Search Results for: Thanksgiving

Build the Pilgrims a Tin Foil Boat STEM Challenge

November 14, 2017 By Deirdre

This week I am sharing with you several Thanksgiving-themed STEM challenges. Today’s STEM challenge is building a tin foil boat for Pilgrims and some of their supplies to travel in. If you want your children to explore building a tin foil boat first, you could have them do a tin foil boat penny challenge.

Getting Ready for the STEM Challenge

Creating the Pilgrims

There are several things you are going to do to get ready for the STEM challenge. The first is to create a set of Pilgrims.

Supplies

Unfinished Wood Peg People
Black Acrylic Paint
White Felt

Directions

You will need to paint the bodies of the peg people black.
Then you will need to cut out a collar for each of the peg people and a hat for the Pilgrim lady out of felt, We cut ours out freehand. (I am working a set of patterns you can use for them.)
Next, you will need to glue the collars and hat on the Pilgrims.

Gathering the Boat Supplies

Your children will need the following supplies to create the boat.

Supplies

Foil
Clay
Bendy Straws
Card Stock
Wooden Blocks*

*Your children will use the wooden blocks to represent the supplies the Pilgrims are traveling with.

Getting the Recording Printable

You will need to print out a copy of the Build the Pilgrims a Boat Challenge for each of your children. The printable was designed to be printed out on a black-and-white printer.

Conducting the STEM Challenge

Your children will need to design a boat that will not only float on the water it will need to carry the pilgrims and their supplies.

Once they have drawn out their design, they will need to create the boat and its sails.

Finally, they will need to test out their design. If they find it doesn’t float well, they will need to work on a redesign.

Building Background

You may want to read your children a book about the pilgrims before starting this challenge. Below you will find a few books that will help them build their background knowledge of them.

The links below are affiliate links.

President’s Day Counting Activity

February 10, 2016 By Deirdre

President’s Day was once a celebration of George Washington’s birthday. Now other presidents like Abraham Lincoln are celebrated on President’s Day. Here is a set of President’s Day Numbers. Washington appears on the odd numbers and Lincoln appears on the even numbers. They would be great to have your children explore around President’s Day or maybe leading up to a presidential election.

While at first glance you may think these President’s Day numbers are just for preschool kids, older kids can use them too. Here is a list of several ways that I have come up with to use these President’s Day numbers.

President’s Day Counting Activity Ideas

Putting the Numbers in Order

Kids can be given a stack of the numbers from one to ten and put them in order. They can they count up for the number one. I think it is a good idea to have them touch each number while they say it.

Number and Object Match

The link below is an affiliate link.

Kids can be given real or play coins to place on the numbers. (We used real pennies at my house.) They will need to up to place coins that match each number on it. Example: Number one gets one penny.

Adding Two Numbers

Kids can select two numbers or have two numbers given to them. They will need to make an addition sentence with those numbers. Kids can place the correct number of coins on each number. They can then combine the coins to find the sum. You could make felt a plus sign and equal sign for kids to put between the two numbers.

Counting Down

Kids can arrange the cards in descending order. The number line can start with ten and end with one. They can start with ten coins on the ten. Then slide the coins to the nine and take one away. This process can be continued until they get to one.

More Counting Numbers

This set of President’s Day numbers is part of a series on numbers. You can find Thanksgiving turkey numbers, Christmas cookie numbers, candy cane numbers, and New Year’s Eve numbers right here on JDaniel4’s Mom.

You will find a number of early learning math activities on my Early Learning Math board on Pinterest.

New Year’s Counting Game Printable

December 8, 2015 By Deirdre

This New Year’s counting game set of printable numbers and party hat counters is part of a holiday number series. The other counting game sets are Gingerbread Counting Numbers, Peppermint Counting Numbers, and Thanksgiving Turkey Numbers.

Each of these counting game sets can be used in a number of ways. Let me share with you some of the ways I have come up with to use them. If you come up with others, please leave them in a comment below or on my Facebook page.

Links below maybe affiliate links.

Counting Game Ideas

Select a number and place the appropriate number of party hats on it.
Line up all the numbers 1-10 (You can make a 10 by placing the 1 card next to the 0 card.) Start by placing one hat on the one and then slide that hat to two and add a hat. Repeat this slide and add process until you have reached the 10.
Select a group of numbers in sequence and place the correct number of hats on each of the numbers.
Challenge another person to place the correct number of counters on a number you have selected.
Sort the numbers into groups of even and odd numbers. Place the correct number of counters on each set of numbers.
Select a number and turn it over. Give another person clues as to what your number is.
- Example:
  - It is even.
  - A triangle has this many sides.
  - It is two more than one.
  - If I paid for a two cent item with a nickel, I would get this many pennies in change.
Create addition sentences with the numbers on a Carrollar Flexible Plastic Cutting Board Mats, Colored Mats With Food Icons, Gripped Back, Cutting board Set of 4or place mat. (You can draw the plus sign and equal sign with washable marker right on the mat. It is so easy to clean up.)

