Valentine's Day is around the corner. We are feeling lots of love in the house as there are heart shapes everywhere in our play and learn room.
We started by having some fun by racing to 100 with Raelyn. Print out the activity here , prepare the following materials:
- Paper clip
- Colour pencil / dot markers
- Pencil
Spin the paper clip and see who is the first to reach 100. This activity helps in 1-1 correspondence and Raelyn work on her counting in 5s. It also gives them a sense of more and less by comparing who is ahead each round. Towards the end, Raelyn was counting the number of hearts to win the race. A simple activity that engages a child in many different ways. Most importantly, when there is fun element, learning becomes less daunting.
I also make a simplified verison of Racing to 50 available here.
Valentine's Day cards / writing prompts
I created a writng corner with all the writing prompts for Raelyn both in English and Chinese with my stash of scrapbook making materials, colourful markers and pens.
First, we read the book - Valentine Mice! and moved on to writing Valentine's Day card.
You can download the writing prompts , writing templates here.
Raelle did a simple craft the the heart shaped sponge. She prepared all the paints while I pasted the heart shape using washi tape. We use a heart shape sponge which i bought from Daiso and a toothpick.
Raelyn helped in creating this activity where Raelle will paste stickers on all the heart shape.
Sharing with you some of our past V-day activities which I have included in the printables:
Fun play with phonics with sensory bin
Valentine's day towere where your child can use counting cubes to build based on the number written on the heart. For older kids, you can write math equations.
From the towers she has built, we arrange from the tallest to the shortest , measuring items with the cubes including our heights or you can just simply do a comparison of numbers.
I love recycling materials and most of the time I collect them before even I get ideas to use them. For this activity, all you need is :
- Toilet roll
- White glue
- Wooden Peg
- Paint
- Paper
Cut the toilet roll into two and use white glue to paste the roll into a heart shape. With the wooden peg at the 2 corners , peg it until it is ready for use.
学一学笔画 | Writing Chinese strokes
This idea started only with fingerprint hearts flower and as we were drawing the stalk, I had an idea of incorporating chinese strokes as we were practicing them at home yesterday. Raelyn couldn’t do 丿and always end up as the opposite direction. Thought this is actually a good way to work on instead of the traditional way of practicing.
I did up a quick activity with Raelyn to recap what she has learnt early last year. I spent 10 minutes prepping these. Drew 6 hearts and cut them out. On each heart shape, I wrote the words with white crayon and it’s done!
I told her to discover the magic words hidden by painting the heart shapes. We read the words on each heart and she did a matching activity to the correct picture onto the white board with the pictures I made previously.
A quick and fun way to combine art into learning.
This math game can be played between 2-4 players and be extended in many different ways. I gave Raelyn the options of using Crayon, colour pencil or bingo daubers and she opt for bingo daubers. With a dice, we are ready to start the game!
💜 Recognition of Numbers on the dice and paper. This can be done in other languages such as Chinese on the print out .
💜Fine Motor skills - Picking up and throwing a dice involve coordinating movements of the hands and fingers with the eyes, allowing her to work on her hand-eye coordination. This works the same for identifying the correct number and coloring/dabbing on it.
💜Counting / Addition - After the game, I bring out the counters and ask her to count and cross it out to see who has the most number of counters. For older kids, you can get them to add the numbers up. This is also a good way to teach them the habit of checking by crossing each number out after she is done.
To conclude the game, I did not emphasize on who is the winner but rather ask her who has a greater and smaller number. This way, I do not have to deal with who is the winner or loser in a group setting and allow them to enjoy the process of learning math.
Download it here.
I will share more again when we do more Valentine's Day activities. Do tag me if you are doing any of our printables!
Xoxo,
Adeline
