Bendaroos Activities

Bendaroos... my girls have packs and packs of these.  Didn't realize that it would be one of little man's new creative toys.  He discovered that he can twist them and form them and then stick them on the chalk board. 

And if they start to fall off.. "Mommy, I need tape, pwease."  Such a calming activity for him and he will play with these Bendaroos for such a long period of time. 

Why Bendaroos for your toddler/preschooler?
 -sensory/fine motor play
 -teach colors
 -creative thinking
 -counting
 -to form letters or numbers

You also find more learning activities organized by age level on Bendaroos main site.

Do your children play/creative with Bendaroos?  If so, share ideas... please!!

Jen

Toilet Paper Roll Color Match

A HUGE THANK YOU to.... 

 for this awesome upcycle idea!

The Princess and The Tot: Toilet Paper Roll Sorter

My version is very similar, except I added a different feature on the back.   I listed the numbers one to five on the back for counting activities and number recognition.

 

If I can get more than one use from a manipulative, I'm all for it- saves time and money!

 

Little man is loving his new desk!  Isn't it adorable?

A special gift from his Aunt.

Be sure to stop by Princess and the Tot to see other great hands-on activities for little learners!

Jen

St. Patrick's Day Learning Center

These adorable Leprechaun hats jumped out at me at the $ store and I knew I had to create some learning fun for the kids with them. 

I created these 5 activities.....

1. Match the colored pom poms to the colors in the hats.

2.Hide one or more leprechauns under the hats.  
Have your child try to find it and then give
them a chance to hide the leprechaun.
Leprechauns from FamilyFun.

3.Use a pom pom or a gold coin
and ask your child to find the letter.



4. Count the shamrocks. 
(laminated shamrocks glued to small straws)



5.  Or just let your little one pretend to be a 
 leprechaun! 



Okay, I fibbed, I have one last activity for older kiddos.  Line up the hats in a row.  Put the number 5, 10, 15, 20, and 25 inside the hats. They are going to be like targets.  Next, toss a ping pong ball or pom pom into the hats.  The smaller number will be closer and the highest number will be farther away.  Have your child toss the ball three times and add up the score.  The person with the higher number wins!

What ideas do you have for these cute little hats?

Jen

Color It By Numbers Review and Giveaway

It's always fun to try out new kid friendly products, so I was happy to share Color It By Numbers with the girls.  Color It by Numbers has a series of online color books: Princesses, Vehicles, and Animals.  Each color book has three variations that can be chosen to color- simple, make it visible, or choose your favorite colors(no numbers).

Peanut chose the Princess color book.  She enjoyed both the color by number feature and the more creative- choose your favorite color feature.  After discovering a little rainbow crayon, she found that she could switch the colors in her artist's palette, also.

The Animal Color book was Sunshine's choice.  She selected the make it visible option because it was more challenging compared to the simple variation.  The toucan and the octopus were her favorite pictures to color.  She said that she had fun working on her creations.  One feature that she mentioned that she liked was the ability to move back and forth among pictures without her current picture being erased.

The girls seemed to have a lot of fun with the online color books, but it hasn't been something that they've asked me to play on repeatedly.  I think that when it comes to painting- they prefer the real thing- to get messy!

I think the simple color by number would be fun for preschoolers to practice number recognition and colors.  A good way to integrate beginning technology for little ones!

To learn more, take a short video tour!

Giveaway......Now for the good part- I get to give away one virtual color book to one of my readers. (valued at $9.99)  Here's how to enter- visit the Color It By Numbers site and take a peek at each of the virtual products.  Next come back to Creative and Curious Kids! and comment about which color book you think your child would enjoy. 

For extra entries:
1-follow Creative and Curious Kids!
1-subscribe
1-like Creative and Curious Kids! on Facebook
1-like Color It By Numbers on Facebook
1-tweet post
1-follow me on twitter
2-blog about this giveaway

Be sure to leave a separate comment for each entry!
Also, please be sure to include contact info. - email or blog address, etc.

(Giveaways ends on August 5th at 12:00am EST.)

Good Luck,
Jen

Disclosure: I was given 3 different versions of Color It by Numbers virtual color books to download for the purposes of this review. I was not compensated in any other way.  The opinions above are mine and my differ from others.