Butterfly Match

I bought two packages of butterfly party favors so the children can play a matching game. C also likes to sort them by color and line them up in patterns.

What's it shaping up to be?

I cut shapes out of construction paper in a variety of colors and sizes. I challenged C "Can you make a sailboat? A house? A tree?" and he arranged the shapes to his interpretation. I also took a turn creating and asked C to guess as I added shapes to see how quickly he could figure out what I was making. C also created freely and had me guess what he'd made.

*Variation: Once you've made an arrangement you like, glue it down on another piece of construction paper for an art piece.

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Naming Colors

Area Tested: Naming Colors

Color recognition - the basic colors are held up to your child one at a time and your child is simply asked to identify the name of each band of color.
red yellow blue green purple brown black orange

Activities to strengthen color recognition:

1. I Spy (a red..., a yellow..., etc.)

2. Car Color Game - while riding in the car, have a hunt for cars of a certain color

3. Sort, match, count colored items (popcorn kernels, pom poms, buttons, etc.)

4. Color 8 sections of a paper plate and 8 clothespins with the colors. Have your child match and clip the clothespins to the plate.

5. Books that reinforce color recognition -

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr. and Eric Carle

Color Dance by Ann Jonas

Mouse Paint by Ellen Stoll Walsh

Little Blue and Little Yellow by Leo Lionni

Making Colored Noodles

Materials: Noodles, zip top baggies, food coloring, rubbing alcohol

1. Decide on what kind of noodles you want to use. To make noodle jewelry, find pasta with a hole in the center.

2. Use as many zip top bags as colors you want.

3. Place the desired amount of noodles into each bag.

4. Pour just enough rubbing alcohol in the bag so all the noodles are covered.

5. Add a generous amount of food coloring to each baggie of noodles.

6. Put the bags of noodles aside and let them sit until they are the desired color-- the longer they sit, the brighter the colors.

7. Remove from the baggies and spread in a single layer on paper towels to dry.

8. Craft away!

DO NOT EAT. It may take hours for coloring and up to 24 hours to dry. Store in an airtight container for future use.

*Variation: Colorations® Liquid Watercolors work to dye noodles as well.

Finals Week Notice

I'm getting into finals week for the last time ever. I am one week away from graduating with high honors in the field of early childhood education! Please forgive my condensed activities until I can resume regular posting.

**Find 10 things in your house that are BLUE (or your child's favorite color.)**

Paint Sample Color Seriation

This is a freebie activity! Next time you are at a home supply store or any store that carries paint, pick up doubles of a few paint sample cards.

For younger kids:

With one card, leave whole.

With its match, cut apart.

Match the cut-outs to the whole card.

For older kids:

Use cut apart cards with no reference card to match to. It's tricky- the more shades on the card, the more visual discrimination comes into play.

Storage Idea: Envelopes

*Variation: Seriate sandpaper by roughness, fabric by texture, objects by physical characteristics like height or weight.

Bouncy Painting

In the middle is 3 primary colors of tempera- red, yellow and blue, in an old film reel lid. Our paintbrushes are nylons filled with rice and tied off. Just bounce into the paint and splat on the paper. Wonderful fun! The kids started bouncing right along with the nylons. I wish I would have taken an after picture, because the ground was splotchy too! It's addicting really. My quite obvious recommendation for this one is outdoors.

Pom Pom Sort

80 ct. assorted Pom Poms, $1 @ Dollar Tree

Collapsible Storage Box, $1 @ Dollar Tree

Another color sorting activity requires crafting pom poms and a divided container of some sort. I found this one with 8 sections at Dollar Tree, but you could use cups, dishes, plastic lids, 6-pack rings, dessert cups, pinch bowls, recycled clean plastic fruit cups...just about anything that makes for clear visual "dividers" so children can easily see groupings.

I just poured the pom poms onto the ground and let C decide how he was going to sort them. It was tricky because a few of the shades were visually hard for him to discriminate (white, pink) and he had to decide what shades could be put together (green, neon green).

*Variation: Buy a package with different sizes and colors of pom poms and challenge children to find new ways to sort them.

*Variation: For younger children, choose basic colors and remove some of the shades. Give them a jump start by placing one pom pom of each color into the groupings you are looking for.

Clothespin Color Sort

This is a hit with the younger preschool crowd.

Plastic Tumblers set x 6, $1 @ Dollar Tree
Plastic Clothespins set x 15, $1 @ Dollar Tree

Opportunity for color sorting and fine motor development, priceless! Pile the clothespins and your child can pinch them open to attach to the right color of cup. Fine motor development helps your child strengthen finger and hand muscles, useful for learning to hold and manipulate writing utensils.

*Variation: Younger children can drop them into the cups.

*Variation: Go on a search around the house for items of each color that fit in the cup.

*Variation: Color with marker on wooden clothespins to match the color of cups you already have available. The more colors and cups you have, the more challenging it will be!