They Have Returned

             
                    Our GingerKids have returned!

It’s true what they say “If you build it they will come.”
                         - they did.
 
We spent the week decorating a gingerbread house in hopes that
our GingerKids would like to move in.

                 
We read through all the letters and post cards we have received
from around the world.  
 
Plus a couple of new ones from Laurie and Donna.

  
                And we kept on decorating.

        
Then this morning, the last day of school before Christmas break,
there they were tucked inside their new home. 
 
    
   Including one final letter full of Christmas wishes.

       
       We're happy to see them back too.

It’s been a grand adventure learning about the world around us. 
Thank you for sharing a little part of your world with us.

Santa Toque for Snack

   
Yes, I am Canadian and we call a warm winter hat a ‘toque’.
           
This toque-to-eat is made with a rice cracker, banana slice,
strawberry and a piece of cheese string.

 
 
The tricky part was balancing the cheese ‘pom pom’ on top of
the strawberry. 
         
It worked best to take a bite out of the strawberry first then add
the cheese. 
Either way the Santa toque didn’t stay around very long.

Math at the Art Table

   
I saw this Christmas card idea over at whatever… and loved it.

Lately I’ve noticed a lot more children picking up scissors
and snipping on anything they can get their hands on;
paper, ribbon, pipe cleaners, anything.

So I thought this would be a perfect art activity for their interest
and the time of the year.

But I didn’t realize how much math could work into it
until I watched this young man work on his card.
     
First he’s trying to decide how long the strip should be for
the base of his tree.
     
He decides to measure the gold paper to the width of the card
then cut.
     
And continued to measure and cut to build his tree.
      
Stopping briefly to cut a much smaller piece to use as the
‘stem’ of the tree.
 
Once he worked to the top of his tree he started to decorate it using precut
stickers and the shaped hole punches to make snowflakes and stars.
       
This art project included working on measuring, sizing and sequencing.
As well as discussion of the shapes he used.

Then there were children that just enjoyed the cutting.
    

Backlog Of Play Trays

It’s been a while since I posted about our play trays so here is a bunch
that we have been playing with this past month.
    
Straw stars that I photocopied for matching.
    
For some families these stars brought back memories from
their childhood.

    
Old fashioned clothespins decorated as toy soldiers,
they were able to straddle them on the wire basket by colour.

 
Gingerbread house toy for sorting shapes and matching to the correct hole.

     
A magnet was added to the bottom of the car then a magnet wand
is placed underneath the box. 
I saw this idea on someone’s blog but can’t find the link,
if it’s yours please let me know.
 
We discovered that the box was a bit too small so…
 
we created a bigger one.

 
Star shape ice cube tray, gold stars and little tongs.

    
Boxes to stack on top of each other or inside one another.
 
With a little surprise in the smallest tin.

  
I saw this idea of matching an object to it’s shape on several blogs like,
De Tout Et De Rien and Irresistible Ideas for Play Based Learning.
 
This would work with many, many things.  I’ll be using it again.

   
Clipping coloured clothespins to the same coloured light bulb.
     
The cards I printed from Childcareland.com several years ago.

 
Santa suit pieces to match together.
    
But then I noticed one of the children using our coloured clothespin
to dress so I pulled out these old fashion clothespins to use. 
I even saw a mother use them as a finger puppet to entertain her toddler.  

    
And finally, a star sorting activity.