Outside Play Archives - JDaniel4s Mom

How to Make a Batting Tee from Pool Noodles

June 8, 2015 By Deirdre

I have been wanting to create some outdoor activities using pool noodles. Pool noodles are easy to work with and store when you are not playing with them. I knew they would be great to work with.How to Make a Batting Tee is the first of three outdoor ideas using pool noodle that I will be sharing with you.

This activity was super easy to put together. There were only a couple of tricky parts. Once I share how we worked through them, they probably will not be trick for you.

Pool Noodles Make Great Batting Tees

The most important thing when you are making a batting tee is having it the right height for your kids. It was suggested in a article that I read that it be tall enough reach just above your child’s waist. After holding the pool noodle up to JDaniel to find the right height, I used a bread knife to cut it to the right size.

It should have been perfect right, but it was a little tall. Why? We placed pool noodle over a stake from my neighbors croquet set. It was really hard to slide the pool noodle down. (When we take this out again, I will use a narrow dowel.) We all tried pushing and pulling the noodle down as far was we could. There was still about 4 to 5 inches of the stack sticking out of the end beyond the part of the stake that would go in the ground. That made the noodle tee sit a little higher that we needed it to be.

To make the tee sit down a little bit lower we dug a really deep hole in our backyard. (We could have cut it down, but I wanted to try this activity with a dowel later.) When it was just where we needed it, we pushed the stake down deep into the ground. (Actually having it down deep in the ground made the batting tee really stable!)

The pool noodle was really flexible when it was hit with a bat. That worked out really well when JDaniel and the boys next door hit the ball off of the tee. They were all trying to hit it as hard and as far as they could.

The end where a cut the pool noodle was a little bit jagged. That worked out well too. The ball was able to stay on the batting tee and not slip off due to the rough texture. It wasn’t super pretty, but it really worked well for us.

As I mentioned I will be sharing two other outdoor activities with pool noodles. While you are waiting for them, you may want to check out some of these wonderful pool noodle activities created by others.

Pool Noodle Activities for Kids

Pool Noodle Rackets

Pool Noodle Ponies

Pool Noodle Light Sabres

If you try any of these pool noodle activities, please leave me a comment below telling me about how it went or share a picture of your anteater on my Facebook page.

Dolch Sight Word Hopscotch

July 15, 2014 By Deirdre

Dolch Sight Word Hopscotch

Old school playground games are a wonderful way to work on a number of concepts with kids. Hopscotch is one of favorites so I thought I would share with you a wonderful way to work on learning to read and identifying Dolch sight words that uses hopscotch.

The first thing you will need to do is draw a hopscotch board on your driveway or sidewalk with chalk. I used the floor from JDaniel’s old Cozy Coupe as a template for drawing the hopscotch squares. It is perfectly fine to draw them freehand. Hopping on one foot can be challenging so; I created a little break area by having two rows with two squares in them.

The next thing I did was to write some sight words on index cards to be picked when that square was selected through a rock toss. You actually don’t need to do rock toss. You could have a child pick up each card as they get to it. The cards don’t actually have to be place on the squares they can be displayed beside the game space if you like. Children can pick a word they want to read each time they land on a square.

Having the card beside the game space eliminates the risk on having the cards hopped on and gives kids one less than to pick up as they go up the hopscotch board.

Dolch Sight Word Hopscotch

We played this Dolch sight word game this way first. A rock was tossed and hopping or jumping was done to that space. If the word was missed, the card was left in the square for another chance to be read later.
By the time we finished the Dolch sight word game the neighbor boys were lining up for a turn. They liked the idea of selecting the word they wanted to read.

Moving and reading seemed to be something they wanted to do too.

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Outdoor Activities and Learning Games for Kids

May 30, 2014 By Deirdre

Getting outside to play and learn with outdoor activities you have put together with or for your children is fun. Simple supplies like chalk, paint, water, a roll of drawing paper, old water bottles, and some farm animals were used to create these fifteen outdoor activities. Some are messy, but not one of them is difficult to put together. All of these outdoor activities feature things that you may have at home already or could get at your local big box store.

Outdoor Activities and Learning Games for Kids

If you are heading to the beach this summer, you may want to take a plastic tablecloth along with you. We used a plastic tablecloth as the liner for a very own homemade tide pool. JDaniel was thrilled to help dig the hole for the tide pool. Filling the tide pool with water was almost as much fun. We all worked on filling it together. Getting to sit in the tide pool was the best!

This idea includes an affiliate link.

