It's finally spring time and time to play out side for FREE
Action Jumping
Each of these rhymes is meant for group jump rope. As everyone chants the rhyme, the jumper jumps while dramatizing the actions.I'm a little Dutch girl dressed in blue.
Here are the things I like to do:
Salute to the captain, bow to the queen,
Turn my back on the submarine.
I can do the tap dance, I can do the splits.
I can do the hokey pokey just like this.
Spanish dancer, do the splits.
Spanish dancer, give a kick.
Spanish dancer, turn around.
Spanish dancer, get out of town. (Jumper runs out.)
Benjamin Franklin went to France
To teach the ladies how to dance.
First the heel and then the toe;
Spin around, and out you go.
47. Do some texture rubbings on leaves, grass, and other items you find outside.
50. Make your own "stomp rocket".Have a happy summer!!
Fuzzy Friends
Present Pointers
You may want to consider buying extra pompoms for this fun and easy project: Glue pompoms onto an old glove to make puppets. Design a different animal for each finger. A great last-minute gift!Time frame: Half to one hour
Level: Easy
What you need:
- One bag of assorted pompoms (Be sure yellow, white, and orange pompoms are included in the assortment, or buy them separately.)
- Tacky or fabric glue
- Scissors
- One piece each of yellow, orange, white, and pink felt
- Bag of plastic eyes
- Pack of pipe cleaner that includes orange
- Bag of plastic hollow Easter eggs (the ones that snap apart)
- For the bunny: Glue two white pompoms together. Cut two hind legs and two bunny ears out of white felt. Glue these to the pompom body. Glue two small eyes to the head.
- For the chick: Glue two yellow pompoms together. Cut a triangular beak out of orange felt and glue it to the face. Glue on two plastic eyes. Use an orange pipe cleaner for the feet: Make a circle out of the middle of the pipe cleaner and glue it to the bottom pompom. Bend the ends of the pipe cleaner into two circles. Pinch the circles in half to form "V" shaped feet.
- For the duck: Glue two white pompoms together. Glue a smaller orange pompom on the mouth area. Cut feet out of orange felt and glue them to the body. Glue two eyes onto the head.
- Place your pompoms in hollow, snap apart, plastic Easter eggs. Put the Easter eggs and leftover supplies in a gift basket and present it to the kids on your list.
Papier-mâché Easter Eggs
If you don't mind a little mess, papier-mâché is a relatively easy medium for creating unusual homemade items. These handcrafted Easter eggs filled with goodies will brighten up any Easter basket.Time frame: Two to three hours plus overnight to dry
Level: Moderately easy
What you need:
- Newspapers
- Five-inch balloon(s)
- Shallow bowl
- 3⁄4 cup flour
- 1⁄2 cup water
- Small wrapped candies
- Masking tape
- Colorful craft paints
- Paintbrush
- Clear acrylic finish spray
- Cover your work area with newspapers or a plastic tablecloth.
- Decide how many eggs you want to make and blow up the balloon(s). Tie a knot in the end(s).
- In a shallow bowl, make a paste from the flour and water. The paste should be thick enough to thoroughly coat a piece of newspaper without dripping off. If the paste is too runny, add more flour; if it's too stiff, add more water.
- Tear or cut a newspaper into one-inch strips. Dip the strips into the flour mixture and run your fingers down the strip to remove excess paste. Paste the strip onto the balloon in a vertical direction, going from the knotted end to the top and back down again. Repeat this process until the balloon is covered. Do not cover the knot of the balloon. Keep a one-inch "hole" in this area to insert the candies. Next add strips horizontally until the balloon is covered with a 1⁄4-inch layer of newspaper. Press the strips to the balloon and rub a layer of the paste over the top to smooth any wrinkles. Allow the egg to dry overnight.
- When the egg is dry, carefully pop the balloon and pull it out through the hole. Fill the egg with wrapped candies and seal the hole with masking tape.
- Paint the egg with colorful craft paints and allow it to dry. Spray the egg with clear acrylic finish spray and allow it to dry thoroughly. The kids could keep the egg to reuse as a decoration for Easter by carefully removing the tape to get to the candies, or they could crack the egg open by hitting it against a hard surface (such as concrete).
Directions:
- Use white and pink construction paper to cut out bunny-ear shapes: two white and two pink, the pink being slightly smaller.
- Glue the pink ears onto the white ears.
- Glue the ears onto a long strip of construction paper, measure to fit your child's head, and staple the ends together to form a headband.
Easter Basket
Materials:
- One large, round margarine container (empty)
- Construction paper (at least two colors)
- Scissors
- Elmer's glue
- Stapler
- Easter egg grass
- Jelly beans, chocolate eggs, or other Easter candy
- Cut a piece of construction paper into a rectangle that will fit around the outside of the margarine tub (approximately 4" x 10").
- Fold the rectangle in half (widthwise) in order to "weave" your basket.
- Draw a line (lengthwise) an inch from the top of the open edge of the paper (opposite the folded edge). This is your "stop cutting" line.
- Measure and mark lines an inch apart starting at the folded edge and ending at the "stop cutting" line.
- Cut along the lines you just drew, up to the "stop cutting" line. Then unfold the rectangle.
- Cut 10 four-inch strips of different colored construction paper (1/2" x 4").
- Weave the strips (from top to bottom) in and out of the cuts you made in the rectangle. To hold each strip in place, add a drop of glue at the top and bottom of each woven strip.
- Wrap the woven rectangle around the outside of the margarine tub and glue it in place.
- Cut another strip of paper approximately 8 inches long (1-inch wide) for the basket's handle. Glue the handle over top of margarine tub.
- Your child can decorate her basket with artificial or construction paper flowers. Fill it with Easter grass, candies, and jelly beans.
Banana Bowl
Form two groups for this relay race. Have all the players line up with a banana on a string dangling from their waists and almost touching the ground. As the whistle blows, the first two try to hit a ping-pong ball with the banana, hands-free, to a finish line (about 15 to 20 feet away from the start). The first to the line is the winner.Minefield
This is a communication game (that can be quite educational) where you try to talk your blindfolded teammate through a series of obstacles.What you'll need are blindfolds and a number of moveable obstacles such as balls, chairs, jackets, shoes etc.
Define boundaries. Have the team create a list of things that are detrimental to functioning as a group such as poor communication, anger, jealousy, wrong tools, not listening etc.
For each characteristic/action, throw an object into the playing space, the "minefield."
Have the kids within a group choose partners. One partner is blindfolded at one end of the field. The non-blindfolded partners stand at the opposite end of the field and try to talk their partners through the minefield without them running into any of the obstacles. If the blindfolded partner touches an object they're out and another partner must try. However, once they are blindfolded the other team can move the objects around if they choose. The team with the highest number of successful crossings wins. After the game is over (if you want it to be more educational) ask the players what they learned from the activity? Did the blindfolded people trust their team? Why or why not? Why is good communication important? etc.




