A collection of fun and educational shape activities for preschoolers to develop their early understanding of geometry.
Activities that develop early math skills are our favourites! We love working on our number recognition, counting skills, subitising and 1:1 correspondence. This “Build a City” activity…
Try these easy activities for fine motor practise with preschoolers using simple household items for different types of button stacking.
Kiddos have a natural sense of wonder and desire to explore, experiment, and discover. I chose…
Learn how to make sensory bags for preschool, pre-k, and kindergarten students to practice writing, drawing, and creating on.
This post shares 5 simple, toddler and preschool-friendly ice cream-themed activities as well as 5 ice cream journal activity ideas great for preschoolers, and ice cream-themed book recommendations to go along with the play theme. These hands-on, play-based activities cover skills such as counting a
This post shares a variety of different developmentally appropriate activities to do at home with 12-18 month old toddlers. Many of the activities require minimal prep and use common household materials. Activities in this post build fine motor skills, vocabulary, and hand-eye coordination.
Planting lifelong foundations in early childhood
Set up a fun phonics activity for preschoolers and school aged children with this sorting objects into baskets game! Easy, low-preparation and adaptable
Here are 22 circle time ideas for toddlers and preschoolers that are easy, fun, and perfect for social development!
Head out on a treasure hunt with the kids today and make Nature Faces with your findings. Terrific self-portrait art project for toddlers and preschoolers!
The Happy Learners' Club Junior Club is our highly popular kids' activity membership for busy parents with 2 to 5 years old children. *Thank you for your interest in THLC. Doors to THLC is now closed. The next enrollment is happening from 18 to 23 May 2024. **If you have children between 6 to 8...
Happy Spring! It is finally getting warmer here in California and we are loving it. We have been spending most of our days playing outside as much as we can....
This educational counting game is perfect for little learners who are ready to learn! This learning game is perfect to help learn how to count and recognize numbers. This bundle is perfect for preschool and kindergarten learning! This learning game is perfect to add with other games to add to a busy book for extended learning
FREE printable Symmetry drawing activity for preschool and kindergarten kids. A fun art and math activity in one! Kids will complete the symmetrical pictures by drawing the other half.
Pinay Homeschooler is a blog that shares homeschool and afterschool activity of kids from babies to elementary level.
Make a hands-on seasons activity for kids using rocks or stones, wooden circles, and some stickers! Children can sort the picture stones onto the appropriate wooden circle depicting either spring, summer, winter or fall. Such a great way to encourage discussion about the differences between the four seasons! Follow our Creative Learning Pinterest board! …
I've been wanting to post this project for a year. This rainbow collage invitation was presented to my art camp kids one year ago today, which just happened to be the same day as the Pulse night
These insect printables are such a fun learning activity for kids to do in the spring or when learning about bugs! These pages can help kids practice fine motor skills, handwriting, scissor skills, memory, problem-solving, and more. These activities are great for preschool, pre k, and kindergarten children. Use them at home with your kids or in the classroom!
Learn how to make sensory bags for preschool, pre-k, and kindergarten students to practice writing, drawing, and creating on.
Whether you have one kid or ten, circle time games are fun for all. Try out these games to bring some fun to your circle time.
Image result for circle time board ideas for preschool Image result for circle time board ideas for
Check out tons of color mixing activities for toddler, preschool, pre-k & kindergarten students. Post includes ideas, activities, & freebies!
Create a colorful sponge painted ice cream cone craft with this easy summer craft for kids! A fun craft for kids of all ages!
These 5 hands-on ways to sort by color are a great way to engage students in this essential early learning skill!
Can you guess what I have been noticing lately? It is something that makes this mama and teacher's heart so happy. I have noticed an increased focus on math and number activities for preschool! I remember very well when the focus seemed to be solely on learning those ABCs. But slowly and surely, I have
Anya, the founder of Montessori From The Heart, is an educational coach, a blogger, an author, a digital creator, and an influencer.
