Spaghetti STEM

🍝Spaghetti STEM🍝⠀

⠀

I’m definitely on a STEM activity kick right now and my kids are not mad about it🤣 ⠀

⠀

Kids love STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) activities because while they are playing they get to explore, make discoveries, and try and test out new things. They are naturally curious about the world (how many “why?” questions do YOU get in a day?🤪) and STEM activities and challenges are a great way for them to start answering some of their “why” questions. ⠀

⠀

🐻The Activity🐻⠀

⠀

▪️Set out some uncooked pasta (I did spaghetti and some odd looking lasagna noodles), animal figures, and playdough⠀

⠀

▪️Challenge your child to make a home for the animals. I didn’t give any other directions besides that. ⠀

⠀

▪️Watch your child create, test out and try different things, and see what they come up with! ⠀

⠀

⠀

🐻I really like easy STEM activities and challenges because they are a perfect activity to do with both my kids (2.5 and 5) and they usually both equally love them! ⠀

⠀

While you might think your toddler is too young for some of these STEM challenges, you would be surprised! Brooklyn was fully engaged with this hands-on challenge and while her “houses” were obviously not as intricate as Austin’s, she was learning, playing and discovering just as much as Austin was! They loved breaking the pasta pieces into different sizes and using the playdough as “glue” for their houses!⠀

⠀

🐻I also love STEM challenges because they give your child so many opportunities to fail and try again (which is a good thing). When Austin had a house collapse multiple times, he immediately turned to me and asked, “Why does it keep falling down?” Instead of answering him, I put the question back on him. “Why do you think it’s falling down?” This really got him thinking and eventually he figured out what was wrong (the lengths of the spaghetti pieces for the house frame were nowhere near the same length). ⠀

⠀

I would love to see your children’s creations if they try this! 

Dancing Fruit

🍇Dancing Fruit🍇 ⠀

⠀

My kids were super clingy yesterday. Even Miss Brooklyn who’s normally so independent was asking me to hold her and hug her all day long. I’m not complaining at all about the cuddles 🥰, but it was almost impossible to get anything done all day! ⠀

⠀

When it came time for me to unload the dishwasher and make lunch, I knew I needed to set up a quick activity for the kids to keep them busy and happy. ⠀

⠀

🍇I grabbed a clear vase and filled it with sparkling water. I put out a bowl of blueberries and grapes and asked the kids what they thought would happen when they dropped each type of fruit in. Brooklyn was too busy shoving her face with blueberries to respond and Austin thought they would change colors 😆. For the next 15 minutes they both dropped the fruit one at a time into the water, watched and made observations, squealed with delight, and repeated over and over. ⠀

⠀

The blueberries would initially drop down in the water then float back up, and then would randomly “dance” around the vase. The majority of the grapes would sink to the bottom, but a few of the grapes did eventually float back up and move around too. ⠀

⠀

💜 I’m going to be honest and admit I didn’t get that into the science behind this. Density and buoyancy are both at play in this experiment. When the fruit initially drops in the water, it’s because the fruit is denser than the liquid. What I did tell my kids was the carbon dioxide bubbles being released from the sparkling water were what caused the fruits to “dance”. The kids loved to watch the little bubbles kind of attach to the fruit right before the fruit would rise back up. ⠀

⠀

I got the idea for this from @funlearningforkids who did this experiment with raisins! ⠀

⠀

💜There’s so much learning that could be done around this experiment, but for yesterday’s sake we kept it pretty simple, and I was able to unload the dishwasher and make lunch without complaints🙌🏻 ⠀

⠀

💜 Make sure to swipe through to see a video of the dancing fruit! Now go fill a vase with sparkling water (or any clear soda) and have your kids experiment with different fruits! Let me know if you try it! ⠀

Sponge Boats

⠀

Add a little STEM challenge to your water play! ⠀

⠀

💦I took some new sponges and cut them in half. I gave my kids the sponges, some umbrella toothpicks (totally optional), and these little colored play jewels we have. I challenged them to make sponge boats and see how many jewels they could balance on each one in the water before sinking or tipping over. Bear counters, legos, pom poms, or anything else small like that could also work! ⠀

⠀

💦I watched my kids try positioning the umbrellas on different spots on the sponge, not using an umbrella on one, using two umbrellas on one, and trying so many different ways to balance the most jewels. When the boats sank, my kids squeezed the water out of the sponge and tried again!⠀

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

⠀

💜Besides being so much fun, there are also so many ways to extend the play too: ⠀

⠀

▪️Use tweezers to pick up the jewels⠀

⠀

▪️Make predictions before experimenting with how many jewels can fit on the boat before sinking⠀

⠀

▪️Talk about why the jewels sink by themselves but float on the sponge⠀

⠀

⠀

💜I know I’ve said this before😉. I’m a big supporter of STEM challenges for kids (science, technology, engineering, math). Incorporating simple and engaging challenges like this into play will encourage problem solving skills and creativity! ⠀

⠀

💦Do you think your children would have fun with this?💦⠀

color tape balance

I added a little twist to my tape balance activity I posted last month and it was challenging for the kids (in a good way) and definitely a hit!




