Mummy Lantern
Builds on: Fine motor skills

What you'll need:

1 empty glass jar

2 large googly eyes

6 (1.5") pieces of tape

white party streamers (about 9" long)

glue

1 tea light candle

What to do:

Show your little how to fold a piece of tape to make a double sided roll of tape (sticky side out) and have them make the remaining 5. Stick one roll of tape to the end of one streamer and attach that to the side of the jar towards the bottom. Have your little wrap the streamer around the jar at an upwards angle. Tape this end to the jar. Start the next streamer just above the start of the first streamer and let your little wrap away. Continue this until the whole jar is covered or until your little feels it looks enough like a mummy. Let your little glue the googly eyes on resisting the urge to straighten them or "fix" them. Place the tea light inside and light it in a dark room or at dinner time for some spooky ambiance. If you'd like to make your mummy a little less tidy you can tear the ends off of your streamers just before taping them and place the tape a little farther from the end so they dangle from the sides a bit like ours did in the picture. 

Decorating with spiders

Decorating with spiders

Builds on: Hand eye coordination, fine motor skills and gross motor skills.  

I love how just decorating the house can  elicit so much laughter from kids. It's as simple as a bag of spiders, a bag of cotton webbing and double sided tape from the dollar store.

What you'll need:

1 bag of cotton webbing

1 bag of 100 black and orange spiders

Double sided tape

2 bowls

What to do:

I like to divide the spiders into two bowls equally and set one aside for later before we do anything. After hanging the webbing on the walls and corners of the house outside I give the kids the double sided tape with one of the bowls of spiders and show them how to put the double sided tape on to the bottom of the spiders. Sit with them and help since working with double sided tape can be frustrating.

Once they've all been taped we take to the front door sticking them everywhere. I of course get the high parts while both Hoots and Roos get the middle and lower parts of the door. It doesn't take long for the kids to start giggling because it always seems that about half of the spiders like to pop off once they've been placed. While the kids continue to place spiders I scoop up the escapees and re-tape them for the kids to try again. The extra stubborn ones get set aside for the next part. 

When all of the spiders from the first bowl have been placed on the door it's time for the webs. I generally will place them about 5-6 feet up depending on throwing strength. I place the bowl of spiders on the floor and tell the kids that they have to get all of the spiders to stick. The plastic spiders legs are just thin enough and the webbing is just fine enough that even a weakly thrown spider can stick if it touches. The fun part is watching the spiders fall back down on the kids when they don't stick.

When you're done you have a spooky decorated house that the kids can be proud of.

Farm Shapes Sewing
Builds on : hand eye coordination, fine motor skills, life skills

This is the perfect activity when you need a little quiet time to talk on the phone or want to make dinner in peace after an active day. 

What you'll need:

Plastic canvas sheet
Printed farm shape outlines
Scissors
Marker
Basket
1.5 foot piece of yarn for each shape
Yarn needle


What to do:

 To make your own shapes you place your plastic canvas on top of your farm shape outlines and trace the shapes using your marker. Cut them out as best as you can with the scissors. Don't get too wrapped up in making it perfect because the sheets are grid based and you will drive yourself batty trying. If you aren't overly crafty you can purchase some from the Hoot 'n' Roo's Closet tab under "activity supplies" (coming soon).


Tie one end of the yarn to a corner of your cut out shape and string the other end through the eye of the yarn needle. Do this for each shape. If you only have Roos to worry about then place your finished product into a basket on the activities table for them to find on their own and figure out. Offer help if they ask.

Spot The Cow Game
Builds on: counting skills, number recognition, finger strengthening

What you'll need:
Large side view print of a plain cow
1 large Ziploc freezer bag
1 tub of black playdoh
number cards 1-30

What to do:

Place the picture of the cow inside the Ziploc bag and zip it up. Place everything on to the activity table and sit across from your little. Explain that you're going to pick a number out of the number cards and your little is going to decide what number it is and make the same number of spots on the cow using small pinches of playdoh.

