Toddler Theme: Science

NOTE: The move into our new home seemed to have knocked me out of my orbit.  I've moved many, many times before but for some reason (cough, the 2 young kids), this one was the most difficult.  Our weekly toddler themes were placed on the back burner as I worked to attain our new sense of normal.  I am forever grateful to my friend Ruth for offering to lead a Science toddler theme this week so that I could ease back into the whole process.  Without her help, I'm not sure how much longer it would have taken me to get back at this.  So thank you Ruth!  

If you are on Instagram, check out her feed here.  She takes the most wonderful photos of her children and I look forward to her posts every day.

-Gina

I had so much fun trying to decide on a theme for this week! After picking through our favorites, we decided on Science! How better to explain Science than with experiments! Noah is just turning three, so when I asked him what an experiment was, he shrugged his shoulders. I told him some experiments can be like magic, we can make something change from one thing into another. Some experiments we just try things to see what happens. Experimenting with your toddler can be so simple, and can cover so many different fields of science.

 First we experimented with magnets. I laid out a tray with magnetic and non-magnetic toys to sort. I gave him a magnetic toy to hold and to try to connect with the items on the tray. I placed a jar on either side of the tray so he could place non-magnetic items into one jar and magnetic items into the other jar. I made him a little booklet with paper I cut and stapled together, I called this book Noah's Experiments. I did this so we could log in what happened during our experiments. I drew two jars in the log book, and we recorded how many items were in each. This is also a great experiment to do if you have a baby; I have always found mine have always loved action and reaction.

My daughter who is 8 years old had to get in on this one too. I think she might be a bit of a science geek! She has a pre-made volcano mold from a science kit, but you can use a cup or anything that can contain liquid. You could even shape a small volcano using aluminum foil. Depending on the size of your container or volcano mold, I would start with using about 1/4 cup of white vinegar and a teaspoon of baking soda. And what you get is a volcanic eruption! They spent a lot of time doing this over and over again! We didn't use food coloring, but you could put in a few drops of red to make it feel more realistic! In our log book we drew a volcano, a box for the baking soda, and a jug of vinegar.

Another fan favorite was an experiment with gummy bears. We used four ramekins, but you can use any small bowl or container. We filled each with different solutions. The first had only water, the second had salt water, the third had vinegar and the fourth had water with baking soda. In each ramekin, we added 50 mL of water, except for the one with just vinegar, where we added...... 50 mL of vinegar! We added 1 tablespoon of table salt to one water ramekin and 1 tablespoon of baking soda to another. Make sure not to add the baking soda to the vinegar!! See previous experiment. My daughter and son drew a chart so we wouldn't forget which had which solution. We placed a gummy bear in each and left them in overnight. When we woke up we found some big changes! These were fun observational changes for us to make comparisons with. In our log book we drew a big gummy bear and a regular one.

A summary of all Science week activities with links:

ACTIVITIES: Did several science experiments including vinegar volcanoes, magnetic sorting, gummy bears in solution, and sundial creation

ART PROJECTS: We decorated our paper plate sundial before bringing it outside.  Crayon rubbing to experiment different patterns and textures in objects around the house, or even collecting leaves from different trees to compare patterns

OUTINGS: Our science centre in Toronto is an all-day outing with many exciting attractions, from an aging machine to making an impression of your body on a pin wall to making your own bottle garden. Going on nature walks and observing seasonal changes. Outdoor play at a park or in your yard can produce a lot of opportunities for experimentation. Discussing motion and force, placing a small car on the ground, you have to push the car to make it go, when the car is placed on a slide, it moves on its own. Is it as easy to move the car back up the slide as it is to move down?

BOOKS: The Magic School Bus books by Joanna Cole

BABY BONUS: Magnetic play, as long as the magnets aren’t too small! Playing while bathing the baby is a chance to try out some experiments like will the toy sink or float?

If you'd like to share a photo of your kid doing theme week activities, you can email it to me (email button in the left menu) or tag me on your Facebook photo or use the hashtag #weeklytoddlerthemes on Instagram (if you are private, just make sure I'm following you or tag me in the photo).