Use a variety of different colored tape and tape strips from one surface to another of the same height. We used the kitchen island to the kitchen side counter and used red, orange, yellow, green, and blue tape. The seats of two chairs could also work for this activity or you could tape across a plastic storage container too.

Give your child little things of the same colors as the tape strips. For us, we used our bear counters. Legos is another idea. Let your child try to balance the items on the matching colored tape all the way across.

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

It seems so simple, yet there's so much learning involved in this activity. Besides color sorting, being a STEM challenge, and fine motor practice, your child will be problem solving and using their creativity to help balance the items all the way to the other side. The bears fell multiple times but my kids didn't give up. They never actually got all of the bear counters up on the tape strips at one time, but I think that was another important lesson. Things don't always come easy and they can use this experience and apply it to the activity next time they try it and maybe they will get them all on the tape then! 

Make a 10 Popsicle

"Make a 10" is one of my favorite popsicle making learning activities and I did this activity with the kids this past week to kick off our popsicle making season! 

For this activity, I let the kids cut strawberries into small pieces using kid-safe knives (you could also cut them yourself prior to the activity). I also put out blueberries. You can use whatever fruit pieces you would like to add to the popsicles as long as you have at least two different types of fruit. 

In the popsicle molds, have your child "make a 10" by adding whatever fruit they choose until there's 10 pieces of fruit in each mold. While they are working, talk about the math addition sentences they are creating. 

Example:

Austin wanted to do one with all blueberries. As he counted 10 blueberries and put them in the molds, we said "10 blueberries + 0 strawberries= 10 pieces of fruit".

For another popsicle he chose 5 blueberries and 5 strawberries "5 blueberries +5 strawberries =10. When we were done we talked about all the different combinations we did using the blueberries and strawberries to "make a 10".


Here are affiliated links to the kid safe knives we use and similar popsicle molds to the ones we have!

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

This simple activity helps teach number sense by visually showing your child how the number 10 can be created and broken down in different ways. Number sense is your child's understanding and ability to use and work with numbers and is an important foundational skill needed to succeed in math. 

If you don't have popsicle molds, you could always just do this activity with pieces of food too! 

Below is our popsicle "recipe" if you're interested, however I don't do any measurements and just wing it every time. I'm sure there's tons of other recipes out there that are far better than ours, so you might want to use this activity with your own popsicle recipe! My family absolutely loves this simple recipe though so it's our go-to!

Ingredients:

sparkling water or coconut water

maple syrup

lime or lemon juice

an assortment of cut up berries (blueberries don't need to be cut) 

After putting 10 pieces of fruit in each popsicle mold, pour sparkling water or coconut water 3/4 the way full. Add a splash of lemon or lime juice and a splash of maple syrup (or more depending on how sweet you want them) and stir before putting the top on and putting in the freezer. Once frozen, enjoy!

What do you all do when it gets unbearably hot?!

Cling Magnets

Cling Magnets

I've mentioned before that our @picassotiles are hands down our favorite and most used toy in our house. I don't even need to create activities for the kids to get them to spend time building, playing and learning with them. But, I love creating new and inviting ways for my kids to play so I'm always trying to think of different ways to use the magnets! 

Lately I've been seeing activities where kids paint and draw on plastic wrap. This gave me the idea to try magnets on the wrap with the kids. It was tons of fun and easy to set up!

I flipped over a small kids table (you could also use a chair), and wrapped plastic wrap around the legs of it. I handed Austin and Brooklyn the magnets and let them play and create!

While they played, I did some shape recognition with Brooklyn. I would tell her a shape and she would look in the bin of magnets and find 2 of that shape to put on the wrap. Brooklyn also began to learn some magnetic principles as she realized one magnet wouldn't stay on the plastic wrap without another one behind it. Austin created a rainbow, made patterns, and just explored how else he could play and build using the plastic wrap.

Here's an affiliate link to one set that we have.

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

Lego Letters

Fine motor, art, and ABC/number practice all while playing with legos!? Yes Please! 