You will find more number games on posts for each of the other numbers sets. Please take a moment to check out those ideas too.

I love to tie learning activities into pictures books. Here are a few New Year’s Eve themed books you might what to read to your children before starting any of the counting games.

Squirrel’s New Year’s Resolution

The Night Before New Year’s

P. Bear’s New Year’s Party: A Counting Book

Pete The Cat: A Groovy New Year

Happy New Year, Everywhere by Arlene Erlbach (2000-07-29)

Christmas Counting Games- Peppermint Numbers

November 23, 2015 By Deirdre

Last year I created a set of turkey numbers that could be used to play Thanksgiving counting games and adding the numbers 0-10. This year I have made two different sets of Christmas themed numbers. Along with the numbers each set has Christmas themed counters that can be for the Christmas counting games. Today I am going to share the Candy Cane Number Recognition Activity peppermint numbers with you. Later this week I will be sharing gingerbread themed numbers and candy counters.

The peppermint numbers come with counting holly leaves. If you think you need something little bit easier for your children to pick up, you could cut out holly leaves out of thick felt.

Below you will find some Christmas counting games you can play with your children. I am sure you will come up with a number of counting game of your own.

Counting Games

Number Order

You can have your children put the the candy themed numbers in order. You can decide if you want your children to start counting a 0 or 1. We tend to start counting at one at my house.

Sorting By Even and Odd

Children can place the even numbered peppermint numbers in one row and the odd numbers in another. Your children may want to add holly leaves to each of their numbers. It will help them to see that the even numbers have leaves that can be paired together. Odd numbers will have one leaf that doesn’t have partner.

Adding Numbers
This counting and adding game has children place the correct number of holly leaves on the two numbers being added. Children can pick up the leaves from the two numbers and place them on number that is the sum.

Here are some more fun holiday-themed printables you will want to explore:

Christmas Graphs You Can Color, Color and Graph

Elf on the Shelf Learning Packet

Reindeer Number Recognition Match

Editable Ornaments for Reading Centers

Gingerbread Shape Activities

More math activities can be found on my Early Learning Math Pinterest board.

Fall Art Projects- Corn and Pumpkin Weaving

September 21, 2015 By Deirdre

When people think about paper weaving, they think about children making plate mats for Thanksgiving. I think that paper weaving is a great fine motor craft activity for children to do all year long. These fall art projects feature themes that could be associated with Thanksgiving. They could also be done right now.

Both of the fall art projects start the same way. A piece of black paper has horizontal lines cut into. The pumpkin project has lines that have been cut almost to the edges. The corn stalk stack has only a couple of lines cut in the center of the paper.

A traditional place mat has long strips of paper woven through it. These fall art projects start as full complete silhouettes of a corn stalk and a pumpkin. The corn stalk and pumpkin shapes were folded in half. The shapes were then cut into vertical sections. By having the paper folded you end up with pieces that will match symmetrically when you weave. The outside edges on both sides of the black paper will be just alike.The inside pieces on both sides will match too.

Once the sections are cut out you can start weaving. We started weaving the strips on the inside of each shape and worked our way out.

When we were sure that each section or picture strip was just where we wanted it, we glued it in place. I think these fall art projects would be great to make for a fall harvest event or a non-scary Halloween.

Here are some other wonderful fall art projects for this blog and others:

Corn Cob Painting

Owl with Cupcake Liner Eyes

Leaf Suncatchers from Fun at Home with Kids

Leaf Hedgehogs from Crafty Morning

If you try any of these, please share it with me on Facebook.

Time For My Family To Give Thanks

November 28, 2014 By Deirdre

It is a tradition in many families to go around the Thanksgiving table share the things that each person is thankful for. I would like for you to imagine a dining room table groaning with food. Sitting around that table are my husband, my son, my mom and I. Each of us has many things to we need to give thanks for.

Rather than create a video of each person sharing the things they are thankful for. I thought I would list our areas we would like to give thanks for. Actually they are really the things that I am thankful for on each person’s behalf.

Starting on my left is my husband.

He would be thankful the opportunity to go back to school after being laid off. The chance to learn a new computer language that was more marketable was really a blessing.

He would be as thankful the new job he will be starting on Monday. It will be a little bit of commute, but it is a great opportunity. It seems to be custom made for him.

Next to my husband is my son. JDaniel is trying sneak a few green beans off this plate as other take their turns to give thanks.

He might not say that he is thankful for a wonderful first grade teacher, but we are. He has grown so much as learner since he started the school year.

Great glasses that help him see. He never complained about the world looking blurry or small printed words not making sense. The glasses he got this fall have really helped remove the blur and made it so he can see words clearly.