You may not be able to go to the beach this summer. If you can’t you can bring the beach to your water table. We have water table with two sections. In one section we placed water. In the second section we place oatmeal. (The oatmeal was supposed to be soft sand.) Then we took out some of JDaniel’s farm animals and a farmer for his Fisher-Price Little People Fun Sounds Farm. The animals had the best time playing in the sand and splashing in the water. The farmer joined in too.

The water table also has been used to create a pretend play ice cream parlor with ice and shaving cream. That was messy, but great for pretend play.

Gluing foam fish to the bottom of a pair of flip flops creates a great tool for painting fish prints. JDaniel brushed paint onto the bottom of the flip flops and walked up and down a roll of paper on our deck or driveway. The fish flops made a really fun under water scene.

You can also do math with golf tees and yarn on your deck. They make great tools for making shapes. These shapes can be used to talk about geometry, area, and perimeter.

Color chalk circles draw on the drive way made a great way to work on sorting objects by color. We used objects that were already in the garage for this color sorting fun.

Hopping, skipping, or galloping down a chalk number line is such fun. I wrote the numbers on the number line, but your kids could easily do the number writing for the number line. It is one of our favorite outdoor activities!

Creating a chalk drawing face with items found outside is also a lot of fun. It is fun to change them around and see if it makes the face changes its mood.

Starting seeds in an indoor paper plate garden and moving them outside once they have sprouted is lots of fun! It is one of those indoor activities that becomes an outdoor activity.

An upcycled juice bottle makes a great watering bottle when caring for seeds. This one is really easy to make.

JDaniel and I created a spider web trellis in our backyard. We used a plastic lid and a garbage bag to make a spider to live on the web.

Giant alphabet letters are super fun. We did a number for activities with these giant chalk letters and a spray bottle.

These recycled fish loved hanging on a coral reef made a fallen tree branch. They hung out of the deck for a day before going to live in JDaniel’s room. He just loves this recycled bottle fish mobile.

We have also made a patriotic wind spinner that was outside on sunny days before going to live in JDaniel’s room.

An outdoor gnome or fairy home made with items from our recycling bin was fun to make and great for pretend play.

I hope you will find an outdoor activity in this collection that you are dying to head outside and try with your children. If you are looking for more outdoor activities for kids, you may want to visit my Outdoor Fun for Kids Board.

How to Make Confetti Eggs

May 22, 2014 By Deirdre

“Mama, can you find out how to make confetti eggs and make some?” JDaniel asked. “Sure! I will find out and make you some confetti eggs,” I said.

Every year JDaniel’s school fun fair has confetti eggs available for purchase for one ticket. For the last two years he had bought a few eggs and then chased his dad and I around until he was able to hit us with one. This year we bought two confetti eggs for JDaniel to share with the boy next door. He really wanted them to chase each other around the yard until the got each other.

Confetti eggs are fragile and the eggs made it in the house from the car after the fun fair, but they did not make it outside for the chase. That is when JDaniel asked if I could find out how to make confetti eggs and make some more.

I searched the internet for ideas on how to make them. I watched a video by Happy Auer and read a few blog posts. Each had unique or different twist on how to make them. After reading and watching how to make confetti eggs, these are the steps I ended up using and the supplies needed to make them.

Here are the supplies you need to make confetti eggs:

Raw eggs
Spoon
Small bowls for dye bowls
Vinegar
Water
Food Coloring
Homemade or store bought confetti
Tissue paper for strips or stripes (optional)
Tissue paper or cupcake liners for confetti egg lids (optional)

How to make confetti eggs:

Create a hole in the top of each raw egg. Some people tap the egg on the counter to get the initial crack. (I tried this technique and ended up with a hairline crack going partially down the side of one egg.) The second technique was to tap the top of the egg with a spoon to make the first crack. This is the technique that worked best for me.
Remove enough of the egg shell from the top of each egg to create a small whole or a medium sized hole. It is up to you.
Remove the raw egg from the shell of your eggs by shaking it over a measuring cup. (I used the raw eggs to to make of brownies. You could clean out an egg as you needed it and save the shells until you had enough eggs for your kids or just make a giant omelet or strata.)
Prepare dye bowl with mixture of water, vinegar and food coloring. I used about a 1/4 cup of vinegar, a half cup of water and enough squirts of food coloring until I got the color I wanted.
Place the eggs into the color baths. (I created two red and two blue eggs. I left two eggs white.)
Place the dyed eggs back in the egg carton to dry.
Use a hole punch to create small dots for the eggs or buy confetti at the store. I wanted tissue strips or stripes to put in the eggs so, I cut small strips out of tissue paper.
When the confetti eggs are dry place the confetti mixture into the top of each egg. I used a funnel for the dots and my fingers to put the tissue strips into them.
If you are worried about the confetti and tissue falling out, you can glue the center of a cupcake liner over the opening like Happy Auer did. Another option is that you could glue a tissue paper circle over the opening. I just left the top open. The idea of having confetti fly out of the egg as it is thrown appealed to me.

