Blog: Middlers

Good morning! It looks like it’s going to be a little cool for May on this Tuesday morning. Here are some invitations Caitlyn and Sarah hope will inspire your middler inside or outside.

Outdoor/Nature/Gross Motor Invitation: Gather various items in nature for the fine motor activity such as rocks, flowers, small sticks, etc.

Intent: Get outside and enjoy the nice weather and beautiful spring scenery. We want to encourage the middlers to use all of their big body and fine motor muscles to enhance gross motor development.

Art Invitation: Painting rocks

Have your child search for small and large rocks outside that they can paint! The middlers can use these painted rocks to add some beauty to your yard, and they can also incorporate them in today’s fine motor activity.

Intent: Painting on a small surface area takes a lot of focus and fine motor control. This activity will allow your child to focus on their fine motor skills and allow for their creativity to shine through with their color choices and painting they create.

Fine Motor Invitation: Spatial Awareness Nature Puzzle. Draw different shapes on a piece of paper and have your child fill it in (like a puzzle) with various nature items. 
Intent: This activity incorporates fine motor development by encouraging the middlers to use their hand muscles and pincer grip to move the nature items. This activity also encourages spatial awareness by encouraging the middlers to stay within the lines of the shape and watching how much room they have left.

Good morning! Welcome to another week of Lakewood at home. We are excited to share another week of activity invitations for children age 2-3 years.

Sensory Invitation: Make Ants on a Log
Ingredients: Celery stick, peanut butter (or a nut butter alternative), and raisins.
Spread the peanut butter in the middle of the celery stick and add raisins on top of the peanut butter for the look of ‘ants on a log’.

Intent: We wanted to include another fun cooking activity. This allows the middlers to create their own snack that they will be able to eat and enjoy.

Fine Motor Invitation: Counting/sorting activity. Gather 5 or 6 muffin/cupcake liners and label them 1-5 or 6. Use tongs to sort pom-poms or other small objects by putting one pom-pom in the liner labeled one, two pom-poms in the liner labeled two, etc.

Intent: This activity incorporates fine motor development by encouraging the middlers to use their hand muscles to guide and close the tongs.The middlers could practice using the pincer grip by picking up the objects with their thumb and index finger. This activity also incorporates cognitive development by encouraging counting and number recognition.

Art Invitation: Make your own watercolor paints!
Materials needed:
Baking soda, food coloring, water, an ice cube tray (or other small container for your finished product)
How To:
Fill each slot in the ice cube tray about ¾ of the way with baking soda.
Add 1-2 drops of food coloring in each slot (vary your colors in each slot).
Slowly begin to add water to each slot and gently mix. As you add water the baking soda will dissolve.
Finish filling the slots with more baking soda, slowly adding more and gently mixing until you have a really thick consistency with minimal residual water.
Let your watercolors dry out, or you can put them in the freezer for quicker results.
(Drying may take 24 hours, but in the freezer it will be set in 3-4 hours)

Now it’s time to paint! Add a little water and use some paint brushes to paint with your homemade watercolor paints!

Intent: This activity allows for total creative control from the middlers. This activity will take a bit of patience and uses a lot of fine motor skills with the mixing. This activity allows for the middlers to help in the entire process of creating their materials and their art piece.

Outdoor/Nature/Gross Motor Invitation: Make a fairy house. Using natural materials you can find outside (leaves, rocks, flowers, sticks, etc.) build a fairy house for your yard.

Possible dialogue:
“What can we find to make a fairy house?”
“How should we build it? Does it need walls? A roof?”
“Who will live in the house?
“What will the fairies do?”

Intent: Get outside and enjoy the nice weather and beautiful spring scenery. We want to encourage the middlers to use all of their big body and fine motor muscles to enhance gross motor development.

Happy Friday! Sarah and Caitlyn have planned some interesting invitations for today. Have a great weekend!

Sensory Invitation: Oil and water sensory bag
What you need:
1 gallon size freezer bag
Baby oil (or other cooking oil if you don’t have baby oil)
Water
Liquid food coloring
Duct tape

Add about ¼ cup baby oil to the bag, then drip in some of your food coloring. Then add about ¼ water. Seal the bag, pushing most of the air out (leave a small amount of air, but not enough so it will pop) and tape the seal closed so it won’t spill.

Now let your child play! Place the bag on the table and let them squish and shake and explore. What does your child see? Can they see how the bubbles form and burst?

Intent: This is a fun sensory experiment that allows your child to see the properties of oil and water when mixed together.

Fine Motor/Physics Invitation: Make a ramp to drive toy cars down (or other small toys that your child would want to try).

Possible variations: Make a few different sized ramps. Ask your child how the cars move differently on the shorter ramp versus the longer ramp.

Intent: This activity incorporates fine motor development by using hand muscles to move their toys where they want them to go. It’a also an exploration of slope and acceleration.

Outdoor/Nature/Gross Motor Invitation: Make flower soup. Find as many flowers as you can and make a “flower soup!” You can add different color flowers, sand, grass, water, etc. Use a stick or a spoon to mix it up. 

Intent: Get outside and enjoy the nice spring weather! The middlers enjoy mixing sand and water to create various types of food in the digging area at school. This activity incorporates gross motor development by encouraging the middlers to use big body movements to gather materials (flowers, grass, etc.) and to mix it all together.

Good morning! It looks like it is going to be a lovely Thursday, and it’s almost Friday.

Sensory Invitation: Create your own moon sand!
How to make: Use ¼ cup baby oil* for every 2 cups of flour
Mix it together well to break up any balls of baby oil that form.

*In our test we used vegetable oil and it worked just fine.

Moon sand will have a similar consistency to kinetic sand. Your child can play with it, mold it, scoop it, etc.

Intent: The middlers loved using kinetic sand in the sensory bin at school. This gives them an at home alternative to explore. They can also be part of making it and mixing the ingredients together.

Art Invitation: Sponge paint! Grab some old sponges and have your child paint with them. You can put clothes pins on the sponges to create handles. This is a great activity for outside. If you have bricks or a wooden deck you can give your child the sponge brushes and a container of plain water for painting.

Intent: This activity gives the middlers an opportunity to explore painting using different materials. They can work on strengthening their fine motor skills while holding the sponge to paint.

Fine Motor Invitation: Animal line up. Use tape to create different shapes or lines and have your child line up their toys on the line or around/in the shape. 

Intent: This activity incorporates fine motor development by using hand muscles to move their toys where they want them to go.