Imaginative Play – WonderHouse of Littles https://wonderhouseoflittles.com Tue, 11 Jul 2023 10:59:51 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.1 https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/cropped-logo-32x32.png Imaginative Play – WonderHouse of Littles https://wonderhouseoflittles.com 32 32 Birthday-themed Shelf Activities https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/birthday-themed-shelf-activities/ https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/birthday-themed-shelf-activities/#respond Sun, 09 Apr 2023 13:02:33 +0000 https://sara.ideatema.com/?post_type=play_learn&p=959

Birthday-Themed Shelf Activities

For the week of my daughter’s second birthday we had this very festive shelf!

It was a mixture of Montessori-inspired shelf work and open-ended play items. I made a small setup for pretend play with a coffee machine and a birthday cake because we wanted to celebrate every day of the week.

Here is what was on the shelf that week:

(individual pictures below)

⋒ DIY Open/close work

You can use any items you have around the house, like an old small purse or pouch, a jewelry box or any decorative box you have. You can get as creative as you need.

⋒ Ball transfer with spoon

⋒ Transfer using a tong and counting frame.

⋒ Shape sorter 

⋒ Color sorting with cupcake liners

⋒ Djeco Nesting cubes. Find a similar one here.

⋒ Bead threading

Open-ended and pretend play setup:

⋒ Silicone blocks 

⋒ Djeco Coffee machine (available in Europe) and birthday cake. (This Hape coffee machine set is another favorite of ours)

⋒ Stacking rainbow and house

These activities help develop a number of skills, including fine motor and practical life skills, 1:1 correspondence, colour and shape recognition, problem-solving and open-ended play.

*** This post may contain affiliate links. That means we may make a small commission on items purchased through links in this post at no extra cost to you! Thank you for your continued support ♡

]]> https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/birthday-themed-shelf-activities/feed/ 0 Arctic-themed Playdough with DIY Stampers https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/arctic-themed-playdough-with-diy-stampers/ https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/arctic-themed-playdough-with-diy-stampers/#respond Sun, 09 Apr 2023 12:44:00 +0000 https://sara.ideatema.com/?post_type=play_learn&p=943

Arctic-themed Playdough with DIY Stampers

I’ve had these wooden shapes for a while – they were actually Christmas tree ornaments – but I decided to give them a new purpose 😁. So I made some DIY playdough stampers using blocks as the base. 

For this Arctic-themed playdough tray I paired the stampers with white playdough, a few natural items and some colored rice. A enjoyed creating different scenarios with the stampers and natural items, and finally dumping all of the rice in the playdough 😂. It ended up looking pretty nice though! 

Playdough is a great pre-writing activity. It helps strengthen hand muscles, improve fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination, while allowing the child to use imagination and express creativity. It also fosters language development as the child is exposed to the different elements on the tray.

Cleaning up is part of the learning process, so make sure to encourage your child to tidy up after they finish playing. Model how to do it until your child feels confident enough to initiate the tidying up process independently.

*** This post may contain affiliate links. That means we may make a small commission on items purchased through links in this post at no extra cost to you! Thank you for your continued support. ♡

]]> https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/arctic-themed-playdough-with-diy-stampers/feed/ 0 Animal Rescue – Bin Edition https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/animal-rescue-bin-edition/ https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/animal-rescue-bin-edition/#respond Thu, 06 Apr 2023 18:12:11 +0000 https://sara.ideatema.com/?post_type=play_learn&p=800

Animal Rescue – Bin Edition

 
This activity is so fun for children and so easy to set up!
 
To recreate this activity all you need is:
 
Put the animal figurines inside the bin and add pieces of tape as you see in the picture.
 
Adjust the level of difficulty according to the child’s age and skill level.
 
Demonstrate first by rescuing one animal and invite the child to do the same after you’ve demonstrated.

Besides being fun for toddlers, this activity also helps strengthen fine motor skills, hand-eye and bilateral coordination, problem-solving skills and develop concentration.

Cleaning up is part of the learning process, so make sure to encourage your child to tidy up after they finish playing. Model how to do it until your child feels confident enough to initiate the tidying up process independently.

Bringing play to life:

  • For older children, how about discussing the reasons behind an animal rescue? Why do some animals need being rescued? What can we do to help animals?
  • How about visiting or helping a local animal shelter or a wildlife sanctuary?

