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Saturday, February 2, 2013

DIY Magnetic Match Blocks

Since the SNAP BLOCKS are such a hit with my son, and he enjoys manipulating things with his hands, I wanted to combine the two and create a new, fun way to encourage letter recognition - something he is currently very interested.  If you read my SCOOTER BOARD LETTER FIND post, you know that he's pretty much mastered letter recognition within the last month.  He is interested in upper/lower case, but the possibilities are endless and by using stickers, you can change out your "theme".  

After searching all around town for the correct snaps, and coming up empty time after time, I was beginning to get discouraged.  RL suggested using magnets....uh, duh.....perfect!

THINGS YOU NEED:
wooden blocks
stickers 
glue

(AN ALTERNATIVE TO MAGNETS IS VELCRO.  WITH VELCRO YOU WONT HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT THE POLARITY OF THE MAGNETS)

You can get any size you want, but just make sure the stickers you choose fit on the blocks you choose.  You can see my choices in the pics below....


I chose these stickers because they have a sandpaper-like texture.  They are from Michaels.

These are the blocks I chose - from Michaels
The process is simple....just glue on the magnets FIRST,  find blocks (magnets) that are attracted to each other, then add the stickers.

Magnets - from Michaels

matching

matching

Add caption

My son really enjoyed this.  There are so many other fun ways to utilize these blocks.  

1. Match textures
2. Match colors
3. Match beginning sounds to pictures
4. Match amounts
5. Addition/Subtraction number sentences (would require magnets on both sides of the block)
6. spelling (I recommend using velcro instead of magnets if you plan to spell with the blocks)

Here is a beginning sounds example

Here is a counting example



ENJOY!

AK (MESE, MECD)







8 comments:

  1. This is such a wonderful idea! Thank you for inspiring me!
    -Deborah
    http://fortheloveoflearningblog.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete
  2. I have really been enjoying your blog since finding it this week. Homeschooling five is a bit easier when us moms can glean from each other. Thanks so much!

    ~Joy
    http://www.vimandvigor.typepad.com

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  3. I will be making these, but geared more towards my 15 month old. Thanks for all of your awesome ideas!

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  4. Your ideas are amazing...I couldn't come up with these on my own so it's so nice to be able to "copy" your ideas and do things like this for my kids...especially now that I'm returning to work and hubby is staying home with them.

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  5. I LOVE your blog and this idea is amazing. The only problem that I have with the letters is that you can not always find lowercase letters (such as 'a')in the style that children usually see at school. I guess it's a good idea for them to see lowercase letters in different ways, but I like the "standard" a, for lack of a better word. Any thoughts? Do you think letters in different fonts can be confusing? Just curious.... But again, I love the ideas you all present.....so engaging!

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  6. The purpose behind customizing these stickers are quite easy. When we are creating in various designs, we actually do not have anywhere to see at apart from other ideas. If a person wants to express a viewpoint across, it starts with the way your creation with the some identification decals.

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  7. Since the SNAP BLOCKS are such a hit with my son, and he enjoys manipulating things with his hands, I wanted to combine the two and create ... magneticblocks.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete