Toddler Group Make and Do idea's please!

[Juliehafrancis]

Hi..

I was wondering if anyone knew of any idea's or any books that would give me some idea's for our play table at my local toddler group. It needs to be something that is accessible(i.e 12 - 3 1/2 yrs) to all even if the parents need to help! Would be great to have things for Valentine's day and Easter too.

TIA

Jules x

sorry that's meant to be 12 months + - 3 1/2 yrs

DOH!

You could make some play dough for them to play with. used to go down a treat at our toddler group. Baker-Ross do some good stuff but its quite pricey. Still you could order the catelogue and get some ideas - I did that for the children i childmind and then got the materials cheaper from places like Wilkinsons.

fab one from my nanny - cut out some big red bus shapes (pretty basic - straight line along the bottom hump sort of shape up above) then cut out black wheels, square white windows and lots of faces (children, teddies etc) from a magazine. It took me a whole evening cutting out when I did it for play group but it went down really well - and all teh kids have to do is stick everything in roughly the right places. Another one is a washing line - two straws and some string stuck to a piece of paper and clothes to hang on it - cut out from a catalogue. Houses too - cut out the basic shapes - house, windows, doors, roof, chimney, and some decorative bits - flowers, curtains. It all involves quite a lot of cutting to do toddler group scale but you get good pictures

The toddler group I sometimes go to has the 7 Play Activities books listed in the literature list link at www.highlandpreschoolservice.co.uk/

I've only skimmed them briefly myself but thought they looked good value for the money. They are available to non-member groups but perhaps your group is affiliated to a pre-school organisation that might have its own literature?

Thanks! Any other fab idea's?

Very simple things work really well:

Cut out large red hearts from cereal boxes, and provide pink or red paint to paint them, then lightly sprinkle glitter on when paint is still wet.

Collect lots of different shades/types/shapes of paper in a particular colour, and cut into small pieces: Provide the kids/adults with PVA glue (or pritt stick) and allow them to stick away!

My main comment would be that children of this age most enjoy/get most benefit from activities which don't produce an impressive result ...!

salt dough is cheap to make and can be used like paydough but has the added advantage of being able to be baked. It can be moulded into different shapes or use shape cutters (hearts). Once it has been baked, the dough is really hard and then it can be painted or decorated.

Juliehafrancis, I keep borrowing various 'rainy day' books from the library for craft ideas. Another one that my ds still loves (he's four) is getting loads of different pasta shapes and loads of different containers, bottles, muffin trays etc he loves pouring, sorting etc them into different piles.

I agree with rosin, keep it simple.

At home my dd will spend hours sticking, either with pva glue or pritt stick. I cut pics out of magazines, wrapping paper, sweetie wrappers, and any interesting or textured materials i can find for her. Sequins are another fave. I keep a Collage box and often spend an afternoon sticking masses (never quite sure what to do with the end result) but the point is she loves it!

When i go to our local P&T group, the activities are often so fiddly that really the children don't do much, and the end products are all identical because the adult helper has done all the work!

To make sticking "look good" you could have a theme. I.e Cut the paper into shape of teddy bears, and cut pics or shapes of teddy bears to stick on, or the same with vehicles, animals. You could stick pics of food onto paper plates.

From dd's (3)Angelina Ballerina comic - cut out cardboard heart shapes - any size really, then cut out loads of little squares / rectangles of red and pink tissue paper, get them to screw up the paper into balls (or anything vaguely resembling a ball, paint glue all over the heart and stick the tissue paper balls on it. Pierce a hole near the top of the heart and thread a ribbon or wool through it so it can be hung up. It looked surprisingly good and perfect for Valentines Day!

small lengths of wool are good for glueing and sticking. we did peg dolls which went down well - we printed the faces which they stuck on then wool hair and a bit of fabric for clothing.

a packet of rich tea bicuits with some runny icing and lots of hundreds and thousands, smarties etc. for decorating. This carries a food additive warning - the kids love it but some of them do turn into the incredible hulk 20 mins later. you could try just using the chocolate ones I suppose

Fill milk bottles/jamjars with different levels of water. Toddlers love hearing the different notes made by different levels of water as you tap the jars with a spoon.

Hi a couple of ideas from our mother & toddler group:

1. magic maize - available from Early Learning Centre. Just uses water on a sponge to stick onto paper or into shapes.
2. iced biscuits - using value rich tea biscuits - make up some thick icing which they can spread on top, then have some edible sprinkles and the like to decorate.

I do lots of crafty stuff with my 2 year old and at the moment she loves sticking. My suggestions are as follows:

1. get a simple picture or shape cutout and then let her stick balls of tissue paper on it.
2. Cut out petal shapes in various colours, have a centre circle and then let the child stick the petals on the circle, then stick a lolly stick on it and voila, a flower you can hold.
3. Make a picture frame out of lolly sticks and decorate it with glitter, paint or jewels.
4. Download masks from the internet and let them decorate them, use elastic or pipe cleaners to secure them to their heads. Good place for masks is the colchesterzoo site \link{http://www.colchesterzoo-kidz.co.uk/wallpapers-masks/masks.html/here]

Sorry link for masks is here

This website is good for a few ideas making things we made those necklaces that you eat out of Cheerios and strawberry laces

Excellent site Humphrey!