Having two new children his age move into our neighborhood has been something to give thanks for too.

My Mom is sitting between JDaniel and I. She is waiting the baited breathe to share all that she wants to give thanks for while glaring at her grandson.

Mom was given six months to a year to live last December. She has almost reached the one year mark! Her cancer symptoms have just started to cause her pain and nausea. For most of the year she has been able to exercise, spend time with family, run errand with me and so much more. That is truly something to give thanks for.

The house my mom owned sold this summer. What a blessing it was to her and to us to know that she no longer needed to pay for a home and an assisted living apartment.

Time with family would also be on her list. My two maternal aunts have been to see mom twice this year. My sister in New York has come to visit several times too. Mom got to have both my sisters and their children spend time with her and my family. We hadn’t done that in a year and a half. What great memories we all have to give thanks for!

Having my husband in school opened the door for me to spend more time with my mom. I have cherished every hour with her.

The time with my mom I never thought I would have after she spent six weeks in the hospital last winter. With our future time limited I have truly enjoyed our time to be together now.

I am so thankful for my job. I love getting to work with amazing teachers and their students. It has been fun to work on the computer lab and teach kids what I know about computers.

Knowing the posts I share on this blog are being read by amazing and supportive people is yet another thing I have to give thanks for.

If you were sitting around the Thanksgiving table with us, what would you be thankful for? Please leave me a comment below or on my Facebook page. I would love to know.

Here are some other posts on ways to give thanks and show gratitude you might want to check out.

Cornucopia of Prayer Craft

Gratitude Turkey

Cootie Catcher Learning Games With Blank Template

November 24, 2014 By Deirdre

Yesterday I shared with you a cool math game that used a paper cootie catcher for the word problems. (Cootie catchers and fortune tellers are the same things.) I know some have already pointed it out.

While you can think of dozens of games you could create on your own, here are some ideas for fortune tellers that I have found on the internet. I know you will love them. Following this list of ideas, I will share with you some of my own.

Cootie Catcher Learning Games

Cootie Catcher Learning Games With a Blank Template

The Country Chic Cottage has created a really fun Dr. Seuss-themed fortune teller or cootie catcher.

Geometric shapes are explored by using this fortune teller created by Bookish Ways.

Autism Teaching Strategies has created a wonderful cootie that works on social skills.

This free printable found on Teacher Pay Teachers works on parts of a story. There are several other available there that are not free.

fortuneteller

Literacy Spark has created a cootie catcher to work on spelling words and one for working prefixes.

One for older kids that works on mean and median on a number.

Teaching Blog Addict made a part of a speech fortune teller.

I even found one that has a Thanksgiving-themed one on DLTK.

Cootie Catcher Learning Games with Blank Template

Kids Activities Blog has a wonderful cootie catcher that works with fractions.

I Heart Teaching has created one that review multiplication facts.

There is a Christmas-themed one on Creative with Kids.

As you can see there are a lot of great ways to use fortune tellers or cootie catchers. They can be used to review concepts, build on concepts, and work on communication skills.

Here is blank fortune teller or fortune teller template that you can use to create one of your own:

I hope your children enjoy exploring these cool math games with a printable word problem fortune teller. If you do try it, please come back and let me know which cool math games worked best for you or leave a comment on my Facebook page.

If you would like to find more early learning math games and activities, please check out my math Pinterest board.

signature

Are We There Yet? – Travel Countdown For Kids

November 23, 2014 By Deirdre

If you have been on a car trip with kids, you have probably heard that dreaded question “Are we there yet?” asked. My son tends to ask it multiple times during a trip. Rather than respond by asking the same question “Are we there yet? back to him, I created a travel countdown. It features those dreaded words I said kids ask “Are we there yet?”

I created the “Are We There Yet?” sign to hang on the back of the passenger seat of the side of the car JDaniel sits on. The sign had holes punched into so I could thread ribbon through it. Each of the ribbons was attached to the metal rods that support the chair’s headrest.

Other ways to attach the “Are We There Yet?” sign

metal rings
shower curtain rings
twist ties
yarn
paper clips

We chose to use ribbon because it wasn’t very bulky and could easily be untied at the end of the car trip. We may not want to have it up in the care while we are visiting with relatives. It can easily we retied to the head rest rods when we head home.

“Are We There Yet” Count Down Strips

Our “Are we there yet?” travel countdown has colored post- it notes. We had the Post-It notes on hand so we used them. It was really easy to cut each of the Post-It notes half vertically and place a number on each strip. A whole Post-It note would have taken up too much room. As it worked out we needed each of the half strips, we are going on a long trip for Thanksgiving.

By using Post-It notes we had a way to stick the strips to the “Are We There Yet?” sign. I did some brainstorming and I think clothes pins or paper clips with a number attached to them would work too.