*** This post may contain affiliate links. That means we may make a small commission on items purchased through links in this post at no extra cost to you! Thank you for your continued support. ♡

]]> https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/animal-rescue-bin-edition/feed/ 0 Story Basket – Amelia Earhart https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/story-basket-amelia-earhart/ https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/story-basket-amelia-earhart/#respond Wed, 05 Apr 2023 14:11:19 +0000 https://sara.ideatema.com/?post_type=play_learn&p=744

Story Basket – Amelia Earhart

We are big fans of the Little People, Big Dreams book series and this book in particular is one of my daughter’s favorites.

Amelia Earhart was an American author and pioneer in the field of aviation. Among many other achievements, she was the first female to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. 

To bring her story to life I included a pilot hat, a wooden airplane, little wooden houses and trees, and tiger and giraffe figurines as they appear in the book. I also made a small landing strip using black cardstock paper and white tape for us to practice take off and landing. 

This was so much fun! While I read to her, A enjoyed putting on the hat, flying the airplane around the room, practicing landing and take off, discovering the items in the basket and matching them to the images in the book.

Bookish play is such a lovely way to bring books to life for children and helps instill a love of reading and learning from a young age.

Cleaning up is part of the learning process, so make sure to encourage your child to tidy up after they finish playing. Model how to do it until your child feels confident enough to initiate the tidying up process independently.

Bringing play to life:

  • How about bringing your child’s attention to the air traffic where you are? “Look up and tell me: what can you see?”
  • For older children, how about bringing their attention to professions that are, still, male-oriented, such as airplane pilots and bus drivers, for example? It’s a great opportunity to start raising awareness about the fact that women, just like men, are capable of anything!

*** This post may contain affiliate links. That means we may make a small commission on items purchased through links in this post at no extra cost to you! Thank you for your continued support. ♡

]]> https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/story-basket-amelia-earhart/feed/ 0 DIY Object Puzzle: Food Edition https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/diy-object-puzzle-food-edition/ https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/diy-object-puzzle-food-edition/#respond Wed, 05 Apr 2023 12:02:52 +0000 https://sara.ideatema.com/?post_type=play_learn&p=678

DIY Object Puzzle: Food Edition

This activity is so easy to prepare and can be done with just about any objects you have at home.

I simply traced the outline of each pretend food item on the paper and encouraged A to match the item to the outline.

At the time we did this activity my daughter was 20 months. She knew exactly what to do and was so happy when she completed it that she clapped for herself.

This seemingly simple activity is actually packed with benefits, including: 

⋒ Fine motor skills

⋒ Hand-eye coordination

⋒ Shape recognition

⋒ Visual discrimination 

⋒ Spatial awareness

⋒ Language development

⋒ Problem solving

The food items used in this activity are from Le Toy Van’s vegetable, fruit and pastry sets.

Cleaning up is part of the learning process, so make sure to encourage your child to tidy up after they finish playing. Model how to do it until your child feels confident enough to initiate the tidying up process independently.

*** This post may contain affiliate links. That means we may make a small commission on items purchased through links in this post at no extra cost to you! Thank you for your continued support. ♡

]]> https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/diy-object-puzzle-food-edition/feed/ 0 Flower Soup https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/flower-soup/ https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/flower-soup/#respond Fri, 31 Mar 2023 11:57:30 +0000 https://sara.ideatema.com/?p=452

Flower Soup

Soon after my daughter turned 2, we welcomed Spring with this simple activity.

Setting up a flower soup activity is a great way to repurpose a wilted or dried bouquet and makes for a sensory-rich experience.

A had a fun time filling and emptying the pots, mixing the flowers around and using the strainer and colander to pick up the flowers. Eventually she decided to squeeze the flowers and of course her favorite dinosaur had to make an appearance too.

In addition to its calming effect, this type of water play helps children develop fine motor skills (plucking petals), practical life skills (pouring and transferring), concentration and early math concepts such as full and empty.

Cleaning up is part of the learning process, so make sure to encourage your child to tidy up after they finish playing. Model how to do it until your child feels confident enough to initiate the tidying up process independently.

*** This post may contain affiliate links. That means we may make a small commission on items purchased through links in this post at no extra cost to you! Thank you for your continued support. ♡

]]> https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/flower-soup/feed/ 0 Vegetable Patch https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/vegetable-patch/ https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/vegetable-patch/#respond Fri, 31 Mar 2023 10:32:08 +0000 https://sara.ideatema.com/?p=424

Vegetable Patch 

Around 21 months old my daughter used to love playing with her vegetable and fruit set by Djeco so I picked a few vegetables from the set and made this vegetable patch sensory activity. 

