Popcorn Magic with Lesson Ideas

(4 Years)

Me- Do you want to see magic?
Little Miss- I do, I do!
Me- What do you think these are?  (I poured out a handful of popcorn kernels)

Little Miss - Beans, tiny rocks, seeds. (I had her feel a kernel and describe it).  It's tiny, hard and yellow.
She poured 1/2 cup of kernels into a brown lunch bag.

Her brother finally emerged from his room and asked to help.  Then she folded the lunch bag over twice.

 

 
We put it in the microwave.  I pressed the secret POPCORN button.  They said, "hocus pocus!"  I asked what they thought was going to happen.  Little Miss - It's going to get hot.

Then they heard the all too familiar pop pop sound.  Wild One - Popcorn!  Mommy it's popcorn!  Are we making popcorn?  They watched as the bag started inflating and they began to pop up and down like little kernels.

We usually buy Orville Redenbacher's Natural Simply Salted Microwaveable Popcorn.  Yummm!  I've wanted to try popping it in the brown lunch bag for months.  I kept thinking, it can't be as easy as pouring kernels into a brown lunch bag and pop the bag into the microwave.  If it was that easy someone would have told me by now!  Well, it's just that easy.  I like a little butter and salt on my popcorn.  So we melted a tablespoon of butter and mixed in a little salt, then poured that over the popcorn and shook the bag.  So yummy!  How did I not know about this?

LESSON IDEAS
So... the teacher in me feels compelled to tell you that you can easily turn this into a math lesson- compare the volume of the kernels to the popped corn, or compare the weight.  If the kids are ready, you can also discuss the reaction (science) that took place.  A writing lesson can be to describe what happened with illustrations.  You can create a popcorn necklace or even paint with the popcorn (art).  There are even fun popcorn books that you can use for read alouds - Tomie DePaola's The Popcorn Book, Half Popped and Popcorn to name just a few that you can borrow or buy.  Today, we decided to observe and describe a kernel and compare that to the popped corn, ok and have a healthy snack.

Learning with food is so much more fun, isn't it?

Rainbow Macaroni Art

(41 Months)

Awhile back we were playing with bug-shaped macaroni (see here) and I knew then that I would dye those shapes along with some rotini and ditali.  I followed the directions from Many Little Blessings to dye the pasta.  It's quick and easy, although a bit smelly (the combination of rubbing alcohol on the pasta, peeeeuuuu).  If you have never dyed pasta before, give it a try the kids will love it.

All that's needed is rubbing alcohol, food dye, zip top bags and of course your pasta.  In a zip top bag, pour 1/2 cup of rubbing alcohol and 10 drops of liquid food dye (or 1/4 inch squirt of gel food dye- sorry about the strange measurement).  Close the zip top bag and squish and shake to combine.  Open the bag and pour in one to two cups of dried pasta.  Close the baggie and shake.  The kiddies love this part.  Repeat with the next color.  Meanwhile, keep the pasta in the closed bags for two hours or until the desired color has been achieved.  Pour the dyed pasta out onto an old towel.  Allow to dry overnight.  That's it, easy peasy lemon squeezy.

When dying the pasta we discovered that gel food dyes produce a deeper richer color (the purple is so deep purple, it's almost black) than liquid food dye.  We dyed the box of bug-shapes, along with a box each of rotini and ditali.  I wanted enough rainbow pasta to use for necklaces (you have to make necklaces - it's a classic), macaroni art (another classic), some math patterning games and to use in their pretend kitchen.

Little Miss decided that she wanted to use our food-dyed glue to make macaroni art.

Look at those little pincers working.  You can really see it in the picture on the left.  

It's fun and easy practice for holding a pencil.

Squeezing a glue bottle takes quite a bit of hand strength, 

plus the coordination of squeezing the glue exactly where you want it.

 Wild One decided that instead of working with glue, he wanted to make a necklace.

I love watching him concentrate.

Wild One discovered after threading a few tiny ditalis that they disappear underneath the rotini. 

Threading is great practice for hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills.

 The next morning, both kidabunks asked to work on necklaces.

Ta da, their finished necklaces!  These were supposed to be quick pictures of them in their finished necklaces.  Wild One completely filled his, whereas Little Miss preferred to have just one of each color rotini.  It's amazing how different these two twins are.

Time for a quick gripe moment. I have seen so many beautiful photographs of kids posing for pictures.  Smiling, when asked to smile. Facing the camera, instead of looking away.   My two have NEVER (since birth) posed for pictures.  Any pictures of the two of them smiling at the same time is completely a fluke (or tricked by tickles).  I was able to capture a few shots (yes blurry) of them dancing around in the necklaces- this was supposed to be when I was taking a picture of the two of them wearing the necklace.

Look at those faces!  So happy.  I'm so lucky.

Button Snake

(37 Months)

Have you ever made something for the kiddos and then found out they just weren't ready for it- or maybe not interested in it?  Well, this was one of those times.  I made this button snake (found at Jonah Lisa Land) about nine months ago and I was so excited to introduce buttoning to them.  Well...  Wild One didn't want to play with it, and Little Miss kept giving one button after another for me to lace it through the snake.  Oh well.  I put it aside, and quite honestly I forgot all about it.  A few days ago, we pulled it out again, and now they LOVE it!

While they are buttoning, they are saying "Peek-a-boo, and pull it through."  I love how they are practicing buttoning while strengthening their fine motor skills, but more importantly I'm so happy that they feel the success of accomplishment.  "I DID IT!"  I love hearing how proud of themselves they are when they learn a new skill.

 

As Little Miss was buttoning, Wild One was busy stringing wooden beads.  I noticed that at one point he started pulling out all the same color beads, and laced the like colors together.  Hmmm.  Idea- next week I'll bring out the buttons and beads again so that we can create a pattern.

I love how excited they get.  I love them so much!