ABC and 123: A Learning Collaborative: Fun Friday

Showing posts with label Fun Friday. Show all posts

Friday, September 14, 2012

Fun for Friday: Apple-onia

Michelle, from The Nature of Grace, put together a fun, fall series about a special little apple. The adventures of this personified apple lend themselves nicely to inquiry and creative writing. Even without the basic lessons included in this activity this would be a fun fall tradition for families with young children. Here are a few preview pictures of this clever idea. You will want to click over to check out the details!

{Meet Apple-onia}

{A special puzzle to figure out}

{Apple-onia with a Nutella mask on}

{A magical ending}

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Create Your Own Red Carpet Event

Dinosaur Train fans get ready for a fantastic new ride into the big city! PBS KIDS’ popular show DINOSAUR TRAIN is launching its second season in August, and to kick it off, PBS KIDS is airing a one-hour DINOSAUR TRAIN movie special called Dinosaur Big City on Monday, August 22nd!

My excited children and a group of their friends enjoyed a sneak peek of the new Dinosaur Big City adventure at a movie preview event today. What a treat!

The parent paparazzi was in full force as our own stars walked the red carpet. Some guests were dressed as fancy as it gets and others were decked out in their favorite dinosaur gear.

Our guests were greeted to a fine swag bag that included clapping noise makers for the exciting parts of the show and play sized character figurines for acting out their favorite scenes.

The theme of Dinosaur Big City is based on research from scientific advisors who help DINOSAUR TRAIN bring history to life and make science fun and accessible for kids. Laramidia – the “Dinosaur Big City” – describes an island continent that existed during the Late Cretaceous period and stretches from
modern-day Alaska to Mexico.

During the feature the kids watched as Buddy and his Pteranodon family journeyed on the Dinosaur Train with the theropod friends to the big Theropod Club Convention in Laramidia, the “Dinosaur Big City.” Along the way they met Mayor Kosmoceratops and helped King Cryolophosaurus overcome stage fright.

Our movie critics enjoyed this new adventure with many of their favorite dinosaur characters. They also enjoyed popcorn and lemonade (smiles!). After the movie the kids brainstormed awards they would give the show based on their favorite parts of each episode. They wrote their award titles on paper certificates (an effort to sneak in a little writing activity - wink!).

To read more about the content of Dinosaur Big City, the creators of the movie, or the airing schedule check out the article here. Also, be sure to check out your local PBS listings to figure out what time the movie will be showing in your area on Monday, August 22nd!

A BIG thanks, from our little crew, to PBS KIDS (and their marketing co.) for providing us with all the gear, goodies, and giveaways for a special red carpet morning. The idea to host this sneak peek preview event was theirs, and such a fun idea for an out of the ordinary celebration. One we hope to recreate again sometime.

Friday, January 22, 2010

Penguins

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Anne from Teaching Two share her lesson tips for teaching within a penguin theme.

Make your penguins an iceberg igloo with this penguin inspired project from Teaching Tiny Tots

Thanks to Chelsea at Fantastic Find for sharing this cute pet penguin craft that she put together with her 3 year. It's made with cups, foam, pipe cleaner and pom-poms.

Amanda from Fun Handprint Art sumbitted this adorable Footprint Penguin Family.The post also includes a thumbrint penguins and a January poem. It teaches creativity and fosters imagination.

Always Something to Learn is having all sorts of arctic fun and has shared it with us here: penguin masks, penguin art, a large motor waddling activity, poems, and more!

Dresses and Messes put together a fun penguin counting activity.

Miller Moments incorporated handprints into a penguin art project and fed goldfish to the penguins during a math activity.

Set up your own Antarctic biome with inspiration from Picklebums.

Friday, October 16, 2009

Creative Building Supplies

Welcome to Fun Friday! New to ABC and 123?
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Today's we're talking about building ideas!

Start by drawing a 2D blue print or layout with your child.

Building Materials Used for Fun:
Blocks
Marshmallows and Toothpicks
Legos
Mega Blocks
Blocks of Cheese
House of Cards
PVC Pipes
Bendable Straws
Cardboard Boxes
Gumdrops and Toothpicks
Playdough or Clay

archKIDtecture is a fantastic resource for teaching children of all ages about architecture and building. The site teaches about architectural terms, structure, wacky building stories and more. They suggest building an indoor sand castle and more!

Spend time researching professional building materials necessary for structurally sound construction with your children.

Take a look at Bridge Building.

Friday, October 9, 2009

Families with Purpose

It's Friday!
Who's ready for a little Family Fun?
We hope you all are!

Parenting Humor has an article explaining the basics of setting up a Family Night.

Check out this list of clever Family Fun Night ideas. I think it would be fun to put together a Family Cookbook or Family Mailbox.

Looking for more ideas? How about 101 Family Home Evenings.

TLC shares the plans for 5 nights of Focused Family Fun.

For other meaningful family night activities browse the ideas in our archived life skill posts to find suggestions that tie into key family values you may be working on with your children.