To make the soil I used chocolate cloud dough (cacao with a few spoons of oil) and mixed in a little bit of black rice for an extra sensory layer. 

This activity offers a great opportunity to talk about how vegetables grow (there were seeds in the little packages which I showed to her), and their need for water and sunlight.

After playing with the soil and the vegetables for a little while, A picked them into a small bowl, we took them to her kitchen and washed them to “make” soup.

In addition to providing opportunities to improve fine motor skills and practice practical life skills such as scooping and washing, this activity also helps develop language and build concentration.

Cleaning up is part of the learning process, so make sure to encourage your child to tidy up after they finish playing. Model how to do it until your child feels confident enough to initiate the tidying up process independently.

Bringing play to life:

  • How about engaging your child into making a real vegetable soup or fruit salad with you?
  • How about getting some real soil for this activity?
  • How about growing your own vegetables or herbs?

*** This post may contain affiliate links. That means we may make a small commission on items purchased through links in this post at no extra cost to you! Thank you for your continued support. ♡

]]> https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/vegetable-patch/feed/ 0 Acorn Sorting https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/acorn-sorting/ https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/acorn-sorting/#respond Fri, 31 Mar 2023 10:16:59 +0000 https://sara.ideatema.com/?p=412

Acorn Sorting

 
If your child is in the enveloping schema (loves to hide/cover objects) or simply enjoys color matching, this activity will be perfect for them!
 

You will need:

  • a tray
  • chickpeas (or any sensory base you prefer. I chose chickpeas because of the neutral color, which makes it easier to spot the acorns and is less distracting)
  • a set of wooden acorns and matching bowls

I filled the tray with chickpeas and buried the acorns. My daughter enjoyed searching through the chickpeas to find the acorns and then putting them in the matching color bowl.

After she sorted them by color we buried them again. She kept playing with this activity for a while, filling and emptying the bowls and searching for the hidden acorns.

This activity has multiple benefits, including improving:

  • Fine motor skills
  • Hand-eye coordination
  • Visual discrimination
  • Color recognition
  • Spatial awareness

My daughter was 21 months at the time.

If you’re into arts and crafts, you can recreate this acorn set using this unfinished set.

Cleaning up is part of the learning process, so make sure to encourage your child to tidy up after they finish playing. Model how to do it until your child feels confident enough to initiate the tidying up process independently.

*** This post may contain affiliate links. That means we may make a small commission on items purchased through links in this post at no extra cost to you! Thank you for your continued support. ♡

]]> https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/acorn-sorting/feed/ 0 Bookish Play with Forever… by Emma Dodd https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/bookish-play-with-forever-by-emma-dodd/ https://wonderhouseoflittles.com/play_learn/bookish-play-with-forever-by-emma-dodd/#respond Fri, 31 Mar 2023 10:05:13 +0000 https://sara.ideatema.com/?p=398

Bookish Play with Forever… by Emma Dodd

This book has been one of my daughter’s favorite books for a long time.

It’s a sweet story about the love a polar bear has for their cub. The polar bear comforts the small cub and lets them know that through life’s ups and downs they will always be there by their side and will love them… forever.

I paired it with white playdough and bear and cub figurines. My daughter loved making footprints on the playdough as we read the book. We flattened the dough a few times and did it all over again.

Bookish play is such a lovely way to bring books to life for children and helps instill a love of reading and learning from a young age. And you can’t go wrong pairing it with play dough!

Playdough is a great pre-writing activity. Squishing, rolling, pressing, molding and all other play dough movements strengthen the finger muscles that will be used for fine motor movements, such as holding a pencil and using scissors. It also allows the child to use imagination and express creativity, while fostering language development as the child is exposed to the different elements on the tray.

Cleaning up is part of the learning process, so make sure to encourage your child to tidy up after they finish playing. Model how to do it until your child feels confident enough to initiate the tidying up process independently.

“And as through all the years to come

We journey on together,

Deep within my heart,

I know

I will love you… forever.”

*** This post may contain affiliate links. That means we may make a small commission on items purchased through links in this post at no extra cost to you! Thank you for your continued support. ♡

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