We are bonkers for conkers! They are a super, free and plentiful resource this time of year. We’ve been exploring how we can use them. We’ve drilled holes in a few and added some hole punched leaves to thread them on to sticks and laces.
With a bit more sparkle they could make lovely christmas decorations!
Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.
Cheap and Easy Slime activity wall and box! Perfect for Halloween! We converted the lid of one of our plastic storage boxes in to a slime wall! We drilled holes and cable tied funnels, sieves and tubes to pour our slime in to. We stabilised our lid to the box by using some toy nuts and bolts, so each time we are done we undo the bolts and just put the lid on. Easy!
What is the slime? The supermarket own brand shampoo or conditioner with some food colouring. This is about 40p an litre! Perfect! Add in some spooky spiders and skulls for a Halloween feel and you are away!
The top half of a milk carton makes a great scoop! This was dead popular. So far we’ve rolled it out for three workshops and my 2yr old’s birthday party. Totally worth the effort!
Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.
We have super chemistry activity for your little ones this Halloween! We boiled up some red cabbage water, and used lemon juice and vinegar to change it’s colour! More than that, bicarbonate of soda in water with some dish soap changed the colour again and creates a fizzy foam! Here is a link to a video demo.
The acidic lemon juice or vinegar turns the purple cabbage water (an indicator) pink! Bicarbonate of soda (baking soda) in water turns it blue! Put both in and you have a fizzy neutralisation reaction that produces salty water and releases carbon dioxide bubbles! The magic ingredient is some dish soap in the bicarbonate of soda, causing a
foam and your cauldron to bubble over!
We had loads of fun chanting spells and adding spiders a fogs to our potions!
Happy Halloween everyone!
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I was so inspired when I saw this photo.
I had to try it with the kids! We had plenty of small teddies and lots of washable paint. So we dived straight in! Some of the bears needed a little stuffing removed from their noses to make good prints. We made ink pads from takeaway containers and sponges. Which is a great idea because you can just pop the lid on until next time!
We liked it so much, we took it a long to our workshops!
Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.
I wondered what they would make of this and I liked the idea of giving them an authentic experience. Oil paint would have proved pricey but dough paint proved a super substitute.
Dough paint is just flour, water and poster paint. You can make it as thick as you like. We popped it down on some mirror card with some artists trowels and off they went!
They explored spreading and mark making using the tip and sides of the trowel.
Then they just got nice and messy!
Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.
This is really easy and lots of fun for toddlers! Water, food colouring, assorted plastic lids, kitchen utensils and other random ingredients such as chopped wool and buttons!
Amazing how something so simple can be so engaging! Water play is always a winner.
Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.
All things blue! The medium in the box is a mixture of rice and salt. I used a small amount of paint to colour it blue. Then I decided to add lots interesting items in different shades of blue. The result is a rather beautiful and intriguing discovery box.
Perfect for little fingers to practice their fine motor skills picking out little jewels. As well as examining and talking about all the little treasures we find, they also love sorting the objects.
The glass beads were the most popular items. The toddlers loved hunting through the rice for them!
Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.
These are very easy to make and lots of fun!
I used drinking straws, a stapler, giant beads and cotton reels to make a variety of rollers for paint play! Our Tiny Adventurers had lots of messy fun making colourful patterns.
After a bit the paper was covered, and this little adventurer had lots of fun mark making in the paint. To our delight he created a gorgeous piece of toddler art!
Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.
Science and Engineering for Toddlers:
I made these pulleys from scrap! What a fun way to experience the power of pulleys! I made two pulleys and a block and tackle for lifting sand and a ramp. It took the toddlers a little while to figure out what to do, but once they did they immediately started experimenting!
We experimented with cotton reels, play people and cars with the ramp. And lifted sand and shells with the block and tackle. This one is the most fun to watch as both wheels turn when it’s pulled. They seem to like watching the wheels change direction as they pull and then release.
Super Science!
Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.
Tiny Adventure 