If you're new to counting and number recognition your going show a number 1-10 to your kiddo. Give them a minute to remember and help if they can't. Then count out loud together as playdoh spots are added to the cow.

The Carrot Seed Farm

The Carrot Seed Farm
Builds on: math, color recognition, fine motor skills

What you'll need:
1 empty cardboard egg carton
green, purple, yellow and orange pipe cleaners
wire cutters
large exacto knife
The Carrot Seed by Ruth Krauss
* optional: 1 bag of Rainbow Carrots from the health food store

What to do:

Turn the egg carton over so that the egg cups are facing up. Use the exacto knife to cut and X into the center of each cup. Use a pencil to force the X open a little more.

Use the wire cutters to cut the all the pipe cleaners into 2 inch pieces. To create a carrot take a green pipe cleaner and a purple pipe cleaner fold them each in half. Twist the two ends of the purple pipe cleaner together to so that you have a loop at the folded end and a point at the twisted end. Finally, thread the green pipe cleaner through the loop of the purple pipe cleaner and twist close to the loop leaving the ends untwisted for the stocks of the carrots. Repeat with all of your other colors until you have 12. Let your Roo have a shot at it to improve their fine motor skills and hand dexterity.

Once you have them all made push the pointed ends through the holes of the egg cups and place it on the activities table. Once you've read The Carrot Seed you can let your Roo pull out all of the carrots and put them back in. Challenge them with color sorting, counting or color pattern questions.

My favorite part about this activity is that kids always comment that carrots are only orange. I get to pull out Rainbow Carrots and explain that there are lots of different colors for carrots and at snack we test all of the different colors to see if they taste any different from the typical orange ones.

Addition activities:

Follow the links below for some of some more carrot activities, by some other awesome bloggers, to go allow with The Carrot Seed

Soda Bottle Carrots: A Very Small Kitchen Garden
Spring Sensory Tub With Carrots
Carrot Fingers
Preschool Carrot Patch Math Activity

Q-tip Painting With Homemade Watercolors

Builds on: fine motor skills, color identification, life skills and creativity

This activity is so easy with very little mess and the kids get excited because they get to help by making the paint.Great for both Hoots and Roos!

 

What you'll need:

Neon and black food coloring
2 cups cold water

4 empty yogurt cups
thick rag towel

straws for mixing

10 large Q-tips

Jumbo Halloween coloring sheets 

What to do: 

Have the kids pour the water into the 4 empty yogurt cups as evenly as they can. Place the cups onto a thick towel that can get stained and hand over the food coloring. We chose electric green, purple, red and black because they are halloween colors. You can also choose primary colors (red, blue, and yellow) to mix together to make custom colors. Let the kids place between 4-10 drops into the water and stir with the straws. Make picture choices. Then place the pictures, q-tips and your newly made watercolors on to the activities table. Use the q-tip ends as the brush by dipping one end into a color and then making strokes on the picture to transfer the paint. Then just let the kids have fun!

*The more drops of food coloring you use the quicker it will stain surfaces making it less washable.

Candy Corn and Pumpkin Patterns

Builds on: fine motor, sequencing

 

What you'll need:

25 pumpkin candy

25 candy corn

a shallow dish

What to do:

Mix the candies together and place it in a shallow dish. Sit with your kiddo and create a pattern with the corns and pumpkins like pumpkin, corn, corn, pumpkin. Instruct your little to repeat the pattern underneath. See if your Roo can figure out what would come next in the pattern if it were to continue.

If your kiddo is new to patterns you should start will simple patterns such as corn, corn, pumpkin or a longer row of a simple repeating pattern like pumpkin corn, pumpkin, corn, pumpkin, corn.Then build up from there as they start to get it. You can do longer lines or turn the corn to point different directions to make a pattern that has them pointing up, right, up, left, pumpkin (repeat).