From Frogs to Fishing

I try to use our toys, materials and equipment in a variety of ways.

Last week I shared the children playing Frogs on a Log.

Once we released our live frogs I changed the frogs to fish.

Turning the half round over and it became a boat.

Going fishing went well with our camping play.

After they caught what they wanted the fish disappeared

to the campfire for a fish fry.

Plastercine Play

While we were studying frogs I put plastercine out on the art table.

I moved our aquarium with the frogs and tadpoles to the table

and added some toy frogs for models.

Great fine motor work as well as expressing their creativity.

The end result - lots of frogs and maybe a tadpole or two.

Cottonball Painting

I'm always looking for new methods of painting and while browsing Pinterest

I found, on various sites, cottonball painting.

Over at Domestic Mommyhood I liked how they set it up in muffin tins

and used clothespins as handles.

The cottonballs work really well to hold the paint and they don't fall apart,

which I thought they would.

This is some of the children's work.

With just a few tins of paint the children created a lot of paintings.

Frogs on a Log

The play started with a book Five Little Frogs Sitting on a Log.

A book that we created several years ago.

A few children sat to read it

while others used the toy frogs to help tell the story.

Then the children became the frogs.

First making headbands to get into character.

Then becoming the frogs.

They crawled or walked across the 'log' then jumped off the end.

Then I saw some children jumping into the pool.

Under the water they went.

Having fun discovering new ways to play, exploring the materials

and learning from each other.

Snail Eggs

Every year we create a Snail Garden.

Most families have snails in their gardens that they are willing to give away

 and we find them fascinating to watch.

To start we sprayed the soil till it was very wet then sprinkled on 

wheat grass seeds.

They grow quickly and thickly.

Each day we sprayed them with water, which the children love to do.

Less than a week the grass was grown.

This morning I went into my flower garden and found two snails to bring to school.

They moved in and we gave them cucumbers for eating.

I cover the garden with screening so the snails won't escape

and to keep them safe from little fingers when an adult is not around.

We watched the bigger snail explore his new home.

We could see his foot moving on the screen and the shiny trail he left behind.

But the most exciting thing to happen was to watch the smaller snail

lay eggs.

I've never seen this happen before and I felt like a proud mama.

We picked up one of the resource books from the library and learned that it will

take 3-4 weeks for them to hatch.

Once the eggs were laid it slimed it's way up the side of the bin.

The children were fascinated.

I borrowed these snail puppets from our district's Learning Resource Centre

to further their interest.