Tips for Throwing Confetti Eggs

Throw them in the driveway for easy clean up.
Try to have at least two eggs per child.
Create eggs and confetti to match an upcoming holiday or event.
Throw the eggs outside

Our eggs were created with a patriotic themed for Memorial day. Confetti eggs could really be made for any event or holiday. It might even be fun to have creating them be a party activity.

For more outdoor play ideas please stop by my Outdoor Fun for Kids Pinterest board.

Interactive Reading Game- Soccer Kick Sounds

May 19, 2014 By Deirdre

Part of learning to read is being able to identify the sounds in words. I recently took JDaniel’s love of soccer and a desire to work on beginning, medial and ending sounds together in a game. I call this interactive reading game game Soccer Kick Sounds. It ended up being a fun game to take outside and play although it could be played inside with a soft soccer ball or in a gym.

Creating the Interactive Reading Game

We started by adding black pentagons to the back of a white paper plates. It was really challenging to cut out pentagons free hand. Honestly a number of our pentagons don’t have five sides of equal length. They looked enough like pentagons that we went ahead and used them anyway. We tried to make our paper plate soccer balls look at a soccer ball in our garage. The thought was that even odd looking pentagons should be arrange the right way. (It would have been fine to just add them anywhere I guess.)

Paper Plate Soccer Ball

On the back of each paper plate I placed a letter of the alphabet. I was careful in selecting letters that I could think of words with it in their beginning, middle, and ending sound. If I could think of words, I thought he could too. I also used the letters p, b, and d. Those letters are commonly reversed. I wanted to plant in his mind words that featured each of those letters as we played.

Playing Soccer Kick Sounds

With the plates ready we headed outside. We tried to spread out the plates so that it would take a kick or two to reach them. They weren’t too spread out although they definitely could have been. (Maybe we will do that next time.)

When a plate was reached, we picked it up and try to come with the three words. One that started with that sound, one that ended with that sound and one with that sound in the middle. Both JDaniel and I took turns kicking to a soccer ball plate. I thought part of what made it an interactive reading game was that we both interacted with the game elements and with each other.

Sometimes when we try interactive reading or math activities JDaniel responds that it was an okay game. This time he asked that we play it again another day. It looks like we will be working on our soccer skills and letter sounds again this summer.

For more reading activities you may want to visit my Learning to Read board on Pinterest.

Preschool Play- Ice Cream Game With Shaving Cream and Ice

July 29, 2013 By Deirdre

Playing an ice cream game with shaving cream and ice seemed like the perfect preschool sensory activity on a hot and sticky day last week. It was messy and wet. Those are two things my guy really likes. Pretend play is a third thing he enjoys and I planned to have us run a pretend ice cream shop one we got everything set up.We started by dragging JDaniel’s water table from under the deck where it is stored and carried it to a shady spot in the yard under some big beech trees. It seemed like a wonderful spot to open a ice cream shop.

Preschool Play- Ice Cream Game With Shaving Cream and Ice

The water table was then filled with the entire contents on our ice cube tray. Since JDaniel’s water table has two sections, I asked him to try to put half the ice on each side. I had brought out an ice cream scoop to use during pretend play, but JDaniel decided that it would be great to scooping ice. It was a little tricky. The ice cubes kept slipping out of the scoop and into the ice tray. Eventually he was able to get ice on one side of the water table. I suggested we just dump the rest of the ice in and he agreed.

Then we added the contents of a can of shaving cream. I was very careful to buy shaving cream that wouldn’t sting our hands while we played. It took a lot of shaking to get all of the shaving cream out of the can. When all the shaving cream was in the water table, we stirred up the mixture.

JDaniel got a little distracted when the next neighbors arrive home and he left the activity for a few minutes to chat with them. That turned out to be just the right amount of time for some the ice to melt a little. The mixture was much easier to scoop when it was slightly melted.

