Welcome to the Hands-On Play Party! Each week my co-hosts and I will share our ideas for a fun, hands-on activity! This is also a linky party for any hands-on learning activities for kids of all ages! So be sure to check out all the great links shared at the end of this post! If you are a blogger I invite you to share any ideas you have for sensory play, early learning play, gross and fine motor skills play, and indoor/outdoor play that is presented in a hands-on way!
Caden is VERY into playing with his Rescue Bots and his Transformers! I am always looking and thinking of ways to incorporate learning into what he enjoys playing with the most. One afternoon last week Caden had dug up an old baby toy, the multi-colored ring stacker, that I had packed away. We were playing with it, stacking the rings up, rolling them around on the floor and playing a made up game with them. Then I noticed that the colors of the rings were similar to his little Rescue Bots that were sitting around.
I showed him how the colors matched and tried to convince him to match up the colors. Caden was resistant at first. Anything that resembles learning or a lesson is met with resistance from Caden. So I had to think of something to convince him. What I thought of was to have Caden feed his Rescue Bots the correct color “donut”. It worked like a charm! Caden enjoyed feeding his Rescue Bots the “donuts” and unbeknownst to him, was practicing color matching and reinforcing his color knowledge.
This color “lesson” came about rather organically through play. I did not plan to use his favorite toys as a lesson in colors. After Caden had matched up his Rescue Bots with their “donuts” I scanned the room for other toys he could match up with his favorite toys. What I found was another “baby toy” our soft rubbery blocks. I incorporated these into play by making them into chairs for the Rescue Bots to sit on at our party! Again Caden took the bait and matched up his favorite toys with the colorful block “chairs”.
The next day we dyed some light-colored beans some wonderfully bright colors using this tutorial from Fun at Home with Kids. After the beans had dried we of course played with them. I had some little egg cups from our Jelly Bean Sensory Bin that Caden enjoyed scooping the beans with and filling them up. Then I thought Caden would like to play with the other Transformers Rescue Bots. I showed Caden that the egg cups matched up with the colors of his Rescue Bots and that he could feed them some beans by matching up the colors. Caden enjoyed playing in this way for quite a while. And I’d say we had a successful week of learning and reinforcing color knowledge by using his favorite toys!
Looking for more Hands-On Play ideas? Link up and check out some great ideas below!
From my co-hosts!
Indoor Snow Play from P is for Preschooler
Simple Sensory Play from Little Bins for Little Hands
Portable Sensory Bins: Alphabet Scavenger Hunt from Lemon Lime Adventures
Favorites from Last Week
This week I decided to feature a couple of great ways to incorporate color learning into play! I love this simple play idea from School Time Snippets to build towers using one color of blocks. The kids at School Time Snippets used duplo blocks, but Caden and I played this game and used mega blocks. Smaller legos and any other colored blocks would work well too!
Another great way to learn about color is through art. Bambini Travel shared a great way to be creative while focusing on one color of many shades, with this coloring activity.
And now for the Linky Party!
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Feed them the right colored donuts – brilliant! My daughter is resistant to anything that has a whiff of educational about it too so I particular admire how you made this seem like just a fun game. Way to sneak in some learning! 🙂
I love the way you took something he loves and utilized it with the learning activities. Very imaginative. Sometimes, our kiddos are so attached to their toys, they have a hard time sharing when we try to use them in activities. Usually, it goes well, after a while.
Renae
I would love if you shared this at our linky party all about robots!
http://suzyhomeschooler.com/autobots-androids-artificial-intelligence-and-other-robotics/