FREE Reading Class!
Anyone who has a young child in their home will want to check out the FREE reading class. Nurturing Your Young Reader will help everyone who works with young chidlren to raise a reader. There are twelve lessons and over 40 activities to use with kids that will help build the skills needed for literacy development. And it’s all FREE! So pop on over to the All Info About Reading Workshops and sign up for the Free Nurturing Your Young Reader class today!
Water Play for Young Ones
On the next hot day, you can occupy your young child with just a bit of water and imagination. Try these fun ideas!
- Use water to “Paint”. Arm your kids with an old paint brush and a bucket of water. Allow them to paint the water onto sidewalks, lawn furniture, or even your house or garage. The water will make a satisfying color “change” and the kids will be happily occupied for quite a while.
- Give young children lots of containers and a little bit of water, and they will pour and mix for quite a while. These skills are important for motor development and also help build foundations for science concepts.
- If you’ve got the time and patience for dirty play, try mixing the water with dirt to make mud. Experiment with different consistencies. What does it take to make pourable mud? How about moldable mud? Stirable mud? Does one kind of dirt work differently than another? How much mud and water does it take to make mud? (I swear I had a kid who could make a gallon of mud from a few drops of water and a couple of grains of sand…).
- Try some water experiments. How long does it take the sun to warm the water? How long does it take ice cubes to cool it? Does the water feel the same to hands and elbows and toes?
- Use a straw and CLEAN water to try spraying water as far as possible.
- Have a water Olympics: hold contests for biggest splash, longest drink without a breath, most water held in the hand, and similar competitions.
- Use a flexible straw and CLEAN water with two bowls to try siphoning from one bowl to the other.
- Can you build a water-powered gizmo from tinkertoys or household items? Try for something where pouring on water moves something or causes something else to happen.
Have a wonderfully wet time!
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© 2008 Sandy Fleming