We both had a great time scooping up the chilly mixture with a ice cream scoop and putting it into small colorful bowls. The mixture scooped up easily and looked a little like ice cream in the bowls.

This ice cream game was a lot of fun. Shaving cream coated JDaniel’s arms after awhile and I was thankful the next door neighbor was out watering his plants. He washed JDaniel down every now and then. Once his arms were clean, he would run back into the yard and dig into ice cream game again.

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Apparently the ice cream parlor only serves great big bowl overflowing with ice cream. JDaniel served me a huge bowl of ice cream. I was afraid it would all topple back into the water table, but it made the short trip across the grass to my folding chair without even a large wobble.

When I bought the shaving cream for this project, I purchased two cans hoping JDaniel would like the activity. He loved this type of sensory play. I think we will be playing the ice cream game again.

Oh! I think children beyond preschool would love it too.

Here are some more outdoor preschool play activities:

Pool Noodle Batting Tee

Creating an Outdoor Water Center

What type of outdoor play do your preschool children enjoy?

Park Hop- Cedar Falls Park

June 26, 2013 By Deirdre

My friend Bethany runs a blog called Kidding Around Greenville. She brings to my attention all kinds of wonderful activities and events that are happening in Greenville, South Carolina that I might have missed otherwise. The latest thing she has shared is an opportunity offered by our local parks. The Park and Recreation department is hosting a Park Hop. The Hop is really a scavenger hunt that includes visits to 17 parks in our county. At each park you are asked to find the answer to a scavenger hunt question. When we have answered at least five questions, we can send in our answers for a prize pack. There are additional levels of winning based of visiting more parks and gathering more correct answers. JDaniel and I have been to eight parks so far. The most recent park is Cedar Falls Park. It isn’t too far from where we live, but it is on a road we have never traveled down. Even with directions to the park I missed the turn. I was looking for a sign pointing me to the park and their wasn’t one.

A man at the Fountain Inn Farmer’s Market (Also a location on the Park Hop) mentioned how pretty the falls were at the Cedar Falls Park and what wonderful trails it had. I was surprised to find a large parking lot with a wonderful playground at the front of the park. In my mind we would park in a lot surrounded by trees and leave the parking lot via the trail head to the falls. JDaniel was thrilled to see the playground and he was dying to explore it.

I encourage him to explore the trails first so, we headed down a winding trail across a field and into the woods. We kept listening for the sound of rushing water. It wasn’t until we followed the trail beyond the buffer of trees that we actually heard it.

There were actually several falls. Some were small and others medium size. Apparently the falls were used by a power plant and several local business in the past. Right now you can see every little evidence that those businesses ever existed.

While there was a paved path, you know who preferred the dirt path least taken through the border of trees and over the rocks. There he found small streams that had carved their way through the rock. JDaniel was fascinated by the power the water had over time on the rocks.

There weren’t as many animals to see as we did on our visit to another local park Paris Mountain State Park. JDaniel did spy a salamander scurrying as quickly as possible over one rock and under another. There was just a lot of water.

JDaniel was constantly dipping his hands into the shallow water near the water’s edge to see what it felt like and let the water flow around his fingers. I stood very close by despite the shallowness of the water.

What a wonderful place Cedar Falls Park is to explore! We have several other parks that list hiking as one of the activities you can do there. I think we will enjoy visiting them along with the nine other parks on the Park Hop. We are going for the grand prize and that means we will be visiting every park on the Park Hop. I bet you aren’t surprised.

Do you have Park Hop going on where you live?

This post is linked to Mrs. Matlock’s Alphabe Thursday. Follow JDaniel4’s Mom on Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter.

Nature for Kids – Observing Spring with Your Senses

April 17, 2013 By Deirdre

Just before the pollen took hold of our region of the United States JDaniel and I explored the nature trail in his Nana’s retirement community. It was such fun to take in all the spring had on display on that pretty trail for us to view and take in. We decided to make this a nature for kids learning activity by looks for signs of spring we could smell, see and touch.

One of JDaniel’s favorite parts of the trail is the swings that are scattered up and down it. As he sat of the swing and I pushed him from behind, I thought about how we could use four out of our five senses to observe spring.

Hearing Sounds of Spring

He could sit for hours and listen to the sounds of the spring. There are the calls that come from birds in the lush trees. There is the rippling of the water feature that was right across from this swing. There was the movement of the tree branches as a slight breeze went by. There was also the squeak that came from the swing as I pushed it. It almost said spring as it moved back and forth.

