Even though Gracen has known how to spell her name for a long while now, we still enjoying doing fun name activities every now and then. I set up today’s activity while Miss G was resting, and kept it very simple. 3 trays, each with some play dough and some letter ‘manipulatives’ I collected from around the house. When Grae woke up, she spotted the play dough name practice trays waiting for her immediately and was eager to check them out.
There’s no doubt we have a thing for play doughs in this house. I absolutely love coming up with fun new dough recipes, and Miss G absolutely loves exploring and creating with them. I’m not sure where this crazy idea came from exactly, but one day I found myself wondering why we had yet to play with basic cooking doughs {like the ones used to make breads and pastas}. Miss G’s well out of the putting things in her mouth stage, so ingredients like raw eggs are not a concern, and how fun would it be to ‘play’ with the dough by shaping and cutting, and then cook it up into something delicious? Sounded like a plan to me {as long as very clean hands and a clean playing surface were involved, that is!}
With our last crafting class of the year coming up in just a few short days, Miss G and I wanted to prepare some simple gifts to share with the little friends she’s made at Bright Minds over the last few months. We adore play dough and had so much fun with our larger scale play dough snowman building activity that we decided to make miniature versions in easy to pack cases – everything needed to build play dough snowmen in small locking lid containers for some holiday fun on the go {or at home, really}.
First, we gathered up our materials… A double batch of our yummy-smelling vanilla mint play dough, awesome divided locking lid containers, beads, buttons, googly eyes, orange matchsticks, small twigs, and miniature scarves cut from inexpensive felt.
{this post contains affiliate links}We found our locking divided containers at City Star here in Kuwait, but these Sistema Klip It Split Food Containers on Amazon look similar. I love them because they’re small, easy for little ones to seal and unseal, and perfect for packing in a purse, diaper bag, or carry-on. Plus, they keep the play dough and the ‘building accessories’ {as Miss G calls them} separate, which I like too.
To get started, I added a big ball of vanilla mint play dough to one compartment of each container.
Then Gracen added the accessories to the other. To keep things uniform, we came up with a ‘recipe’ of what should be added to each container (2 googly eyes, 2 matchstick carrot noses, 2 twig arms, 5 beads, 5 buttons, and 1 felt scarf), which turned out to be great counting practice for Miss G.
This is how our kits looked when we were done with them.
Afterwards, Gracen matched up the lids, locked them on, and I used a regular glue stick to adhere some very basic labels I made and printed to fit our containers. And that was it – simple but cute gifts for our friends to enjoy over the holidays, be it at home, on an airplane, and while waiting in restaurants and doctors’ offices. I am so keeping one of these to bring along on our upcoming trip to Germany. In fact, I’m thinking I may create a couple of other little ‘play on-the-go’ kits too! ☺
Of course the one I tucked away for our trip didn’t remain a secret for long…
In fact, Grae’s already had several play dough snowman building sessions with her little kit.
Now let’s just hope the excitement continues until Christmas break rolls around and we board that plane!
Fingers crossed!
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Play dough is an everyday thing in our house. Grae is free to use the bin of tools and dough we keep in the main living space of our home at any time and she also has a smaller set in her bedroom to use during quiet play time too.
One day, while playing with our well-loved pumpkin spice play dough, Gracen asked if we could have some friends over so she could share her new dough with them. She’s always adored having friends come over, and now that we’re in an apartment building filled with teaching families, arranging play dates is easier than ever. A play dough play date sounded like a brilliant plan to me, so I agreed and immediately started thinking about another fall-scented play dough we could create. I quickly remembered the apple play dough post I’d seen on Fantastic Fun & Learning, and knew that Miss G and her friends would enjoy something similar. Because I was on a bit of a roll with the dough containing real pumpkin, I decided our apple dough would contain real apples and would be further fall-ified by making it apple pie scented. The good news is that my mission was a total success! The dough turned out soft, squishy, and smelled deliciously of warm apple pie drizzled with caramel sauce – yum! In fact, as I was making it, Brad came into the kitchen with eager eyes and asked what I was baking because our house smelled so delicious. Oops.
One of the things I’ve always loved doing with students who’ve found using scissors challenging is pairing them with play dough instead of paper. Let’s face it – learning to use scissors properly is tricky! First there’s figuring out which fingers go where, plus there’s finding the hand strength and coordination to open and close them, and then there’s also guiding them in the direction you want them to go… Certainly no easy task! The reason I love play dough is that although many kids come to Kindergarten not all that familiar with using ‘school tools’ like scissors, almost all kids come to school having played with play dough. And not only are they familiar with it, but they love it. And because it’s fun and non-intimidating, plus soft and easy to cut, it’s a perfect starting point, even for reluctant munchkins.
I’ve done this activity with Gracen many times, and although she’s already very comfortable using scissors with paper and cutting on pre-determined lines, she still loves cutting play dough. It’s an easy activity to put together and I’d rather smush together bits of play dough than pick up tiny shards of paper any day of the week. When I set it up, I usually create both play dough ‘pancakes’ and ‘worms’ and then let her go to town, but anything goes. Today after quickly preparing the play dough shapes, she used them to create a daisy and a stem. ☺
Then it was time to cut!
Two things I like to reinforce during the cutting process are one, being mindful of where your ‘holding fingers’ are and two, positioning your scissors so they’re pointing away from your body.
During the process Grae almost always asks for a bowl to put her ‘food’ in, which makes the activity that much more fun and adds in an element of pretend play.
Today’s food was for kitties only. ☺
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