Established a consistent family night. Our family has set aside Fridays this year, but understand that as the kid's get older we will have to change the night to accommodate their recreation and sports schedules. It works for now! Each Friday we choose an activity from our Family Fun box to complete together. To read more about our Family Fun Nights or to see some of the things we've done this year, check out Finally Friday.

Since intentionally planned, focused family fun is so important to our family I was really excited to come across another fantastic family resource. I'd like to introduce you to Families with Purpose.

Families with Purpose is committed to providing Family Fun Ideas and organizational resources. The Families with Purpose Store includes items such as:
Games,
Calendars,

Chore Charts,

Family Planners,

Journals,
Travel Games,

Activities, Gifts and More!

If you'd like to see more of Families with Purpose you may also enjoy their informative Family Life Blog

In addition to our weekly Family Fun Nights, our family is putting "fun" into family dinners with Family Dinner Games. These short, purposeful games are perfect for busy families on the go who still manage to find time for dinner. The game is available in two styles, each game set includes 51 dinner games that will add lively conversation to your dinner table. The sturdy cards are laminated to protect them from spills and come in a colorful hinged top recipe style box with additional room for your personal family dinner recipes.

The games address phonics, vocabulary, math, social skills, memory skills, critical thinking skills, creative thinking, and being silly! They are appropriate for kids ages 3-12. Since my children are on the younger side of this age range we modify some games and/or pick ones where they will be able to participate with ease.

Check out a few Sample Games from the Family Dinner Game set.
Read some similar reactions from a family with children who are a bit older. They have come up with some funny answers for some of the dinner game challenged.

Families with Purpose wants to add to your Family Fun this Friday and in the weeks and years to come! They are offering a $25 gift certificate to their store to 1 of our readers!! You are welcome to shop around to find just the game, activity, gift, or family organizer to fit your family's needs.

WIN!

For your first entry, please take a look at Families with Purpose before commenting here about a product or two that caught your eye.

Additional Entries:
Follow ABC & 123 publicly
Become a fan of ABC & 123 on Facebook
Follow Families with Purpose on Twitter
Become a Fan of Families with Purpose on Facebook
Share an idea for a Family Fun night

This giveaway is open to US residents only until October 23rd at 10 PM EST.

Friday, August 28, 2009

Experimenting with Water

Welcome! New to ABC and 123?
Please check out our FAQ in the left sidebar.

Happy Friday!
Wishing you have oceans of fun with all these water experiements.

Make a sunset in a bottle
Objective: Kids will learn about liquid density in a hands-on way.
Materials: Jars, food coloring, water, cooking oil, rubbing alcohol, beads, glitter and action figures (optional) and hot glue gun (optional).

Create a Tornado Tube with the instructions from Kristi at Orange Juice.

Here is a fun science experiment from The Attached Mama involving cornstarch and water.
The science behind the experiment is described here.

The kids at Growing Up Our Style experimented with color while painting with ice cubes.

Adventures with Kids tested the properties of water while making a Special Soup.

Delightful Learning played with many different objects to determine whether they would float or sink.

Sharon from Teaching Tiny Tots shares the step by step instructions for an experiement on How a Plant Absorbs Water.

One Busy Mama submitted her experiement, Will It Float?

Put together a homemade lava lamp with frozen water.
You freeze rainbow ice cubes (with foodcoloring). Then you just drop the ice cubes into a big jar of oil, as they float and melt it’s a beautiful color show and looks like a rainbow.

Ten Kids and A Dog submitted her link to 3 easy to implement experiements using water.

Joann and her children also had great experiements for their lesson on floating.

Absorption Experiment

Learning Objective: exploring properties of water; actively engages in hands-on science activities

Materials: ice cube tray, medicine dropper, cup of water, small piece of wood, facial tissue, tissue paper, writing paper, paper towel, Unifix cube (or anything plastic), cotton ball, small rock, sponge, aluminum foil, any other materials which will/will not absorb water.

Procedure: Have the child squeeze a few drops of water into each section of the ice cube tray using the medicine dropper. Provide them with a variety of materials for the experiment, some that will absorb water and some that will not. Hand the child one of the items and ask him/her to predict whether it will absorb water or not. The child will place the item in one of the sections of the ice cube tray to see which items absorb water and which do not.

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Tea Party Activities

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August is a great month for a little tea party.
Although, they are enjoyable any month if you ask our 3 year old girly girls!

Set up a Royal Backyard Tea Party .

You may want to serve a rose petal & apple pie!

Adventures of a Flake has a weekly Tea Time Thursday feature on her blog.

Beth and her daughter know all about tea parties. They submitted the following three ideas:
Check out the fancy tea PARTY!

Here is a Fancy Nancy tea party hosted by a local book store. This would make an exciting playdate event as well.

Perhaps you'd like to make your own fancy felt foods for tea time.

Basia lists the key ingredients for a toddler time tea party.

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Blowing Bubbles: Recipes, Activities, Books

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Blowing Bubbles
Margaret Hillert

Dip your pipe and gently blow.
Watch the tiny bubble grow
Big and bigger, round and fat,
Rainbow-colored,
and then
SPLAT!

