Fine motor skills

This week we have been working on little one's fine motor skills.  His birthday was on Sunday.  I thought it would be a good lesson for him to make thank you cards.  On one side I wrote the message and little one signed his name.  On the other side I wrote "thank you" in big letters.  I used paint and the end of a marker to make circles.  Then little one glued either pom-poms or pony beads on each circle to spell out "thank you".   It has taken us quite a few days to do this project becuase it is quite tedious for little one.  He also used a paint dabber for some of the dots.  We reviewed the letters and the words as he worked.

Dying Easter Eggs

Today we dyed Easter eggs using shaving cream and food coloring.  

Paint in a bag

So I found this cool sensory activity on another blog.  It is super easy to do.  You get a gallon sized ziploc baggie and some paints.  You squirt the paint into the bag and seal it up.  Then you tape it to your sliding glass door!  Simple as that!  Little one and I practiced his shapes and letters.  Its like using a dry erase board without any cleaning :). Little one kept looking at his hands to see if there was any paint on them ;). Try it out!

Dinosaur footprints

Today we completed our Dinosaur Train PBS lessons by discussing dinosaur tracks and painting.  We watched the video, did a matching worksheet, and then painted footprints.  We cut out a footprint and glued it onto construction paper.  Little one practiced his fine motor skills by doing the cutting and glueing all by himself.  He also wanted to use glitter on the footprint.  I cut a foam brush to make a footprint shape.  Here is a picture.

Our new Pope!

Today the Catholic Church has a new Pope.  He chose the name Francis.  Little one and I watched the news and then made a Pope hat out of white felt.  I got the idea from catholicicing.com. 

Another plane :)

After making our pterosaur planes little one asked to put together a wooden bi-plane kit we had picked up at AC Moore for $1.  I said "sure!" :). What good homeschool momma would say no to more learning? ;). The kit was for age 8 so this homeschooling momma actually did most of the work of this project.  LO painted the plane and mommy glued it together with a hot glue gun.

Pterosaur plane

Today we did the Dinosaur Train PBS lesson on making our own pterosaur planes.  I made one and little one made one.  It was definitely a lesson in following directions and fine motor skills.  We had fun and it only took a few minutes to actually construct and decorate.

Paint dabbers

On Friday we went to AC Moore to buy paint dabbers.  Little one uses these in his Gymboree school skills class and loves them.  I asked his teacher where she purchased them and she said AC Moore.  I should have asked her exactly where in the store that she found them.  We asked two separate sales associates and finally found them in the party supplies section.  They are actually labeled for using on windows. 

When we got home with our new paint dabbers, little one wanted to play with paint dabbers immediately but it was bedtime.  Saturday morning he was very excited to get started with the paint dabbers.  I printed some pages from royalbaloo.com.  She has some great printables for FREE on her blog :). She is currently doing units on "The Zoomin' Moovin' Alphabet". For every letter of the alphabet she is making printables based on different trucks.  My son LOVES trucks so this is perfect :). We printed off the paint dabber pages for an EMT, bus, and dumptruck.

Check out our pictures. :)

Homeschool lego club :)

We joined a new homeschool lego club.  Its open for all ages and meeting once a month at our local library.   We had almost 30 children show up for our first meeting! :). The club desperately needed more legos.   So I volunteered to go to a local consignment shop to see if they had any legos for sale.  Boy did I pick a good place and day to go.  I scored the whole bin in the picture for less than $40. :). Its filled to the brim and overflowing some.  All duplos and megablocks.  Some cool sets even like Disney's Cinderella are mixed in the box.  Little one is having a blast digging through the box and we can't wait to take them to our next lego club meeting later this month. :)

Butterfly out of beads and pipe cleaners

Today we worked on our fine motor skills.  I got the idea from another blogger http://teachingmama.org/fine-motor-skills-stringing-beads/ 

We used multi-colored pony beads and pipe cleaners.  Our cat, Tarzan, was very interested in this project ;)

It was a simple craft to do.  We used 3 pipe cleaners (2 for the wings and one for the antennas).  It took LO quite a while to string all the beads.  He really enjoyed the finished product.  He kept singing "fly like a butterfly, fly like a butterfly in the sky!" :)

With Spring approaching soon we plan on ordering caterpillar eggs and growing them into butterflies.  We did that last Spring and LO still talks about it. :)

31 Days of Simple Sensory