making learning fun | There's Just One Mommy

Plastic Egg Learning Activity: Contractions

OneMommy — Fri, 22 Mar 2019 19:08:28 +0000

My seven year-old has been working on learning contractions lately. She learns best with hands-on activities, so I knew we needed a fun activity to teach contractions.

To reinforce what she has been learning, I came up with this simple learning activity with plastic eggs.

We have used plastic eggs for so many learning activities over the years.

My son loved making plastic egg submarines, and this simple contractions activity helped my daughter quickly learn those tricky words.

Plastic Egg Activity to Teach Contractions

Affiliate links have been provided below for your convenience.

Materials Needed:

Plastic Eggs
Black Permanent Marker
Strips of Paper

To set up the activity, use a black permanent marker to write the two words that form a contraction on each of the plastic eggs. (You could also use masking tape on the eggs if you don’t want to write on them, but I have found hand sanitizer cleans the marker right off afterwards.)

Then cut strips of paper and write the matching contraction for each egg.

How to Teach Kids Contractions

We did several activities with our plastic eggs.

First, I had her read each plastic egg and then put the corresponding contraction inside the right egg. This helped reinforce what each contraction stands for.

The next time we played, the contractions were already tucked inside the eggs.

Again I had her read each egg. This time she guessed what the contraction would be aloud. Then she opened the egg to see if she was correct.

Then, she wrote the contraction down on her paper. This reinforced not only what the correct contractions were, but also helped her work on spelling them correctly.

Finally, I put all our eggs in a container.

When I called out a contraction, she had to choose the right egg. When she opened it up she found the strip of paper to check and see if she had chosen the right egg.

There are so many fun plastic egg activities for kids.

Using the eggs in this activity to teach contractions helped my daughter better understand what each contraction stood for.

Spelling in the Snow

OneMommy — Mon, 31 Dec 2018 20:34:21 +0000

Writing spelling words over and over isn’t fun.

That’s why I try to come up with lots of new and fun ways to practice spelling words.

This week the snowy weather inspired this spelling word practice for winter.

This simple activity is also a fun sight words practice idea. Just use your child’s sight word list and let them practice spelling the words and reading them to you.

Affiliate links are provided below. See my full disclosure for more details.

Spelling Word Practice for Winter

Materials Needed:

Letter Tiles
Snow
Large, Shallow Container
Your Child’s Spelling or Sight Word List

Start by putting several inches of snow at the bottom of a large, shallow storage container.

Don’t have snow where you’re at? You could do this activity using Magic Snow too! (Put it in the refrigerator first, and it will even be cold like real snow!)

Then get out some letter tiles. We used our tiles from our Bananagrams game. (We love using Bananagrams for learning!)

Have your child use their word list to write each word with the letter tiles in the snow. To add an extra layer of learning, have them say each letter as they add it to the snow.

Once they feel comfortable with the words, you can take the list and give them the words orally to spell.

Sight Word Practice

You can also use this idea to practice sight words.

Have your child use the letter tiles to write their words in the snow. Then have them read the words aloud to you.

Be sure to give plenty of time to play with the letters in the snow on their own, too!

We had lots of fun writing spelling words in snow.

I hope your child enjoys this spelling word practice for winter as much as mine did.

Have a Ball with Math Facts This Summer

OneMommy — Thu, 16 Jun 2016 20:27:05 +0000

I can remember being bored, using black and white flashcards to practice math facts as a child, looking at the problem, saying the answer aloud, and flipping the card over to see if I was right.

Thankfully math facts practice doesn’t have to be boring. There are lots of fun ways to practice math facts at home.

One of our favorite math activities that get kids up and moving is beach ball math.

This simple kinesthetic math activity is perfect for kids that learn better through movement. Because kids will be saying the facts aloud, it’s also good for auditory learners.

Beach Ball Math

To make your math beach ball you will need a black permanent marker and an inflatable beach ball.

Use the permanent marker to write numbers 0-12 all over your beach ball. Write the numbers at least 2 times each.

To practice math facts with the ball, toss the ball to your child.

Have your child add whichever 2 numbers their thumbs are closest to. Ask them to read the math fact aloud to add in auditory learning as well as the kinesthetic here. (10+3=13)

Keep tossing the ball back and forth and have fun practicing addition facts!

If your child loves ball games, you may also like this printable baseball math ball game.

Math Ball Game Modifications

For younger children you can use the math ball to practice number recognition, just have them read the numbers their thumbs are nearest.

You can also use the beach ball to work on subtraction facts and multiplication facts. This allows kids of all levels to have fun while practicing math facts together.

Skip the boring flashcards. (Or at least make them more fun with this math activity.)

Let your child have fun practicing math facts with this simple beach ball math activity.

If you like this idea, be sure to check out:

The post Have a Ball with Math Facts This Summer first appeared on There's Just One Mommy.