How We Will Use the Sign

After each hour of our trip has gone by, we will have JDaniel take down the largest number on the sign. The strips that have been taken down will be placed in the plastic bag so we can use them on our way home.

We may end up hearing “Is it time to take down a strip?” during our trip, but I think this will be a fun way to countdown the hours until we reach our destination.

You can Are We There Yet- Travel Countdown Sign for your family.

Do you have favorite car trip game or activity? If you do, please me leave a comment below or on my Facebook page.

Kid Friendly Recipes- Teepee Snack

November 17, 2014 By Deirdre

I wanted to come up with a yummy kids friendly recipe for Thanksgiving snack that kids can build. It needed to have ingredients that could be swapped out if the children creating it had food allergies. This kid friendly recipes for teepee are something that will do just that. If you read through the ingredient list and it doesn’t, please check out my scarecrow snack mix. It is another one of those kid friendly recipes I have done with my son.

Kid Friendly Recipes for Kids

Ingredients:

Graham crackers
Nutella
Pretzel sticks
Assortment of dried fruit or Trail Mix

Adding a Spread to the Graham Cracker

The ingredients can be set out for children to completely create on their own. You can put the nut spread on the crackers ahead of time instead if you like . If you put the nut spread on ahead of time, you won’t have to put out a spreading tool.

Here are some spreading tool ideas:

Dull knife (If children are allowed to use them)
Popsicle stick
Tongue depressor
Small Spatula

Constructing the Kid Friendly Recipes for Kids

Children can arrange the pretzels in to the shape of teepee. We used two short or broken sections of a pretzel at the top of the teepee for this thanksgiving snack for kids. One full size pretzel and one broken pretzel that were about pretty long were used to create the side of the teepee. We did not have to break pretzels. There were a lot of broken pretzels in our bag. If you don’t have a lot of broken pretzel in your bag, you can break them into the sizes you need for the kids.

After creating the teepee, we added dried fruit to it to decorate it. Children can create patterns or a design with the fruit or just place it where they think it will look best.

Ingredient alternatives to use in these kid friendly recipes for kids

If you want to steer away from nut butters, you could try spreading the cracker with one of the following:

Cream cheese
Jelly
Frosting
Honey

If pretzel are a problem, you could use one of the following:

Diagonal columns of raisins
Small bread sticks
Chex cereal
Slices of cheese sticks

There are probably bunches of other alternatives. If have any food alternative suggestions, please leave a comment below or on my Facebook page sharing them.

Children love to create. This snack is one that is fun to create! We also found it to be really delicious.

Here are some for kid friendly recipes you will enjoy:

Fruitful Turkey

Over a Veggie Rainbow

Applesauce Toppings Bar

Very Hungry Caterpillar Snack

Jellyfish Lunch

Other Kid friendly recipes can be found on my Food Creations Pinterest board.

Arts and Crafts for Kids- Potato Masher Turkey

November 14, 2014 By Deirdre

Kitchen tools can make great painting tools for arts and crafts for kids. We create this turkey craft using a potato masher. The masher added a lot of texture to the turkey. It was lots of fun to make. I think you will like creating a mashed turkey for Thanksgiving too. I have titled this preschool activities, but I think older children will enjoy it too.

Arts and Crafts for Kids- Potato Masher Turkey

The trickiest part of doing this arts and crafts for kids project is that after you paint with each color you have to clean the potato. If you have more than one masher per child or per color, it will make it a whole lot less tricky. For the rest of this post let’s assume you have more than one masher.

There are several ways that you can apply the paint to the potato masher. If you want to eliminate a lot of paint dripping, you can paint the paint onto the potato masher with a paint brush. If you want to complete the craft a little bit faster, you can have children dip the potato masher into a tray of paint. (A tray will be much easier to dip the paint into or onto than a bowl would be.)

This arts and crafts for kids project can be created in a center by one child at a time or in a group setting. The group could move around a table that has stations with specific color and a masher in them. The members of group could also pass the trays and mashers. I think it would be easier for the children to move.

We started by painting the feathers first and then the body. By doing the painting that way we ended up some of the color from the feathers showing through the potato masher painted holes in the head. If you don’t like that look, you can have your children pain the head first.

Painting the beak and waddle onto this Thanksgiving craft head didn’t work for us. The tempera paint we tried just didn’t show up. We ended up cutting a beak and waddle out of construction paper. Then we glued them on. You may want to explore beak and waddle painting with the paints you have available to you. They may show up well on the turkey’s head. ( Sometimes arts and crafts for kids require experimenting.)

When it has dried, I think this would be a wonderful Thanksgiving place mat (If you use it as a place mat, you may want to laminate it.) It could also be used as a wall display or door decoration. Your Thanksgiving guests will probably enjoy getting to see this arts and crafts for kids Turkey.