Coloring Circles

Take a piece of paper (we used the big floor paper) and draw circles of all different sizes with a black sharpie, some overlapping, some inside one another, some just out on their own. Then color each portion of the circle it's own color, making sure not to let the same color touch.

This is a perfect winter afternoon activity because everyone can lay on the floor and color together and everyone gets to be creative... the more colors used the better! It also takes awhile to complete and can be put away and finished later without much effort.

The other reason I really liked this activity is it really helped enforce the concept of "coloring within the lines" (what a concept, huh?!).

New Years Kids Journaling Page

We love our This Is Me journal, but I've used it more for inspiration to come up with our own pages. Jacob writes or draws on blank 8 1/2 X 11 paper and I'm saving them all in a manila envelope until I have enough to bind - probably in a couple years.

I found this link today that has a list of questions that would be fun to do once or twice a year; maybe in January, maybe on a birthday, maybe whenever. It's up to you, but it's sure fun to look back even one year later. I can't wait to pull these things out when my kiddos are in high school.

rice activity

I did this rice activity with the girls, and they loved it! (little did they know it was educational) It told me a lot about where they were in their abilities. I knew Kylie was more coordinated, but I didn't realize the extent of the differences. It was interesting!

I started with pouring a bag of rice in a large bowl, and had Kylie hold the funnel over a pan while Stella scooped rice from the bowl into the funnel. Then they switched. I then had 3 different sized small bowls for them to fill-up, but like before, one had to hold the funnel, and one had to pour the rice, and then they had to agree when the bowl was full, or if it needed more. This encouraged them to work together and trust each other. I didn't let the one pouring to touch the funnel, and vice versa. We talked about how many scoops it took to fill up each bowl, and why it was less scoops when Kylie did it (her scooper was always full) than when Stella did it (her scooper was barely half-full).

After they both had a turn filling the bowls, I then had them each hold their own funnel while they filled up bowls. Kylie had no problem with this; Stella, on the other hand, spilled her rice all over creation with her first try, and opted to just fill-up the pan instead of the small bowls. I think with practice Stella will get much better with her hand-eye coordination (at least I hope so!).