I'm always looking for different hands-on ways to practice letters. When I saw @aileenandteam use liquid colors in legos I was inspired. I decided to have Austin work on different letters and numbers (only the ones with straight lines) by carefully dropping colored water into the lego holes using eyedroppers.

 I started by asking him to create the letter L, then I let him come up with other letters to try! It was a good activity for him to mentally sort which letters have only straight lines too! After he created all the letters with straight lines, he ended up wanting to create some numbers too.

It was a simple activity and something different that we hadn't done before.  I found it to be a very effective way to practice creating letters and numbers while also encouraging patience and working on fine motor skills. 

For Brooklyn, I just let her use the eyedropper to put different colors of water into the different lego holes. Both kids were entertained for awhile and seemed to really enjoy the activity. 

To set up, give your child a small cup or bowl with water and 1 drop of food coloring in it. Hand them an eyedropper and let them create!  I did 3 different colors for the kids to choose from which they found fun! I put some paper towels underneath the legos because some water did spill out occasionally. I also had some extra paper towels on hand for when water overflowed (which also happened occasionally) . This was some serious hard (and fun) fine motor work!

If you don't have eyedroppers, you could try using the tip of a paintbrush to just drop one drop of water in at a time. Another idea is using a syringe (although I haven't personally tried it that way).  If you are interested in the eyedroppers we used in this activity (we use them all the time), you can head over to my blog and see the affiliate link to ours.

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

Do you think your children would like this activity?

count and clip

🖐🏼count & clip🖐🏼⠀

⠀

I call this my lazy mom activity. I save this for times that the kids need an activity because they are about to lose it, but I’m feeling lazy and don’t want to spend time putting together anything! It’s saved in a bag just ready to save the day🎉 And lately, there’s been a decent amount of these days🤪 Can anyone else relate?

⠀

On clothespins, I have one number written on each one with a sharpie. In this particular bag, I had numbers 1-10. I also have bags of clothespins for numbers 10-20, shapes, and uppercase and lower case letters. Choose whichever one makes most sense for you (or just make all of them like me🤣). ⠀

⠀

On pieces of paper, draw out matches for each clothespin. I had numbers 1-1

0 drawn with dots in ten frames. You could also do addition or subtraction problems equaling the numbers, objects to represent the numbers, tally marks, etc. There’s so many different options to choose from! ⠀

⠀

Once you have a paper for each clothespin, fold each paper up multiple times (so the activity takes more time to do haha). Give the papers to your child to unwrap, count, and clip to the matching clothespin. You could also hide these papers around the house to extend the activity, or put them in a sensory bin to find before clipping! So many variations of this easy activity! ⠀

⠀

When you’re done, throw everything in a bag and it’s ready for the next time you need something to save the day! 🙌🏻

Make sure you're following me on instagram to see my latest activities for toddlers and kids!

Roll & Write

I love this activity to help your child or student learn to write their name or practice spelling words. It's really engaging and easy to set up, and below are links to everything you need!


Roll and Write Supply List:

2 pieces of paper

one die

crayons

markers

letter stamp set 

pipe cleaner

letter beads 

paint set and brush

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

DIRECTIONS: 

On the first paper, write out the rules (1-Crayon, 2- paint, 3- stamp, 4-marker, 5- bracelet, 6- rainbow colors).  I also put a little box next to the rules for Austin to check off as he finished. On the second paper, write six lines for your child to write on. 

Have your child roll the die then write or create their name (or whatever word they are working on) using the directions from paper 1. Once they complete that number they can check it off and roll again. If they roll the same number again, they continue rolling until they get a number they haven't gotten yet. 

chalk obstacle game

Happy Thursday! I've been saving this activity to share for #happythursdayletsplay and it's one of the activities my kids and I are going to create and do again this morning. 

You've probably seen at least one chalk obstacle course in the last couple of months. We see tons of them when we are out on walks, and we've done our fair share on our driveway. 

But after seeing @dayswithgrey's outdoor DIY chalk game, I got the idea to combine the two things together to create an outdoor chalk game with an obstacle course twist! My kids absolutely love board games and love being outside so I knew this would be a hit!

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

Here's what to do:
To make a big die, I used a box, white paper and a sharpie, and packaging tape. After drawing the sides of the die on the paper, I taped them down on each side of the box with the tape. Draw a board game with chalk on your driveway. In some of the boxes I put simple directions like -4 or +3. In other boxes I put some obstacle course directions (hop on 1 foot 10 times, spin around 3 times, 5 jumping jacks, etc.)

My whole family (husband included) had such a great time playing this game for multiple days in a row until the rain washed it away. It's for sure something we will do again and perfect for the spring and summer. 