Create patterns, swirls or zig-zags with colourful buttons, great for fine motor learning centre activity. Easy to set up and children enjoy hands-on activities
Seed sorting activity for garden or vegetable week at preschool.
The preschool years are a time of exploration and discovery. They are also filled with learning a lot about what makes us unique individuals. Recently, I started working with my toddler on identifying and naming body parts and reading various All About Me Books. Today we’re sharing a fun all about me preschool science activity...Read More
Making your own DIY nature paint brushes is a fun and unique way to create art while also getting outside and exploring the world around you.
This All About Me printable book is a great way for preschool and kindergarten kids to practice early literacy skills. AND you get to learn more about your students along the way. You can grab a copy by clicking on the Fun-A-Day.com link.
Whether it’s first day of preschool or a birthday, this Preschool All About Me Caterpillar is a wonderful way to get to know more about our children.
This Australia sensory bin is perfect for NAIDOC week or Australia day. It's a fun and easy sensory activity for toddlers and preschoolers.
Laura @inspiremyplay Founder of @inspiremyplay, Early Years teacher for 11 years and mummy to three gorgeous girls. I'm passionate about about the benefits of play in early childhood. This post may contain affiliate links. This means that if you click on a link and go on to make a purchase, I may receive a small commission (at no additional cost to you). Please read my disclosure policy for more details. I often get asked for recommendations about what to buy to use with the PlayTRAY. The world of sensory and small world play can feel overwhelming! Where do I start? What are the must-have items? Do I really need to buy it all? There are definitely some basic items that are useful to have (scoops and bowls for example) but beyond that my advice is always start with your child's interests! What fascinates them? What will excite them and draw them into play? And yes, some of these items you might already have at home, or something that will work as an adequate substitute. So don't feel you need to buy everything, not all at once at least! By popular request I've put together a range of options for resources and supplies to go with the PlayTRAY based on different interests and themes. If you are giving the PlayTRAY as a gift, these ideas are a great way of filling the PlayTRAY to make something truly special to open! Many of these setups are a hybrid of bought resources and natural items. Where possible I've included links to resources to make it easier for you to source things to go with the PlayTRAY but please be aware that Amazon don't always direct you to the exact product I've selected, so do just check prices against other listings if they seem unusually high! As always do be aware of the age-appropriateness of the resources you choose. For example I wouldn't use the glass stones featured in some of these set ups until you are sure that your child won't put them in their mouth. To find out more about our award winning PlayTRAY visit our product page or click the links below. Sensory Play Starter Kit When it comes to sensory play there are definitely some tools that are invaluable! The set of resources pictured here will allow you to set up a range of activities. Bowls and scoops are a must for filling and pouring with dry materials like rainbow rice, oats and sand. These activities are the foundation of sensory play and I can guarantee you will get a huge amount of use out of them! The handy tools set by Learning Resources is another great investment for use with the PlayTRAY. Each tool is designed to work on developing children's fine motor skills and hand strength. We find these great to use with water play and for use with pom-poms and waterbeads. Another tool that is very useful is a set of liquid droppers. You can find them all via our Amazon store button below. Buy Sensory Play Tools & Equipment (Amazon US) Buy Sensory Play Tools & Equipment (Amazon UK) To complement these tools I've chosen a couple of popular sensory play materials- rainbow rice and play dough. You can find out how to colour rice here and how to make our super-simple no cook play dough recipe here. Another great starter option would be to buy a pack of waterbeads! Construction Tray Construction play is so much fun and a brilliant way to gift the PlayTRAY to any vehicle enthusiast! An option for a quick and easy base is to buy some play sand or kinetic sand. If you have a bit more time why not try making our sand play dough or use pantry items such as black beans, dried chickpeas and