Toddler Theme: Night

Daylight savings time was observed over the weekend and now nighttime descends on us well before bedtime.  Mia noticed the change right away so we spent the week focused on Night.  I haven't really seen Mia show signs of a fear of the dark yet but I did put an emphasis on celebrating night this week.  Talking up the positives to make it less scary.  If you have a child that does show some fear then it might be fun to make a Monster Spray together.  I've seen many recipes on Pinterest but I can imagine it's as simple as distilled water and some lavender essential oil.  Or even play up the silliness and figment of imagination that monsters are by setting up a Build-Your-Own Monster station with play dough and pipe cleaners, googly eyes, etc.   We made dreamcatchers with paper plates, paint, string and feathers.  Last year, we made dreamcatchers using an embroidery hoop instead of a paper plate and actually used it as decor for her room.  Put it right above her bed and it worked like a charm.  Another fun evening activity was a glow stick bubble bath.  I picked up a bunch of glow sticks from the Target Dollar Spot -- all leftover from Halloween -- and threw them in the bottom of the bathtub.  Both girls really enjoyed this special bath and it made something routine a little more special.  Another fun evening activity we did was make shadow puppets on the wall.  I discovered that the iPhone flashlight is perfect for this.  Just prop your phone up on its side with a pillow or something similar.  

All Souls' Day fell during this week and even though we touched on it a little bit last week as we learned about Dia de los Muertos, we did a special activity that paired nicely with our night theme.  I found paper sky lanterns online and ordered a few.  I let Mia color them with pictures for our deceased relatives and then one evening after dinner we went across the street to the park and sent them off towards heaven.  There's a little science lesson in this whole activity and Mia was able to see how hot air rises.  She even equated the floating lanterns to the hot air balloon show she went to during Up in the Air week.  She's learning & retaining stuff from these theme weeks!  Eeeeeeee!  (NOTE: We did not in fact release these off towards heaven, but simulated it.  Colorado already has enough issues with wildfires and I didn't feel good about sending flaming lanterns off into space.  So to improvise, I tied a few pieces of fishing line to the bottom of each lantern and then the other ends to a 5 pound dumbbell I brought over with us.  The balloons hovered for a little bit -- 10 minutes max -- and then they came back down.)

We're hoping that Santa brings a teepee this year because Mia is really into pretend camping.  She just roasted marshmallows over a campfire for the first time last week and is still talking about it.  So when she's really into something, I try to exploit that interest a little.  All in the name of learning, of course.  My idea was to figure out a way to make a pretend campfire for our possible new teepee so we went to Joann's to scout supplies.  While we were there, Mia said a lantern would be more fun because she could carry it.  I like how she thinks.  We walked up and down the aisles looking for potential vessels & light.  We ended up finding plastic mason jars and they sell wire handles, too!  Mia wanted to use a candle for the light but we decided that we should avoid the whole flame thing.  Ha!  We did, however, find a cool battery-powered flickering votive candle.  We were able to make two lanterns for under $10.  Another fun spin on this project would be to somehow tint the jar a blue color and then use one of those battery-powered LED strands to simulate fireflies.  We're going to be watching the holiday clearance bins for one of those!  Here are the supplies we used in case my descriptions above didn't make sense. 

Mia has been very fascinated by the moon and the stars this last year.  We have a telescope on our wish list, but in the meantime, I use my DSLR camera and zoom lens to create a simple telescope of sorts.  If you have these items, it's pretty easy to set up.  I just put my camera with zoom lens on a tripod.  My Canon camera has a Live View mode so I switch to that and this mode lets you use the back screen as the viewfinder.  The Live View mode allows you to do a preview zoom (it won't take the picture that zoomed in but it allows you to fix your focus if you were using it the traditional way) and it's in that zooming that we can see details like craters on the moon.  One of Mia's favorite iPad apps is Star Walk Kids (find it in the app store) and many evenings, she and I can be found out on our balcony with our iPad & camera telescope watching the sky.  We took this photo of the full moon the other day.

And this is a picture we took of the Milky Way earlier this summer.  We saw lots of shooting stars (Perseid meteors) and even captured two in this photo!

Buzz Aldrin was in town a few weeks ago and I was able to get an autographed copy of his new book Welcome to Mars.  She enjoys looking through it and reminding me that a guy from outer space signed it.  Ha!  And to wrap up the week, we made a trip to our local science museum and watched the space show in the planetarium.  It mesmerized us all -- baby, toddler & mom!

