Sylvia Martignani Activities For You and Your Children

All of these items can be found at your local dollar store. Here is a handy list to make your shopping experience easier.

• Electrical tape (comes in 3 colours on 1 roll) Masking Tape
• Flash Light
• Fly Swatters
• Large foam dice Paper
• Paint
• Markers
• Pipe Cleaners
• Lint Roller
• Clothes Pins
• Balloons
• Spray Bottles (Mini ones usually in the hair accessories section)
• Glow sticks (just the simple ones a pack of 10)

Moon Sand

Moon sand is a fun activity that can be made with 2 simple house hold ingredients. You can expand the learning by adding anything that can create a print (Cars, toys, measuring scoops, cups…)

What you need

• 8 cups of all purpose flour
• 1 cup of baby oil (if children are younger, use vegetable oil) Added Challenge: The great part of this activity is its appropriateness for all ages. Infants are excited to explore the texture, and toddlers and preschoolers are excited to use the toys for play!

Shadow Tracing

Shadow tracing can be done inside or outside, in so many ways! Use a flashlight or a lamp if inside. Try different sizes toys or objects from around the house, and see what angle makes the best shadow What you need

• Large Paper
• Toys
• Light Source (Lamp, sun, flashlight) Markers Added Challenge : Ensure to add items that are large as well as items that have a variety of ridges. Older children will be able to trace the more intricate designs while younger will be able to explore shadows and try to follow the lines.

Toy-Rescue

This is a great activity to support motor development and keeps children entertained for long periods of time. Allow the kids to choose their favourite tiny toys, and add them to balloons. Fill those balloons with water and freeze them over night (I love doing the first part in the evening, so the kids are excited to go to bed and see the toys in the morning). The next day we remove the balloon casing and are left with a toy in a ball of ice. Add warm water to mini spray bottles (Local dollarstore) and the kids can spray to rescue their toys from the ice. What you need

• Balloons Small Toys Water
• Spray bottles Added Challenge : Some children will melt the ice faster, so just make sure you have a few of these to use. Also, you can add small toys vs. larger toys based on childrens age.

Tape Maze

Simple activity with masking tape and a carpet area. I created the maze in the evening while the kids were sleeping, and set it up with cars so that in the morning they came right down to a new activity. This promotes ; problem solving, hand eye coordination, language development as well as motor skills. What you need

• Masking Tape Cars Added Challenge : Younger children will use the toys, but picking the tape off the carpet is a wonderful fine motor challenge! Older children can expand on this by adding blocks, ramps, tools… allow them to build their city! Children working on their spelling and writing skills can go to the next level and make signs for their new town (Library… Super Market- whatever they want!)

Tong Rescue!

Create a web with any yarn or string that you have around the house, and loop it through a laundry basket. Let the kids choose some medium to small toys that they can put inside, and using tongs allow them to rescue their toys! They will have to use their motor skills, problem solving and coordination to get through the web and remove the toys! What you need

• Laundry Basket Yarn

• Toys

• Tongs Added Challenge : A great way to add or remove a challenge is with the tongs. You can get mini tongs for older children, and can even go as small as tweezers. For infants you can simply remove tongs all together, and they can work on special awareness by using just their hand to retrieve toys.

  Clothes Pin PIN Children really enjoy creating with a variety of materials. Clothes pins come in an array of sizes, styles and colours. This activity involves simple clothes pins and cups! The children are using their motor skills to clip on and remove the clothes pins. What you need

• Cups Clothes Pins Added Challenge : This base activity can be expanded in so many ways. You can colour the clothes pins and match them to the correct coloured cup. Older children can have letters on the clothes pins to start creating blend sounds. Younger ages that are working on letter recognition; you can add letters to the pins and children can match the letters to the corresponding cup. The sky is the limit for this activity based on the learning outcome youd like.

Circle Painting

Creating circles using cut up paper towel rolls and a large mural paper. Sometimes simple activities are the most fun. This allows the kids to explore colours, mixing colours and creating some open ended art. What you need

• Paper
• Paint
• Cut up paper towel rolls Added Challenge : An adjustment for younger children. Mix vanilla yogurt with food colouring. Younger children can “paint” with that allowing for them to use all their senses, and without worrying if they ingest it.

Pipe Cleaner Pick up

Cut up pipe cleaners and lint rollers make for a fun activity that can be enjoyed for hours! Cut pipe cleaners into 3 inch pieces. Leave lint rollers out and use pieces of construction paper for the kids to “sort” the pipe cleaners on that they have collected! They are sorting by colour, using their fine motor to pick up the pipe cleaners, Playing with textures and sensory with the sticky side of the roller and having a blast! What you need

• Paper (Variety of colours) Pipe cleaners
• Lint rollers Added Challenge : A great added challenge would be seeing how many they can pick up in 1 roll. A way to make the activity easier for infants is omitting the paper for sorting and just using the rollers with the pipe cleaners ( this would be an opportunity to play with senses, fine motor and cause and effect with infants!)

Colour Swat!

This is a great large muscle and movement activity to get the kids moving on a rainy day! Cover your carpet in different colour shapes, and add those colours to a large dice . Using a fly swatter let your children roll the dice and swat all the shapes with the corresponding colour! What you need

• Electrical tape
• Fly swatters
• Dice Added Challenge : Younger children will enjoy rolling the dice and finding the COLOURS. Olde children will be able to find different shapes and colours (i.e., the red square vs. the red triangle) you can adjust based on age!