Tooter4Kids has a great collection of bubble blowing activities and art projects.

Storytime and More made special recipe bubbles and used them to make bubble art.

KinderArt has an inquiry lesson based on bubbles.

Perpetual Preschooler has a list of several different bubble art projects submitted by teachers and parents.

Step by Step has a list of fingerplays and songs about bubbles.

Coolest Kid Parties suggests several soap bubble games appropriate for a bubble party.

Check out this site dedicated to Homemade Bubble Solutions. There is a recipe here for everyone!

If you didn't find one you liked there, check out Fresno Family for more bubble recipes!

Creative Kids at Home shares how to make rainbow bubbles.

Thinking Fountain has an activity that teaches geometry with bubbles.

A baking soda Bubble Bomb is an interesting alternative to soap bubbles.

Xtreme Bubbles shares tips and hints for blowing the biggest, best-est bubbles

Did you know that you can make bubbles out of Karo Syrup?
Did you know that bubbles are the best on humid days?
Did you know that bubbles work best if you don't stir them?
Would you like to learn a bit about the physics of bubbles?

Bubblesphere will answer all sorts of questions you and your kids might have about bubbles.

One Pink Fish has a helpful post on making your own bubble wands

Make a Bubble Tea to drink while you enjoy blowing bubbles!

Books about Bubbles
Bubble, Bubble - Mercer Mayer
Bubbles, Bubbles, Everywhere - Melvin Berger and Dwight Kuhn
Bubbles, Rainbows, & Worms : science experiments - Sam Brown
Bubble Trouble - Mary Packard
Clifford Counts Bubbles - Norman Bridwell
Grandpa's Secret Potion - Holly Hartman
The Bubble Factory - Tomie dePaola
The Unbelievable Bubble Book - John Cassidy

Bubble Trouble
When I'm blowing a bubble,
it's always a sphere -
With a dipper that's square,
rounded bubbles appear.
With a three-sided dipper,
I still get round bubbles.
Blowing bubbly cubes
is giving me troubles!

Friday, May 22, 2009

Sidewalk Chalk

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For today's Fun Friday Activity, we're highlighting sidewalk chalk, it's a fun way to take art outside, but don't stop there. There are almost as many ways to use sidewalk chalk as there are ways to make it. Have fun!

Recipes

All Free Crafts has a recipe for sidewalk chalk.
Mom's Budget shares her recipe for chalk.
They also have an interesting recipe for eggshell chalk.
Blisstree's recipe for chalk is scented and glittery - fun!
Frugal Family's has a "cheap and easy" recipe.
Want a neon blend? Try Bugdet 101's recipe.
My Sidewalk Chalk has a color changing recipe.
Easy Fun School has an eggshell recipe & a cornstarch recipe.
Ohdeedoh has a recipe for sidewalk paint.
eBeanstalk sells a great set of Doug & Melissa triangular sidewalk chalks that are easy to grasp.

Kiddio made multi-colored heart shaped chalk.

Activities:

Take a look at Carol Weatherford's complete Lesson Guide for Sidewalk Chalk: Poems of the City.

Host a neighborhood wide "Chalk the Walk" day. Encourage the kids to fill your area sidewalks with colorful designs.

Super Heroes and Princesses had all kinds of fun with chalk. They incorported the story A Piece of Chalk by Jennifer A. Ericsson.

They also experimented with chalk painting.

The Masked Momma and her daughter demonstrated painting with sidewalk chalk.

They even integrated their theme book for the week!

Sidewalk chalk aids in the study of how the sun moves and creates shadows. Trace the shadow of an object on the sidewalk. Leave the object in place and check back on it to watch the shadow move over time.

A to Z Kids Stuff has 2 fun sidewalk chalk game suggestions: Heart Break & Stake Out.

Chalk can also be used to:

~draw a hopscotch board

~write numbers for shuffleboard

~design a course for bikes or scooters to travel down.

~four square boxes

~sidewalk tic-tac-toe

~score keeping during outdoor games

Thank you again to everyone who submitted an idea for this post, remember we can't do it without all of your help! Thanks for your support!

Don't forget to check in next week to find out about our first sponsor for our Big Summer Prize Picnic!

We hope you're all planning on joining next Thursday for our first Picnic Table Talk and will be inviting us over to visit your blog by linking up!

Friday, May 8, 2009

Handprint Projects

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This week's Fun Friday is full of little fingers! Maybe you will find the perfect handprint project to inspire you to add your little one's prints to a gift for grandma!

The Fifth Street Palace has used one little arm to create a springy tree.

Making's of a Montessori Mum has created a sensory activity using smooth and rough handprints.

A Child at Play has created a whole handful of animals for you to try!

Check out these cheerful chicks submitted by Ten Kids and a Dog.

Mama's A Mess made hand print hugs! Look how much these little arms can love!

Handprint & Footprint Calendar
Learning Objective:
Sensory fun using finger paints

Materials:
calendar (I bought this one at Michael's for $1.00
finger paints
scrapbooking embellishments