Family games are a free and easy way to connect and bond with each other, they are great practice for taking turns, learning how to be a good sport, and following directions. There was also some math and gross motor skills involved in this game too! This game can easily be adapted to whatever is age appropriate for your kids. 

Who is going to make a chalk obstacle game?

Click here to see more pictures of the game and follow me on instagram to see my latest activities! 

DIY window clings

What you need: -plastic wrap or cling wrap -elmer's glue -food coloring (I use the one below) -dish soap -paint brush

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

What to do:

-Roll out plastic wrap on a flat surface

-In a bowl, pour about 2 tablespoons of Elmer's washable glue. 

-Add  a couple of drops of dish soap and 1-2 drops of food dye. Mix with a paint brush.

-Paint directly on the plastic wrap. Thick is better. 

-Let them dry overnight.

-Once dry, peel off and use on windows over and over!

Make sure you're following me on instagram to stay up to date on more activities!

Spaghetti Letters

I love using a multi-sensory approach to help teach the alphabet. Multi-sensory activities are activities that stimulate more than one of the senses at the same time. These activities will help activate different parts of your child's brain and make them more involved in their learning.

Spaghetti letters is a multi-sensory activity that was such a fun way to start introducing Brooklyn (2.5) to the letters in her name and for Austin to practice creating his name. I dyed the spaghetti to make it a little more fun (and to throw in a storage bin for more sensory play later in the day), but that's definitely not necessary. 

Cook some spaghetti, drain it, and place on a plate or tray to dry. If you want to dye your spaghetti, add a couple drops of oil to your drained pasta and one drop of food dye. Mix it around until the spaghetti changes color then place on a plate or tray to dry. I tried touching the spaghetti before it was completely dry and a small amount of food coloring got on my hands so make sure to test it out before playing with it. 

On paper, write some letters, words, or numbers. Give your child the spaghetti and have them trace the letters using it. They can easily cut the spaghetti to different lengths using their pincher grasp (good fine motor practice too). To make it more challenging you could always say a letter aloud and have your child create the letter without tracing it too. 

Who is going to cook some spaghetti this week?!

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

tape magnets

You guys! I can’t believe I hit 🎉1,000🎉followers on my instagram today!

THANK YOU to each and every one of you! ❤️

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant 

in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites 

to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

This activity is 🙌🏻 🙌🏻 and turned our really difficult morning into over an hour of pure magical playing, allowing me to finally finish my cup of coffee that was 4 hours old! ☕️😮

Grab that painters tape again and find some sort of counter. My kitchen island was the perfect spot for us. The seat of a chair could also work! Tape some strips of tape going from the counter (I had about an inch or two on the counter) and let the rest hang down. 

Grab your Picassotiles magnets (if you do not own these- they are hands down the family favorite toy and I highly suggest investing in some). 

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant 

in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites 

to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

Let your child place one magnet on the back of the tape (the sticky side) and another on the front (non sticky side) right on top of each other with the tape in the middle. They will stick together! 

It was a great little cause and effect activity for Brooklyn who tried a few times to put a @ tile on the front first to then find it wouldn’t stay put without the help of the one on the back. 

This activity kept my kids entertained for an hour (which is really good for them)! It then turned into creating really awesome and creative things using the tape magnets.

This activity will for sure become a staple in our house. 

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant 

in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites 

to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

Head over to my instagram 

to see more pictures of this activity!

abc caterpillar

Because what parent doesn't want to hear the ABCs over and over and over again right after breakfast?! HAHA.

My son had a blast creating a caterpillar with dot stickers in ABC order. This simple activity can be prepped in under a minute and can be adapted in so many different ways to fit what's appropriate for your child (numbers, patterns, numbers from least to greatest, etc.). 

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

On a sheet of dot stickers, write the ABCS (in a random order to add a fun searching element in). Take a piece of long paper (I taped two pieces of computer paper together) and draw the head of a caterpillar on the far left. Put the "a" dot sticker on the caterpillar to show your child how to start. Let your child search for the next letter on the dot sticker sheet, then add it to the caterpillar. 

This activity was a mini little scavenger hunt, had my son practicing letter recognition/ABC order, and was a little fine motor practice as well. I call that a win!

What kind of dot sticker caterpillar will you create for your child?  

What can you build?

A simple STEM activity that only requires 2 things. Clothespins and popsicle sticks! 

Stay at Home Activity Mom is a participant in the Amazon Series LLC Associates Program, 

an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees 

by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. 

Put out popsicle sticks and clothespins and simply ask "What can you build?" 

STEM stands for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics and STEM activities have so many benefits! 

Here's my instagram post for more about the activity and why I love STEM activities!