Ideas and resources
Do you have a bunch of maps around your house that you don’t want to throw away, but no longer need them because of your smart phone? Why not collect them all and turn them into beautiful beads? You and your kids will love making these Map Beads by following the directions over at Art With Kids. Perhaps a Mother’s Day Necklace would be the perfect use for these beautiful beads?
There are so many different classroom activities you can do around Valentine’s Day, from STEM activities to art projects and math activities.
I wasn’t sure how to share more ideas this year than I already have, but I thought for this one I would just share activities of various sorts that involve heart shapes.
For example, this color sorting heart game from Mason Jar of Memories. You can do it with the printables and buckets as shown, or cut hearts out of construction paper and have a larger heart of the same color somewhere in the room so kids have to go to a different place in the room for each color. That makes it a bit of a scavenger hunt to find the hearts and put them in the right place.
Another way to get little ones moving with a Valentine’s theme is playing musical hearts. This idea is from No Time for Flash Cards, and in involves writing different actions on hearts the kids walk on. When the music stops they do what their heart says.
If you scroll down in this post from Mrs. Plemons’ Kindergarten you’ll find another use for big hearts kids can step on: write the letters of the alphabet and do a musical alphabet hearts game, where the child identifies the letter. (You can also use them for an alphabet scavenger hunt, which you’ll also find in this post.)
Or you can put numbers on them and have kids match the number to another heart with that number represented in dots (or hearts, or whatever you want) like in this idea from Active Littles. Kids can also cut out the hearts (or you can do it for them) and use them to help them learn how to count to 20. This one is form Happy Toddler Playtime.
I guess we’re going to need some foam hearts for all these fun heart shaped activities!
Put a coat of clear nail polish on them for extra strength. It works great and gives them a nice shine.