things. We just can’t help it, we might be able to use that for something! I know how deep this runs, I’ve been out of the classroom for almost two years now and I still have a collection of empty containers in one of the cabinets in my office – they might come in handy one day! Collecting loose parts plays to this piece of our “hold onto that” mentality. The most difficult thing about loose parts is that you often need a fair amount of whatever item you want to use. You need enough that the children can actually…
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Loose Parts Inspiration
I am a huge fan of loose parts for a couple of reasons; They encourage creativity – if you give five children a basket of pebbles, a bucket of twigs, and a collection of old keys they will all find different ways to use the items. They are easy to gather – loose parts are usually natural or recycled. They won’t cost you a lot of money and often the children can be involved in collecting them, which motivates them to explore these items after they’ve been gathered. They fit into so many different centers – use your loose parts as counters in your math center, materials for exploring weight/volume/mass…