A summary of all Night week activities with links:

ACTIVITIES: Watched the night sky and looked for constellations using the StarWalk Kids app (find it in the app store), Made monster spray with lavender essential oils, Took a bath in the dark with glow sticks, Crafted our own Mason jar lanterns, Made shadow puppets on the wall before bedtime

ART PROJECTS: Created dreamcatchers out of a paper plates and embroidery hoops, Built our own monsters with a play dough monster creation station, Colored paper lanterns to release at night

OUTINGS: Visited the planetarium at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science

BOOKS: Welcome to Mars by Buzz Aldrin, Sleep Like a Tiger by Mary Logue, The Cat at Night by Dahlov Ipcar

BIBLE STORY: The star guiding the 3 Wise Men to baby Jesus, The Creation story (night and day created)

If you'd like to share a photo of your kid doing theme week activities, you can email it to me (email button in the left menu) or tag me on your Facebook photo or use the hashtag #weeklytoddlerthemes on Instagram (if you are private, just make sure I'm following you or tag me in the photo).

Toddler Theme: Body Parts

We had to take our dogs in for their annual check up and also little sister Millie in for her follow-up flu shot so it seemed like the perfect week to explore Body Parts.  That's the trick to easy theme weeks...match them up to things you are already doing.  Keep it simple, right?  I told both the veterinarian and the pediatric nurse that we were learning about body parts and they jumped right in to help.  The vet pointed out the different canine body parts she was checking and told Mia about the tools she was using.  The pediatric nurse gave Mia all kinds of goodies -- tongue depressors, swabs, masks, a specimen cup -- to play with at home.  While Mia was eating lunch one day, I set up a whole doctor pretend play area.  I've heard this technique called "an invitation to play" (you know, on Pinterest and stuff) but it's one of my favorite things to do for Mia.  After my initial setup & maybe a brief introduction, she'll go for hours (I did something similar for the Manners week teddy bear tea party).  I pulled together her doctor kit, the real items from the kind nurse, and a few goodies from our own first aid kit.  Oh, and you gotta lay down a piece of tissue paper because no doctor's office is complete without the noisy paper.  Here's what my setup looked like:

She immediately ran to find a patient, Froggy (yes, we're original with names around here).  Her favorite thing to do was take his temperature so she did that about 30 times.  She listened to his heart, checked his blood pressure, covered him with bandaids, gave him shots, and fed him vitamins.  And her bedside manner is pretty awesome...she gave him a kiss during his shot.  Does your kid need some x-rays for his doctor kit?  I found those pics during a google search and then printed & laminated.  Staples will print on transparencies for you, if you want to go the ultra authentic route.

We had a play date with Mia's pal Olivia at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science this week, so we made sure to check out the Expedition Health exhibit.  Everyone receives a card upon entry and you sign in with some basic info like your age, gender, and name.  Then you can record different health stats at stations as you learn about body parts and systems.  At the very end, they give you a printout with all your information.  Mia checked her heart rate and danced around in front of the x-ray simulator.  Olivia looked at her skin with an ultraviolet camera.  Then her mom gave her some sunblock and we got to see how that works to protect the skin.  Pretty cool!

There are so many easy activities you can do, too.  I pulled out Mrs. Potato Head & a magnetic face game for Mia to play with during the week.  We sang songs like "Head, Shoulders, Knees & Toes" and "The Hokey Pokey."  I cut out random body parts from magazines and let Mia make a body collage (I included a printable link below if you don't want to cut up magazines).  And this last activity is fun as a pre-bedtime family game.  Give your kid a sheet of stickers and challenge them to put a sticker on daddy's nose.  Put a sticker on baby brother's foot.  And on and on.

A summary of all  Body Parts week activities with links:

ACTIVITIES: Played Doctor with stuffed animals, Sang body parts songs like "Head, Shoulders, Knees & Toes" and "The Hokey Pokey," Played with Mr. Potato Head and a magnetic faces game, Labeled body parts on family members with stickers

ART PROJECTS: Made a face collage with magazine cutouts and household items (string, pasta, beads, etc)...Here's a printable from Picklebums if you don't want to cut up magazines 

OUTINGS: Explored the Expedition Health exhibit at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, Took the dogs to vet for their annual appointment, Supported little sister as she got her follow-up flu shot

BOOKS: When I Was Born and At Our House both by Isabel Minhos Martins, Tickle Monster by Josie Bissett

BIBLE STORY: Eve was made from Adam's rib

If you'd like to share a photo of your kid doing theme week activities, you can email it to me (email button in the left menu) or tag me on your Facebook photo or use the hashtag #weeklytoddlerthemes on Instagram (if you are private, just make sure I'm following you or tag me in the photo).