Smells of Spring

The tree blossoms weren’t in full bloom , but we could smell the initial perfume that they put out. The new green leaves also gave off a fresh scent. There was also a slightly damp smell coming of the swing. Spring is filled with some many different smells.

Seeing Spring

JDaniel couldn’t slow down once he got off the swing. He was all over the trail looking at all the plants and trees. There were so many different shades of green and brown to observe. There were early spring plants that were festive and dressed up for Easter. Some plants were still dormant and hadn’t realized winter had passed and spring had arrived. Others were just starting to show their spring displays.

Thankfully each plant had a sign in front of it. JDaniel kept asking me what each plant was.

Touching Spring

JDaniel had the best time showing me each of the treasures and describing what it felt like. Some were soft and smooth while others were hard and bumpy. There were seed pods, pine cones, leaves, small twigs and so much more.

There were some many treasures that plants had deposited on the ground for JDaniel to find. By the end of the trail I wished that I had brought a paper bag with me to hold all of them. Since I didn’t, I asked JDaniel to find special places to hide them on the trail for others to find.

I hope you will each be able to head and out observe spring. It has so many things for us to see, hear, touch, and smell. This nature for kids activity is one your kids will ask to do again and again.

Here are some more nature for kids activities:

Backyard Nature Table

Do You See Animals When You Hike?

This post is linked to Mrs. Matlock’s Alphabe Thursday.

Easter Games- Hopping with Chalk Bunnies

March 28, 2013 By Deirdre

The weather has been warmer here and we have needed to get out and move. I thought we could boogie to the left, boogie to the right and play Easter game I am calling the chalk bunny hop. We have been hopping like a rabbit all week. It has been a lot of fun. Sometimes we stop by our row of bunnies on the way to the mailbox and hop, hop, hop.Before your children start this bunny project, you may want to read them a bunny-themed book. Below you will find some of my favorites.

Links below are affiliate links.

Here is how we made our bunny hop:

First, you can print out the Hopping with Chalk Bunnies Bunny Template. Then I used an Exacto knife to cut the picture of the rabbit. It was a little challenging to cut out his ear and feet. His feet didn’t end up as round as they had been in the picture. I think I am a little rusty at using the Exacto knife

Then we took the template outside and used sidewalk chalk to draw a line of rabbits on our driveway. We really had to push down with the chalk to make the rabbit outlines stand out. The chalk really had to be shoved into the ears and feet. The ear and feet areas are not really that big.

Once the bunnies had been drawn, we were ready to get moving. We hopped from bunny to bunny. We stepped from bunny to bunny. Finally, we boogied from bunny to bunny. We really could have jumped, sidestepped, galloped or tiptoed too.

The goal of this activity was to get out and move in the warm sunshine. I think this would a great activity to do with children on Easter Sunday. After a morning filled with sitting in church and inhaling sugary sweets, playing Easter games that get you moving is a great idea.

I hope you will make a chalk bunny template and have a bunny hop of your own. Your children will probably love playing this Easter game too. You will find more Easter related games and activities on my Easter Pinterest board.

Here are some wonderful Easter games and activities right here you might want to check out:

Experiments with Egg Parachutes

Plastic Egg Greenhouse

Plastic Egg Patterning

Jelly Bean Prayer Rocks

Outside Play- Games: Moving Cup Golf

August 15, 2012 By Deirdre

Welcome to the Outside Play: Games link up! My co-host for this event are Train Up a Child, Kitchen Counter Chronicles, Rainy Day Mum, Kindergarten and Preschool for Parents and Teachers and Inspiration Laboratories.

If you have a post related to playing games outside, we would love for you to link them up below and add this badge to them.

Moving Golf Game

If you set out a red cup, some plastic gold clubs, and a variety of balls, your child will come up with a fun game to play.

At first they may just try out the different clubs and balls. They may find that it is easier to hit them on the driveway than it is to hit them on the grass. If the grass is tall, it will slow the ball down even more short grass would.

Once they have chosen a golfing surface, they may try different ways to hold the club. Holding the club backwards may be easier than holding it forwards.

In a made up game it is possible to hold the club in a variety of ways. There isn’t a right or wrong way to play a made up game.

While some people may choose to have the cup facing them when then try to get the ball in , others may decide they want to see what the cup with do when it is hit. There will be those that think it is fun to hit the ball around the cup instead of in it. There will be still others that try to hit it past the cup.

Remember there are no rules to the game of moving cup golf. Actually there is one rule and it is for parents and older siblings. The only rule is to sit back and watch the game creator create.