Glass Gem Compilation

Glass gems have been a staple in our playrooms since our children were 6 months old.  We love how one "toy" can become so many different things.  Below, you can see some ways that we have explored them.  

Glass gems can be purchased at any craft store, Dollar Tree, Walmart, Target, etc.
**They present a choking hazard and should only be used with young children under close supervision.**

Most of these pictures have a blog post with more detailed information.  To see the entire post, click on the links below the pictures.  

Creative Play

Use gems with our letter/number templates.
LETTER/NUMBER TEMPLATES

Enlightening Math
ENLIGHTENING MATH

Sorting

Sensory Bin
SENSORY BINS

Illuminated Ornaments
ILLUMINATED ORNAMENTS

Color Recognition

Creative Play on the Light Panel

Great Big Giant Tree of Light
TREE OF LIGHT

Glass gems on a mirror.


Framed mirrors can be purchased at Dollar Tree.  

Glass Sculptures
GLASS SCULPTURES

Window Art
WINDOW ART

Glass Gems on clear plates. 

Clear plates can be purchased at Dollar Tree in a pack of 8.
Great for classrooms!  

Glass Pumpkin
GLASS PUMPKIN

Exploring Spacial Patterns
EXPLORING SPATIAL PATTERNS

Airplane Adventure

My days are often filled with the "vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv" sounds of airplanes flying around the playroom, garage, living room, etc.  My son LOVES all things airplanes.  We had a left over piece of wood in the playroom and one day my son took it out and sat on it, pretending to fly a plane.  I asked him if he would like to make some airplane controls (yes!).  We started by flipping through his airplane book making note of all the dials and knobs in the cockpit, then it was time for a trip to Walmart.  Once we found the aisle with switches and knobs I let him choose which ones he wanted for his controls.  When we got home, we created this - together.

We simply used screws to attach everything.  The wooden pieces have holes in the bottom, so we screwed in a screw (leaving some of it sticking out) and stuck the wooden pieces onto the screw.

The wood pieces can be purchased HERE.

"Flying" his airplane


Since posting the picture above over a year ago, a steering wheel (AKA apple cutter) has been added - by him - as a steering wheel.  He uses his controls often in our imaginary adventures.  They are a HUGE hit!



Click HERE for a video of one of his adventures.

Incorporating his controls into his space ship.

Hard at PLAY!

His space ship!  LOVE!

- AK (MESE, MECD)

Invitation in Green

This summer we struggled to maintain enjoyed the benefits of a bountiful garden. We had more summer squash than we knew what to do with, so we gave a lot away and made a lot of squash muffins (think "zucchini muffins" but with squash...yes, it works, but it's not the same). We also had a lot of okra - yum! And we soon discovered that it was better to pick small okra in the morning because by evening they were too tough to eat (seriously, they grew THAT fast). Anyway, one day we had some giant okra, so I decided to create an invitation in green. We'd already done the Yellow Invitation using the squash so it made sense - why not?!

 I set up an invitation on the light table after collecting a number of green tools for measuring, cutting, writing, and general exploration. Lately Addi shows interest in having a variety of collected items to create with, so I really did include a a lot (last year this many items would have overwhelmed her, so it's important to research your child's individual interests and needs when setting up an invitation).



Addi immediately took the lid off the homemade light table and brought it to the ground along with all the supplies; she always knows just how she wants to play, lol. Then she set to work pouring the paint into the translucent cups.  She noticed the cups with paint were now opaque and explored how to completely cover all the cups...the green popsicle sticks worked well.

"I can see through these, but not that one. Can you help me? Oh, I got it."

This summer her interest in letters grew, so I try to include them in most invitations. I didn't know how she would use them in her work; she started off by painting around them while singing a song from one of her favorite books (Chicka Chicka Boom Boom).

"Weeee said D to E F G I'll beat you to the top of the coconut tree."
"K is out of bed & this is what she said, dare double dare you can't catch me..."

And she painted her hand, around her hand, and made a hand print.



"I'm painting my fingers, not your fingers. Is that cool?"

Luckily there was quite a lot of paint on the ground because Addi LOVES to spray and wipe up...well, she loves to spray. And she likes knowing she can get her own cleaning cloths out of the closet.

I make my own cleaning products, so she's welcome to spray away!

Researching our children's interests can be a fun challenge as long as we don't set ourselves (or our children) up for failure. There are several ways to do this:

• Does your child work more deeply with a few items or many?
• How does lighting affect his/her play?
• Include your child's favorite colors
• Include an object your child visits often (lion, letters, etc.)
• Consider a theme: color, animal, letter, medium (art, sand, water, etc.)
• Give yourself a pep-talk before setting up a potentially mess-making invitation, "This is going to be messy and fun. The more mess the more learning. I will ignore the mess until after dinner if I have to, even until after bedtime." If you start to panic, focus on the sheer joy on your child's face!
• Keep your sense of humor and playfulness.
• Follow their lead: if they want you to play you can whisper, "what should I do?" Otherwise you can simply enjoy the show.
• Jot down their reactions and responses. Their facial expressions and words can bring new and deeper meaning for everyone.
• Let go of how you want the materials to be used and instead notice how your child chooses to use them - become curious! "Why did he paint the cup rather than the paper? Interesting: she took apart the light table before using the other materials! I wonder why she included the horse?"