15 of the Best Flower Activities for Kids

OneMommy — Thu, 14 Apr 2016 14:13:33 +0000

Spring is the time for new beginnings and colorful flowers that begin to pop up.

These flower activities for kids are the perfect way to welcome the season of spring. You may also enjoy these flower crafts.

Flower petals have inspired creative play, science experiments, adorable reading activities, and some creative flower math activities that are sure to make your little one’s imagination bloom. These activities are perfect for spring.

Your child will also have fun puddle painting.

Flower Activities for Kids

Fairy Soup Sensory Play — Your child will love using those colorful blooms in this pretend play activity from There’s Just One Mommy.

ABC Letter Matching — Preschoolers can create a garden while matching capital and lowercase letters in this simple activity from A Little Pinch of Perfect.

Daffodil Pinwheels — Spring is perfect for this pinwheel from Nurture Store.

Beginning Sounds Sort — Sort objects by their beginning sounds with this flower activity from Pre-K Pages.

Floral Sight Words — Work on sight words with this reading activity from Coffee Cups and Crayons.

Sticky Flower Wall — Fantastic Fun and Learning has a fun way to work on number recognition using flower petals.

Shape Sort — This activity from School Time Snippets is perfect for the youngest learners.

Flower Math Activity — Work on number recognition with this simple activity from No Time for Flash Cards.

Petal Addition — I love this creative hands-on math idea from Fantastic Fun and Learning.

Geo Flowers — Create your own geo-board-inspired flowers in this simple STEAM activity from Little Bins for Little Hands.

Mini Garden — Kids love having their very own garden to take care of like this one from There’s Just One Mommy.

Color-Changing Flowers — Your child will be amazed by this classic science experiment from Little Bins for Little Hands.

Borax Crystal Flowers — Have fun with science and make these flowers from Go Science Girls.

Coffee Filter Bouquet — Science turns art in this activity from There’s Just One Mommy.

Playdough Flower Garden — Little ones will love Fantastic Fun and Learning’s pretend play activity.

These colorful flower activities for kids are a fun way to celebrate the start of spring.

Nail Those Math Facts!

OneMommy — Mon, 12 Oct 2015 15:57:47 +0000

A few days ago I shared with you our hammering nails in pumpkins activity. As promised, I’ve got an educational twist to the activity to share with you! We used our pumpkins to have fun working on math facts.

Materials Needed to Nail Those Math Facts:

Pumpkin
Permanent marker
Nails
Hammer (We used a plastic toy hammer.)

Both of my children have been working on memorizing addition and subtraction math facts.

I used a permanent marker to write numbers all over the pumpkin. Then I gave them a math problem to solve, such as 5+3, and they searched for the answer and hammered a nail into the correct number.

If you put enough numbers all over the pumpkin and played long enough, you can have a pretty neat looking pumpkin to display after practicing all those math facts!

Ways to modify the activity:

You could also use this activity to work on multiplication or division math facts.
For a younger child you could write the letters of the alphabet on the pumpkin and have them locate the letters.
Use the permanent marker to write sight words on the pumpkin for your child to identify.

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Be sure to check out our other fun learning activities with pumpkins!

The post Nail Those Math Facts! first appeared on There's Just One Mommy.

Bottle Cap Word Sort

OneMommy — Fri, 21 Aug 2015 17:20:48 +0000

I am always looking for fun ways to work on early reading skills with the kids.

We love using sight word games as a way to practice not only sight words, but phonics skills as well.

This week we had fun with several apple themed word games, including DIY word sort games with plastic bottle caps to review letter blends we’ve been working on.

We used this as one of our apple activities for kids during an apple unit in our homeschooling adventures. But plastic bottle cap activities like this are simple to make and use any time of year.

Bottle Cap Word Sort Game

Materials Needed:

Plastic Bottle Caps
Black Permanent Marker
Several Small Containers for Sorting
Sticky Notes or Masking Tape

This word sort activity can be modified to fit each child’s individual needs.

We have been working on the following diagraphs: “sh,” “ch,” and “th.” So these are the ones we used for this activity.

You can choose to use words with any variety of letter combinations your child is working on.

Use masking tape or sticky notes to label your plastic containers with the letter blends you choose. Using tape or sticky notes allows you to reuse the containers for other diagraphs later.

Next, use your permanent marker to write several words with each letter blend on your plastic lids. Write one word per bottle cap.

Have your child sort all the words into the correct containers.

As they sort the words, have them practice making the sound that each letter blend makes. So, for “s-h” words, they would say, “shh.”

Then have them read the whole word as they put the word into the correct container.

You could do this to sort words with any letter blends your child is working on.

I plan on adding to our bottle cap word collection throughout the year as we work on new diagraphs and blends for more word sort games.

Check out how we also used our bottle caps to play this sight word game.