Is your Child Bored and Restless, then look no further, here are 5 Great ways to keep your child entertained while still learning?
We are halfway through our second lockdown and you probably feel like you have tried every game, activity etc to entertain your child while they are at home. Therefore, we want to share some more ideas with you that don’t cost a fortune and will get your child, thinking, problem solving, investigating, exploring and being creative plus so much more.
Here are 5 more ideas to help keep your child busy and give you a chance to finish your hot drink before it becomes cold:
1. Chalk Paint
Chalk paint is a fun resource which I’m sure your child will love and be kept entertained all day long! It also can be made with ingredients that you have already at home. Combine 1 cup of water and cornflour and stir well. The mixture will be quite hard but will become liquid as you continue to stir. Pour into small containers and add food colouring with ensuring that you stir it well until the colour is mixed through.
Note. That the colours will dry much lighter if using them on the sidewalk. Learning: Children can assist in making the paint by measuring and stirring and choosing the colours that they would like. For older siblings they can investigate using flowers in the garden to make natural colouring for their paint.
2. Growing vegetables from cuttings
Here are some of the common vegetables (and herbs) that you can re-grow from scraps.
- Potatoes
- Sweet Potatoes
- Onions, Garlic, leeks, shallots
- Celery
- Carrots, turnips, parsnips
- Lettuce, Bok Choi and other leafy greens
- Cabbages Basil, mint and other herbs
If a sweet potato is a little past its best eating, cut it in half and suspend each half using toothpicks or twigs above a shallow container of water. Roots should begin to form after a few days. Shortly after you should see sprouts grow out of the top. Take your celery or spring onions using the base and place in a shallow dish in a sunny pot. In a couple of days, you will see new leaves growing from the middle of the base. Transfer to a pot with soil once leaves are strong Learning: another opportunity to practise and learn about sustainability and mindfully reducing waste in your home
3. Squishy Balls
These are fun to make and should offer lots of enjoyment for your child. You will need some balloons, rice or flour to fill. I have even made them with recycled plastic shopping bags if you’d prefer not to use food items. Stick a funnel (or make your own with paper or cardboard) and stick into the neck of the balloon. Slowly fill the balloon and let out as much air as you can then tie the balloon off tightly. Draw on some faces, stick on some hair (using flowers, leaves, wool etc) and then your child has a friendly faced squishy stress ball.
Learning: Great for anxiety or stress busters, strengthening grip, redirect focus (even divert a meltdown)
4. Sensory Bottles
We make lots of sensory bottles in our rooms at Red Apple as we have found them so popular with the children. They are easy to make using empty water bottles (clear Voss Water bottles are ideal) and any household items for interest. Just make sure the lid is glued on well. We often use PVC electrical tape as an added measure. You could use rice, jewellery, sequins, buttons, pom poms, foam letters, small animals or leaves/flowers anything really.
Some suggestions for the bottle: Just add water with added food colouring (thus would do well in supporting colour recognition that we work on often with many of the rooms across all ages). Add oil and equal part water, leave a little amount of space at the top for shaking.
Another idea is to add a few different miniature trinkets, embellishments or small toys
(e.g. buttons, beads, sequins, mini cars or dinosaurs) along with rice or lentils and then encourage your child to shake and hunt for the different items. Hint: Take a photo of the items and print it out for your child to find independently
Learning: Great for listening to the sounds or watching the movement as they shake, rolls the objects inside. Encourages perseverance in finding the trinkets.
5. Melted Crayons
Fill a muffin tray or silicone mould (that has been lightly sprayed) with small pieces of broken crayons (without the wrapper) and arrange in a mixed colour design. Place in a pre-heated oven at about 130C for about 10-15 minutes or till fully melted. Then let them cool and harden. You can put it into the freezer to speed this process up.
Learning: another opportunity to practise and learn about sustainability and creating new objects/resources out of something that might have been easily thrown out and replaced.