pasta, which are great for transporting with little vehicles. You can even use cereal, which is a great option for our youngest PlayTRAYers who are still mouthing! When it comes to vehicles there are two sets that I recommend. Le Van Toys make a gorgeous wooden set of vehicles that we love but we tend to save these for less messy set ups. If you are looking for versatility & value for money, CAT make a plastic set of vehicles that can be used for wet sensory play, like oobleck, and easily be cleaned afterwards. Both can be bought via the button link below. Buy Construction Play Resources (Amazon US) Buy Construction Play Resources (Amazon UK) Dinosaur PlayTRAY We used kinetic sand for the base of this dinosaur tray but this one could also be set up with play dough or pantry items. If you're looking for greenery for small world play, a good place to start is a pet shop. Plastic plants for a fish tank or reptile terrariums work really well as vegetation! These wooden slices and green boulders are something we use for a lot of different play scenarios. In fact, all of these items you will find useful to reuse! Buy Dinosaur Play Resources (Amazon US) Buy Dinosaur Play Resources (Amazon UK) Ocean Tray This is one of our favourite themes! Water play is a great place to start with the PlayTRAY and these resources will enable them to build their own watery worlds! Although we collect a lot of shells at the beach ourselves I do recommend the pack of shells from Amazon to give you a great selection of different types. We do love our Schleich animals but I also find this pack of assorted sea creatures invaluable! Because these are comparatively cheap I don't mind using them in all sorts of messy play scenarios like setting them in jelly or popping them in the freezer for some ice play! Buy Ocean Play Resources (Amazon US) Buy Ocean Play Resources (Amazon UK) Frozen themed PlayTRAY This one is such a hit in our house! We've also made this Frozen play dough kit as a gift for a few friends and it always seems to go down well. I painted Elsa and Anna peg dolls for this, but if you prefer you could buy little frozen characters (there are lots of options on Amazon). Check out our Frozen play dough kit blog post for full details on how to put this together. Buy Frozen Play Resources (Amazon US) Buy Frozen Play Resources (Amazon UK) Birthday Cake Sensory Play This is the perfect way to gift the PlayTRAY for a birthday and is one of my kids' all time favourite sensory play set-ups. This uses cloud dough for the base, which is a mixture of flour and oil. It's powdery, yet mouldable so it works well with cookie cutters and to make pretend cakes- you can poke in the candles and they will stand up! I added a little bit of vanilla essence to this to give it a gorgeous cakey smell. Adding candles is a must for this and if you can find some number ones too then it is a great opportunity to work on counting and number recognition. You can find the instructions below to make cloud dough. If you'd like a slightly cleaner option than you could substitute the cloud dough for playdough, but still add the vanilla essence- it's a must! Buy Birthday Play Resources (Amazon US) Buy Birthday Play Resources (Amazon UK) Space Tray These space figures from Safari are the perfect size for small world play! Use them with a base of black beans or make some moon cloud dough. Again, these can be substituted for black or grey play dough. I actually made these planets using air-dry clay but below I've suggested a set of planets that you can buy instead. Buy Space Play Resources (Amazon US) Buy Space Play Resources (Amazon UK) Arty Crafty PlayTRAY Okay, so this isn't small world or sensory play as such but the PlayTRAY compartments are a brilliant size for holding craft items so I had to include it! This is also a really inexpensive way to fill the PlayTRAY. Take a trip to a supermarket or craft store to stock up on crafty items. Alternatively, you can find some of our favourite craft supplies linked below. Buy Art & Craft Resources (Amazon US) Buy Art & Craft Resources (Amazon UK) I hope that's given you plenty of inspiration for resources to use with PlayTRAY and how you can gift it in an exciting and original way! Do pin this article to refer to later and for more PlayTRAY ideas do follow us on Instagram at @inspiremyplay. You can also find a selection of our favourite play recipes and PlayTRAY set ups in our PlayTRAY ebook.
Can you guess what I have been noticing lately? It is something that makes this mama and teacher's heart so happy. I have noticed an increased focus on math and number activities for preschool! I remember very well when the focus seemed to be solely on learning those ABCs. But slowly and surely, I have
