CLICK HERE for more spring sensory bin ideas! I love everything about this season – the frogs croaking in the yard, the caterpillars that will be delivered to our classroom, the seeds we will plant, and the nature walks we will take. Spring officially enters our classroom in April after we return from spring break. While colors start popping outdoors, our classroom becomes more colorful, too! When planning our spring theme, I love to add the season’s touches to all of our learning domains, including math....

Inside: Over 40 toddler rainbow activities that include art, sensory, snacks and books. Easy and fun ways to teach color recognition! When planning ideas for toddlers in our classroom, I look for ways that toddlers can have fun without rigid guidelines. Basically, I like to set the activity on a low table, pull the chairs away, and let them walk right up and get busy. Because their attention spans are shorter, they might only want to spend a minute or so and then walk away....

Inside: On the hunt for good toddler winter books? These short and interactive books are our choice for January, during our snow and bear themes. When planning our January theme activities, the first thing I do is decide on which books I will read. Because toddlers and young preschoolers have shorter attention spans, I prefer books that aren’t too wordy and get the children involved. I talk about this in my most popular video, The Secrets of a Successful Circle Time....

Inside: This fall sensory bin for preschoolers builds color recognition skills as the pom poms are transferred to matching colored containers. If you’ve been reading my blog for awhile, you know I love using pom poms for a variety of activities. (Remember our spring color sorting bin?) Young children can handle them easily and appreciate their soft texture. They are fun to pick up with the fingers or scooped with tongs or spoons....

Inside: Easy Christmas gifts made by kids that can be done in the classroom or at home. Perfect for parents, grandparents, and any special person! Every December our preschoolers make Christmas gifts for their families. When thinking about kid made Christmas gifts, we want them to be something that will either be a keepsake item, or something that the receiver will enjoy using now. When I did a search on Pinterest for kid made gifts, many that I found were too complicated for little hands....

Inside: These favorite toddler Valentine’s Day books celebrate love and friendship. Perfect for your home or classroom library! Looking for some simple toddler Valentine’s Day books that younger children will enjoy? Part of this collection is what we will be reading to our 2 and young 3 year olds during the first two weeks of our February themes. I kept their shorter attention spans in mind, finding shorter books that grab their attention....

Fillable Keepsake Ornament for Kids to Make I tend to change the details of our ornaments from year to year, but they always contain a photo of the child. Every Christmas, as we are setting up our family tree, I love pulling out ornaments that my now-grown children made back in their days at preschool and elementary school. Their little touches. Perhaps their photos glued on top. Paint and glitter and maybe a handprint....

25+ Homemade Christmas Ornaments for Kids Make a shimmery ornament with paint and glitter. Create a keepsake photo ornament with cute Christmas buttons. Use doll pegs to make darling angel ornaments. Brighten your day with a colorful gingerbread suncatcher ornament. Read a gingerbread man book and then make gingerbread ornaments. Make a photo keepsake ornament that you will adore for years and years. Invite the children to fill baubles and add a handprint....

Inside: It’s easy to make a preschool Christmas ornament to use as a gift for parents or other special people. Add some fun buttons and the child’s photo, and it’s a keepsake item to be cherished for years! Parents love keepsake ornaments. I don’t love super crafty things that take a lot of my time putting together and then watching the children’s every move to make sure it looks “right”....

Learning shapes can be part of every day with toddlers and preschoolers. There are so many playful opportunities to expose young children to shapes during centers time, circle time, while singing songs, even while playing outdoors. Ditch the flashcards and workbooks and try one of these fun and engaging activities. They are sure to build toddler and preschool shape recognition skills! Art Shapes Art Using Toys Circle Art Recycled Shapes Process Art (Mosswood Connections)...

Fall is the perfect time to explore apples and we love to include them at the art table. We’ve enjoyed creating apple suncatchers (they look so colorful in our window!), making apple prints using bubble wrap (rolling paint is always a favorite), and making three dimensional apple trees to display on our classroom shelf. Our students then bring apples from home so we can compare their colors and cut them to make applesauce!...

Each year during our fall theme we ask our preschoolers to bring an apple to school to make applesauce. But before we cut into our apples, we sort and graph them. I put together this apple graph activity with free printable cards as a way for us to add some simple color recognition and math to our preschool day. It’s a great learning activity for circle time so that all the children can participate at the same time....

Make sure to check out more ideas on my math pin board! If you’ve been reading Teaching 2 and 3 Year Olds for awhile, you know that I prefer to teach concepts in ways that get young children excited about learning. When children arrive at our preschool at the start of the year, their counting skills are at varied levels. Some can count easily to 5, 10, 15 or even beyond....

Games are a great way to help young children build skills. They can be done independently or with a small group of children. They can be adapted for use at home or in the toddler and preschool classroom. This collection of number games for toddlers helps strengthen simple counting skills and number recognition. Some of the activities also include color sorting and fine motor strengthening. Most importantly, these number games are fun!...

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You can find the original post here: ICE PAINTING! Here I go again! I’ve found yet another way to turn a cake pan into an ice painting activity. This time the shape is a bunny and it’s perfect for the Easter theme! If ice painting is new to you, hold on. You are going to be so glad I’ve introduce this method, as will your toddlers and preschoolers. It’s that good!...

If you have toddlers, you know that a lot of those Easter crafts are over their heads. You are trying to direct them to add the bunny ears in a specific place, sprinkle the glitter over there … well, you know what I’m saying. Toddlers want to simply have fun exploring whatever materials you are providing them. This is why I LOVE this easy toddler art with Easter eggs! So, grab those plastic eggs for some toddler approved Easter egg art....

Then I placed the flower bouquet sign in front of a container of flowers. Over the many years I’ve been teaching, our preschool has somehow acquired an abundance of artificial flowers. When I open our gardening theme box, it’s full of them! So, what to do with all those flowers? Have a flower market, of course! And that’s exactly what was in our dramatic play area during our gardening theme....

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Inside: Add these Easter circle time props to your classroom this spring. Toddlers and preschoolers can hold their bunny sticks while singing Easter songs! Get your toddlers and preschoolers engaged in circle time with these fun bunny sticks! I’ve created these props for children to hold while listening to favorite Easter books. They are also perfect to use with bunny songs during music and movement! Scroll down towards the bottom of this post to find the link to the free download....