Sorting the Rainbow

Summer heat in South Florida is brutal. Summer heat in South Florida during the last trimester of pregnancy is just downright torturous. So what is a pregnant mama with a toddler to do to beat the heat? I’ve decided to compile a list of activities to do with my son that will keep us entertained, inside, and cool during these HOT, HOT months. I will publish a weekly activity that worked in our house and include how to modify it for age/skill. Additionally I’ll cover all the great learning opportunities that the activity presents while you and your child are engaged. 

The first activity inspiration came from me refusing to pay $23.00 for beads during a Michael’s trip. I looked at their neatly color-coded box of beads and said “we can make that!” and so we did. It turned into a great two day project that bought Mommy a couple of extra hours in the cool AC. 

Materials:

1. Old Muffin Tin or Egg Carton

2. Assorted Acrylic Paint Colors

3. Paint Brushes

4. Water 

5. Paper Towels

6. Beads or Pom-Poms

7. Pipe Cleaners

8. Assorted tweezers

9. Sensory bin or craft table (area for the kiddos to go to work)

Steps:

1. Paint each “compartment” of the muffin tin or egg carton a single color. Try and correspond the colors with the same color beads or pom-poms (or whatever sorting object you chose). We left one compartment unpainted (so painted 11 out of twelve cups). The unpainted compartment to hold the beads before they are sorted. 

2. Let the paint dry. Watch-out! acrylic paint is not washable, but will work the best on the aluminum muffin tins. 

3. Place the muffin tin in the sensory table with tweezers, “handy scoopers”, and pipe cleaners. 

4. Fill one compartment with objects for sorting. 

5. Start by matching beads into compartments by color. Let it evolve into picking up the beads with the scoopers or tweezers, threading pipe cleaners, making jewelry, making patterns, etc. 

Embedded Teaching and Learning Opportunities

Sorting and Categorizing: Children can be encouraged to categorize by materials, colors, sizes, shapes, etc, depending upon the “sorting” material you use. You can even re-use the muffin tin and change the sorting objects to keep the activity fresh. Sorting and categorizing is an early cognitive skill that is foundational to children’s development of math skills, language skills, and scientific understanding of the world. By identifying common characteristics, labeling the common adjective, and separating objects, they are practicing all three of these skills; thereby, strengthening those connections for future and generalized applications. 

Patterns: Forming and identifying patterns is another traditional math and science skill explicitly taught in early childhood classrooms. Teaching and learning patterns can be applied in music, pre-literacy skills (example: rhyming), math, science, and so many other practical life applications (red light, green lights, schedules, self-help routines). If you model pattern making and show/explain it to your child, whether or not they make-up their own pattern or follow yours, they are learning the process of forming patterns through play. 

Fine Motor Coordination: All of the activities require children to use a pincer grip, strengthening the small finger and hand muscles required to write, tie shoes, pull a zipper, fasten a button, and other important necessary skills. Adding pipe cleaners or string to the activity is another layer of fine motor practice. 

Over the course of the next few weeks, I hope you take these ideas and transform them into your own. I recommend integrating your child’s interests into the activities. For example, if they like bugs, find brightly colored bugs, and use tweezers. The muffin tin activity can become a “bug lab”. The more personalized the activity is to your child, the more engaging the activity will be to them. The more engaged they are, the longer it will entertain them (#momwin!) and the more they will learn. With all of my Play With Purpose activities, my hope is always to empower parents to be their child’s biggest advocate and most influential teacher. When we, as parents, engage in purposeful play we speak our child’s language and provide priceless and meaningful learning opportunities.