Preschool Powol Packets

SHARKS!!! We seriously love them!! Even my preschoolers think they are super cool, and if my kids like them, I imagine there are other kids who like them too! Sooooo... I put together a new Shark Preschool Activities Packet! Just in time for summer! This packet has SIX sets of hands-on movement-filled learning activities! Do you need a quick game for your preschooler? Got it! Do you want to teach about a shark's life cycle? Got it! Does your preschooler like to color? Covered! What about matching or puzzles? Got them both! I even have letter cards in this set!! Here's a quick overview of all the Shark Activity Printables you'll find in this packet: 1- Life Cycle Spinner! Use this to learn about the life cycle of sharks that lay egg sacs (also known as mermaid purses)! I also included some fun biology information about the brown banded bamboo shark that is featured in the spinner! NOTE : You can get this activity FREE as a sample HERE ! 

We have been talking a lot about life cycles lately, and now that it's summer one of our favorite themes is SHARKS! So it only makes sense that we would start out our shark unit with a life cycle project! I won't lie...my girls love making these things! You can expect to see a lot more coming because they are a favorite activity lately...also the fastener brads come in packages of like 150! It's like someone thinks that if we need one, we need 150! Anyway, the brown banded bamboo shark is a fantastic animal!  It eats at night, lives in the warm waters of coral reefs and tide pools, and can survive out of the water for 12 hours! That's particularly convenient if you get stuck in a tide pool when the tide goes out... Sharks in general have a huge variety in their life cycles. I made this spinner to showcase a shark that uses a "mermaid's purse" to grow their babies, but I think it's important to point out that only about 40% of sharks d

I have a secret to confess. The fossil hunt STEM activity is the project I have been most excited about in the  Preschool STEM series !  I absolutely adore fossils and dinosaurs. There is a part of me that will forever be about four years old and absolutely in love with anything more than 10,000 years old. And if it makes it over 65 million years--well, anything older than the KT Extinction is more exciting than chocolate (and that's saying a lot)! When I was a teenager we went to a dinosaur quarry, and I kind of wanted to move right then and become a paleontologist! I wanted to create some of that magic for my preschoolers, especially because the nearest dinosaur quarry that I know of is thousands of miles away. Happily, we have this very awesome game: Fossil On! I Laugh-n-Learn sent us this game to review last year, and we have absolutely loved it (you can see some of my thoughts on it HERE on Instagram )! Anyway, I decided to use these fossils to create a sen

Our final project in the  Preschool STEM series  this month is inspired by my kids' love of my phone and crafting!  Like so many of our other STEM activities, this one also creates a path for creative play, imagination, and story-telling. The best STEM activities for preschoolers integrate these other subjects (arts and literacy) easily and beautifully! This one also provides excellent fine-motor exercise! Supplies : * camera or phone with camera * computer (optional) * printer * scissors * craft sticks (or straws or pencils or sticks or strips of cardboard...something to make a puppet!) * tape or glue Start out by letting your kids take pictures of each other and you. Let them gather around a computer with you and select which pictures they want to print to make puppets. Print them. You can let them decide if they want help cutting out their people. My kids cut a lot, but sometimes they want help too.  *** It is so important to let them cut if they want to-

We are doing one more big art project in our  Preschool STEM series !  If you visit here much (or even just our last Preschool STEM post!) you've heard me mention how much my youngest daughter loves to do art projects, and I love to let her--partly because art is a magical experience for her, and partly because there are so much educational value to art! This particular project has 5 important supplies: 1- canvas 2- paint and brushes 3- buttons 4- glue (We used Tacky Glue so it dries faster) 5- glitter (okay, this is optional, but my girls loooove it!) I introduced the project by suggesting they use paint and buttons to create a tree from their imaginations. I encouraged them to paint backgrounds first, but many made their trees first and then added backgrounds! Either way, the results were fantastic! Since then we've done similar projects, but I didn't even need to introduce anything...the kids had their own ideas and wanted to try out their own proj

I have an adorable 3 year old who thinks that glue and paint are some of the best things in the world, so our next project in the  Preschool STEM series  is a mixed media art project! One of the truly glorious things about this project is that there are never two identical products...each is its own beautiful masterpiece! Sidenote: there might be a certain cartoon that my preschooler also loves that involves kids making "masterpieces" in every episode. I won't lie...my heart melts a little every time she holds up a completed project and declares it "my masterpiece!" This is doubly fun to do outside. We usually work indoors to contain the mess, but a lovely woman in our community started hosting Art in the Park twice a month. She uses this exact same method, and the kids LOVE working outside! Since then I've let my own girls work outside more often, and they really enjoy it! I sometimes have to remind them to bring in the supplies when we'

Our next preschool STEM project in this spring's  Preschool STEM series  is making ramps with boxes! Between the things we order online and some gifts the kids have received recently, it seemed like boxes were starting to pile up! Our preschoolers love boxes. Sometimes they color on them with markers. Sometimes they glue random papers and fabric scraps to them. Sometimes their older siblings use them to make massive sculptures, houses, castles, or boats.  In fact, one of my preschoolers' favorite things is sitting in a box (whether or not it's decorated), and letting their older brother or sister drive them around a room by pushing and pulling the box. Sometimes they even drive each other around! Today, however, we were looking for a no-setup STEM project we could do with (a ridiculously large assortment of) boxes! These ramps were perfect! All you need are boxes! The invitation to experiment was so simple...I just flipped a box at an angle on its

One of the most beautiful things about preschool STEM is watching your kid's imaginations merge with their science and engineering skills! This Castle Project is the perfect opportunity for that! Begin by looking at pictures of castles and talking about what the perfect castle would have in it.   Have any of your kids seen a castle in real life? What was it like? Conversations like these help connect information and experiences in your preschoolers' brains, which helps them develop memory skills and neural pathways to process new information! Click HERE to learn more about how preschooler brains work !  Next tell your preschoolers that today we are building the tallest castle we can!   Give them their building supplies: paper cups and craft sticks ! Give them time to see how tall they can build a castle! It turned out that only one of my kiddos wanted to make a super tall castle...the others had other creative ideas they wanted to explore...and I compl