Inside: Strengthen fine motor skills with this easy shamrock art for toddlers and preschoolers. It’s as simple as dropping watercolors onto the free shamrock printable, squeezing and releasing the paint, watching it fall and mix. Hands-on fun! I love activities that build multiple skills, and that’s exactly what this shamrock art activity does. I took the same shamrock printable that I used in our fun and easy St. Patrick’s Day art, and also our shamrock color mixing activity....

Creativity Our toddlers and preschoolers love to use their imaginations while working with play dough. Play dough is a must in our toddler and preschool classroom, which is why it is available every day. It is an easy way to work on a variety of skills, but can also be very calming, which is important for busy kids. In addition to various tools, I like to use play dough mats for some of our skill building activities....

Providing great learning opportunities for toddlers doesn’t always require purchasing brand new toys and supplies. In fact, you can create some amazing hands-on experiences with the materials that are already around you. Tongs, basters, measuring cups, and items from around the house can be utilized for great fine motor activities. These activities for building fine motor skills using household utensils will inspire your creative outlook on how to utilize items already in your possession for toddler skill-building!...

Make sure to scroll down to find other fun water table activities, too! Our toddlers and preschoolers love the water table. Well, they love everything that involves water! So, it’s only natural that I take what they love and use it to teach concepts. This color sorting water bin is full of water fun, with some learning taking place, too! And this is a pretty cheap activity to put together!...

Inside: Put together a simple spider art activity that involves rolling golf balls with white paint. A fun process art idea for toddlers and preschoolers! Even during the holidays, when crafts are ever so popular, I love to find an activity that involves process art. Using golf balls with paint is a favorite method for toddlers and preschoolers We’ve used golf balls while making our: gingerbread man banner pigs on the farm frog puppets...

👉 I’ve included a leaf template below to make this activity even simpler to assemble! Fall is so colorful, so I always want to add more of it to our classroom. We are lucky to have huge windows and I love being able to display the children’s artwork in them. Especially colorful art work, like a fall leaf suncatcher. This activity is not only easy and fun, but it’s also a great way to work on those fine motor skills, getting the hands and fingers ready for future writing....

During our preschool summer camp, I used our outdoor time to show them how to mix colors on a mirror. I love using mirrors outdoors, and we’ve done other watercolor activities on top of them, such as when we mixed yellow and blue by hand. We have a safety mirror that was once on a stand in the church nursery. I unscrewed the stand so it could lie flat on a surface....

35+ Quiet Time Activities for Toddlers and Preschoolers There are moments in every day that we need some quiet time. Especially if there are young children in the house. This is one of the reasons we love nap time so much! But what about when they give up their naps? Oh, I remember those days well. I didn’t know how I was going to handle a full day without any down time....

Inside: Put together a simple preschool Halloween sensory bin with pumpkins. We added rice and beans and even some flicker tea lights for extra fun! Putting together Halloween sensory play for preschoolers is as easy as adding small pumpkins with any type of materials that they can pour. Young children love to pour, and pouring over a sensory bin minimizes spills. We happened to use uncooked rice and beans, such as in our sunflower sensory bin, because they pour well and the texture is appealing....

Inside: We had so much fun with our toddler and preschool Christmas theme. Lots of playful learning and gift making. Lots of free printables are included in this post! Our last theme before winter break is Christmas. In fact, the Christmas theme stretches for 2 weeks since there’s so much happening. But even with the gifts and treats that we make for our families, I’ve also included some simple fun activities that help burn the excess energy that seems to happen around this time of year....

Inside: We found lots of fun ideas for our toddler and preschool St. Patrick’s Day theme, plus we explored mixing blue and yellow to make green. It’s a fun way to expose children to color recognition in playful ways! Our classroom has lots of green in it this week as we celebrate St. Patrick’s Day! We are mixing colors at the art table and at the science table, learning what makes green....

Inside: Looking for a simple preschool science activity? This volcano idea involves apples, baking soda, and vinegar! I do love classic, tried-and-true science activities. EASY and FUN science activities. You know, the ones that make your kids get all wide-eyed and curious? Nothing fancy, just plain fun? Well, that’s just what this easy volcano science activity is all about! And the good news is that it’s part of an amazing collection of over 100 other easy and fun science activities!...

50+ At-Home Activities for Preschoolers (and Toddlers!) Toddler and Preschool Activity Plans Looking for an entire year’s worth of learning activities? We’ve done the work for you! Finding ways to entertain your children at home often feels overwhelming. Finding ways to do this while focusing on their skill development can sound even harder. Don’t worry, putting together activities at home is simple and requires fairly basic supplies! The sorted list below will inspire you to fill your afternoons with fun fine motor games and art activities ....

You know all those shipping boxes you break down and recycle? Take them to your art table instead! We love using cardboard and I’ve shared some of our creations: Cardboard Fall Tree Craft Cardboard Christmas Trees Cardboard Gingerbread Men Big Cardboard Snowmen Cardboard Pom Pom Hearts Fish Suncatcher Craft Basically, something for each season! So, naturally, I wanted to find something for our apple theme that would be easy for our two year olds, and this was perfect....

Inside: Looking for Valentines classroom ideas? This collection contains a variety of skill-building activities that toddlers and preschoolers love. Can be used at home, too! You have your February planner open and you know you want to include Valentines with your activities. I’ve made it easy for you by finding activities that build a variety of skills. I thought of my own classroom while searching for ideas, but they can easily be done at home, too!...

Inside: Have fun with this assortment of winter learning activities! Can be adapted for toddlers and preschoolers at home and in the classroom. I love how there is such a wide variety of winter learning activities! We start our winter theme as soon as we get back from break at the start of January. We include ice and snow, winter clothing, and hibernation. When searching through Pinterest, there is a lot of crafty ideas floating around, but not as many learning activities....

This year I am moving into a classroom after over a decade in my previous room. I will admit it took me quite awhile to warm up to the idea. I loved my previous room. I had everything figured out! I knew just where circle time would go, I finally had figured out a great spot for our science center, and I always loved that our dramatic play area had a nice big window behind it....

Inside: Put together a week’s worth of apple learning activities with these fun ideas for toddlers and preschoolers. Free printables included! One of the best themes to kick off the fall season is apples. There are so many fun apple learning activities that build multiple skills! I’ve put together a variety of ideas that are simple to do at home (or at school!) that also focus on building different skills....

Inside: This collection of popsicle stick activities builds a variety of skills that can be done at home or school. A little something for everyone! If you’re a teacher, chances are you have a box of popsicle sticks (or craft sticks) buried somewhere in your art supplies cupboard. Parents, you might have a stash of them at home, too! They’re so simple yet useful- you could actually probably build just about anything using popsicle sticks....

This is how they looked when completely dry: If you are looking for a super easy and sweet gift for Mom, this is it! The idea started brewing in my head when we purchased some yogurt that came in small glass jars. I instantly could visualize these jars being turned into colorful candle holders. Now, this “stained glass” technique is not my idea. It’s been around for a really long time....