Raising children is full of magical moments when we are able find within ourselves the time and space to watch and listen. I hope you'll find some today...or tomorrow!

Imaginary Adventures (with an overhead projector)

My son loves going on imaginary adventures - particularly on airplanes and boats.  It usually just involves my bed or his bed....and some pillows.  He prefers to just imagine things rather than bring objects into his play, which I love.  Yesterday we went on a trip that looked something like this:

We went to Oshinatu, where we sat on a nest of eggs and watched in awe as 4 baby ducks and 1 baby turtle were born. Their names were Stainer, Rainer, Mainer, Crainer, and Scrainer. The ducks sat and kissed my arms. Just as they were about to take their first swim, we noticed there were alligators in the water.........

Today I thought I would help him delve deeper into his imaginative play.  I printed some pictures onto transparency sheets using my LASER printer.  This did not work with my ink jet printer when I tried it a few months ago, but you can take pictures to places like Kinkos and have them print them on transparencies for you....and I think there may be transparency sheets specifically for ink jet printers.  I would love to make these available to everyone, but that would be A LOT of ink and A LOT of postage for me.  

We have an overhead projector that I purchased from Craigslist for $30 a few years ago.  I simply projected the pics onto a white sheet hung on the wall and let the fun begin.  This was a HUGE, HUGE hit!!  I think the airplane was by far his favorite.

Wanna play in the forest??

An invitation to explore in an imaginary forest.

An invitation to sail on the ocean.

The "boat" and accessories.

Ocean Adventure

The box boat tore, so he made a boat with his blocks.

Invitation to FLY!!

His "controls"

He LOVED this one!!

The controls are something he made back in April.  Today he added an apple slicer to steer.  Love it!!

Controls - picture from April, 2012

CLICK HERE

for a video of him "flying" today.

MORE FUN....

Fly to - and walk on - the moon.

Swim (take a bath) with dolphins.

The possibilities are endless with this.  I also have a construction site picture and an under the sea picture for future play.

For more projector play, click HERE.


-AK (MESE, MECD)

Special Delivery

"Mommy, I'm a delivery man.  I deliver the mail.  I have a special delivery for you."

This has been an imaginative play scenario with my son for about a month now.  I knew I wanted to get him a mailbox, but I had this vision of what it would look like in my head and just couldn't find what I wanted - until today.  I stumbled across this vintage looking mailbox at our local World Market and both my son and I love it.  He explored it a bit when we got home and as he was eating his lunch, I quickly set up this invitation to delve deeper into his imaginary play.  We spent the entire afternoon playing "special deliver man" (aside from an hour or so where we went swimming with RL and her girls). 

Invitation to play.  Mailbox, envelopes, cards, pencils.

I was secretly hoping it might inspire him to write a bit....or at least use a writing tool.  Yeah - not so much.  He did draw a tree on one card and a balloon on another, but that was it.

Look at that smile.

Checking the mail.  He thinks this door is "cool".

He told me he needed a mail bag.

He also said we needed stamps, so we used stickers.  He said the letter was for me and asked me to write Mommy on the envelope.

He later asked if we could hang the mailbox...and he chose the spot.  :)

"Reading" his mail.

- AK (MESE, MECD)

Broken Bones - Orthopedics at Work

As you all know my girls love playing doctor.  You can see our latest doctor post where they performed open heart surgery HERE.  Here is yet another extension off of that play.  One of their favorite books right now is "Maisy Goes to the Hospital".  In the book, Maisy falls off the trampoline and breaks a leg.  They are always asking a million questions...

How does it get better?

Is the cast hard?

Can she take it off?

How come her friends are writing on it?

I set us this invitation up for them below.

Casting Invitation

I know there are a bunch of different paper mache recipes out there.  For this invitation we used one part glue to one part water.  

Newspaper

Gauze

A willing participant.  (LOL)  

Pouring in the water

(All my oldest's curls are gone.  :-(  AK and I had some BAD experiences at the hair place last week)

Glue

Mixing it all up.  

My oldest (3.5) prepping me for the cast.  

Sorry about the quality of pictures.  I was taking them myself while they put my cast on.  

My 27 Month old getting her first strip ready.  She was EXTREMELY particular that they didn't bend, fold, etc.  Very true to her nature.  If it wasn't perfect she tossed it in the garbage.  

My oldest ditched the invitation at this part.  She did NOT want to get messy!  

Carefully placing newspaper on my leg.  

Very precise!  I was kinda shocked at how much she enjoyed this. I thought for sure my oldest was going to run the show.

Taking off excess glue.

Almost done!  

Finished!!  

Our original plan was to let it dry and then paint it white so we could color it.  It ended up being a bust. "The doctor's" told me I was healed much sooner than expected and we needed to cut it off.  :-)  We tried to save it so we can use it again for future play but it fell apart.  I'm sure it was a combination of taking it off before it dried and my 27 Month old didn't quite cover my complete leg.  There were a few holes and it was only a layer or two deep.  

This was a bit messy.  I would definitely recommend laying a blanket or some sort of sheeting down underneath.  I also had a garbage can and towel close by.  My 27 month old liked to wipe her hands off after each piece.  

RL