Easy and Fun Halloween Knock Down Game

(4 1/2 Years)

We love playing games, board games, running games, cards games.  We love them all!  While searching for fun carnival-style games for our school's Fall Festival, I saw a knock down game made with painted coffee cans.  They were so adorable, but also very time consuming, plus I don't have ten coffee cans just lying around.

Hmmmm.... I know, I'll use orange Solo cups!  They are perfect for this project.  Inexpensive.  Stackable.  Easy to decorate.  Easy to store.  Heck, they are even recyclable!  Sold!

Materials Needed:
Orange Solo Cups - we used ten
Black Sharpies
Pin pong ball or a wadded up paper lunch bag

Wild One and Little Miss wanted to help- yes, you can practice writing and strengthen your fine motor skills.

This only took about twenty minutes to create our ten scary faces.  Then it was time to PLAY!  First Little Miss stacked the cups.

And... then Wild One knocked them down!

So much fun!  Oh and we're learning.  We're carefully building and using fine motor skills.  We're using critical thinking and spatial reasoning skills.  We're using hand-eye coordination and gross motor skills.  More importantly we're having fun!

Lightning McQueen + Sight Words = Learning Fun

(4 Years)

Lately the kids have been asking to practice their magic words (that's what we call sight words).  Their favorite way to practice is to Soak the Sight Words from the pool, they don't even know that they are learning or practicing or working.  To them it's all a game, it's all fun, and that's why it works!   This morning Little Miss asked to play the game three times  She said that she wants to win, and answer more words than her brother.  She actually said that!

A few days ago I found a sight word parking lot on Pinterest from A Mom with a Lesson Plan.  It looked perfect for us.  Easy set up, I have everything that's needed in the playroom already (a roll of easel paper, crayons, cars, dice with sight words on them).  So... during nap time I drew up a four-foot roadway and parking lot, wrote down some sight words in the parking spaces, grabbed all of our cars, and invited the kids to draw the landscaping.  Little Miss sat right down and began drawing trees and flowers.  Wild One decided to get dressed as Santa Claus, because it's July and one must dress as Santa in July, and June and May.

We used our giant die from the the Sight Words Race game, grabbed our basket of cars and we were off!  Little Miss rolled the die, rolled on was, said the word (yay!), revved up her little car engine and raced (wildly, not the the typical controlled and precise driving that her personality is known for) down the windy road, past the green trees and white flowers to the parking lot and easily parked in the was parking space.  She didn't even get her hand off of her car, when Wild One was jumping and saying, "my turn, my turn".

This couldn't have gone any better!  We were laughing, we were racing, we were taking turns, we were learning!

Look at learning through play in action.  Look at his concentration.  Look at her smile.  Look at Grandpa watching carefully.  I love homeschool preschool!!!!

Are you looking for more sight word games?  Just type sight words into the search box on the right.  I'll show you what's worked for us and at what age we started working with it.

Giant Sight Word Stomp Board

(4 Years)

Little Miss likes learning activities that are quiet, Wild One always lights up when I make our learning into a physical game (specifically jumping, running, swatting).  It seems a lifetime ago when we were learning our letter sounds.  I remember Little Miss liked pointing to magnetic letters, whereas Wild One was learning letter sounds by playing swat the letter.

Two years later, we are learning our sight words and Little Miss now likes (sometimes, when she's in the mood) to jump and dance and twirl.  I created a gigantic sight word board in the driveway (with each word written twice, so that the three of us could play simutaneously).  Little Miss said that she was going to be the teacher and tell us (Wild One and me) which word to jump on.   I have a feeling that as she grows-up , I'm going to be hearing a lot of Little Miss trying to take the lead and tell us all what to do!

The inspiration for this giant sight word stomp board was from the below hopscotch board.  You see, early last week, we played a game of hopscotch using -at words.  Little Miss was not at all interested.  She wanted to draw with chalk, Grandma and Grandpa bought them a huge box of vibrant sidewalk chalk.  She was all ready to draw, however she asked me not to take any pictures until she finished - and of course it rained. Meanwhile, Wild One kept asking, "are you done yet?  Can I play?".  I didn't think I'd ever finish the hopscotch board, he kept trying to jump on the board as I was creating it.

Oh, those red stains on the collar of Wild One's shirt is strawberry juice.  He ate almost 1/2 of a pound of strawberries!  

Yay! We Love Soccer!

(42 Months)

We just had our first soccer practice and game.  It is so much fun!  Our team ranges with kids that are newly turned threes to four and a halves.  I read on a blog that signing kids of this age up for sports is a waste of time and money.  She went on to say that they just run around and no "real" skills are developed in this form of organized recreational play.  We only had our one practice and game so far, but I can already see that there are real skills being learned and reinforced:

• waiting your turn (patience)
• lining up when called and working on drills (following directions and listening skills)
• tracking the ball with your eyes while running after it (gross motor skills)
• compassion (we saw a little one help up a teammate that fell)
• teamspirit (clapping when a goal was scored)
• communication skills

We signed Little Miss and Wild One up with the anticipation that Wild One would LOVE the physicality of it, whereas we knew that there was a good chance Little Miss wouldn't even step onto the field (she is so painfully shy sometimes, even with family that she sees at least twice a month she shies away).  Boy, were we wrong about her!  From the moment she stepped onto the field, she was eager and ready to play.  Little Miss shed her shyness and went to talk to the other two girls on her team.  During one of the lineups, the boy next to her was dancing, and Little Miss started dancing with him!  My shy little girl, went onto the field and had a great time.  She did come over three times during the game.  Once she asked to have "a short one", she needed to have a moment another time, and the last time was for a drink break.  We realized that we forgot to explain to the kids, that during a game and practices they aren't supposed to leave the field unless the coach tells them to.  

Wild One loved running after the ball!  He even started acting like the coach, directing everyone (as if he was putting on one of his shows that he does for us at home).  He was even fascinated with how well his shin guards worked, "Mommy!  I got kicked and it didn't even hurt!" This is his element: sports, running, performing.  He loved it.  We knew he would.  He loves sports, he loves being active.  

The hour went by very fast, especially for the grown-ups.  We were all laughing so hard, watching as our kids looked around aimlessly for the ball, only to discover it was right by their feet.  Or as two little kids were holding hands and skipping through the field.  Or when they would just run around in circles trying to figure out which way to go.  Or when they would line up on the wrong side (that was our two- it happened twice).  

So verdict?  I think you can tell.  For our two kids, organized recreational sports is a fun way of learning and making new friends.

Preschool Fun- Letters, Puzzles, Bath Math, Field Trip

(37 Months)

Little Miss asked to work in her schoolbooks, while Wild One read books with Grandpa.  I love the concentration on her face as she works.  I keep forgetting to pull out my sandpaper letters before we do a tracing activity.  At this rate, by the time I remember to take them out they will already have learned how to write their letters.

After we worked on a few pages, we pulled out our new favorite toy- puzzles!  I decided to try and challenge Little Miss by giving her two puzzles at once to see if she can still put the puzzles together.

Bath Math- we added numbers 6-10 (from our previous post).  Wild One decided to stay in the tub to continue working on ordering the numbers to ten.

We love Mr. Tommy!  He is an incredible performer.  He uses music as a way to teach children math, nursery rhymes and gets them dancing (while following directions).  Plus, the kids love every minute of it.  His CDs are available on his website.  This afternoon, Wild One pretended he was Mr. Tommy and did a reenactment of his performance.

Of course every trip to the mall requires a train ride with Grandpa.