Ducks in Muck Tot Bag

My new tot bag is based on the book Ducks in Muck by Lori Haskins. This is a well loved book about ducks, trucks, being stuck, and muck. Kaleb adores this book and we read it daily. It seemed only natural that I create a tot bag to go along with our reading. I also got creative and created a free printable pack for both tots and kindergarteners. You may read and download the printable pack here.

My Ducks in Muck tot bag includes the duck/truck matching cards and play dough mats from my printable pack. The duck/truck matching cards can be used to practice colors or shapes. The play dough mat is 2-sided. One side has the d is for duck and the other side is t is for truck. I laminated this for easier clean up. I added a duck sewing card which I found at . This is great for hand-eye coordination. The foam truck puzzles idea came from Little Family Fun. I had planned on making them magnetic (and I still might) but I will use them with water on our glass door.

The five ducks math mat will be used to practice counting and acting out the story. The -uck word truck printable came from my kindergarten printable pack. How many -uck words can you find in the story?

I added the 2 part puzzles and made them magnetic. Kaleb loves magnetic puzzles. The tot bag also contains the magnifying cards that I created. Use a magnifying glass to find the letters or the -uck words. The 5 little ducks story patterns come from Kizclub. Along with reading Ducks on Muck, we will be learning the 5 Little Ducks song. I laminated these and added velcro for our felt board. The color ducks came from Confessions of a Homeschooler and these will be used for color recognition. We are still working on our colors and I plan on using these different ways. I will have my tot match blocks to each duck, I can hide these and have the tot find them, I can cut them and make them puzzles.

The best part, though, from my tot bag was the chocolate "muck" play dough that I made. This was, by far, the best addition to the tot bag. Kaleb loved it. We rolled trucks in it, Kaleb cut it into pieces and served it on plates. We had to have muck for the ducks. I only wish I would have had plastic ducks for the muck! Oh, well, maybe next time.

Links

I Can Teach My Child has the chocolate play dough recipe.

Little Family Fun has the idea for the foam truck puzzles.

Kizclub has the patterns for 5 Little Ducks felt board.

Confessions of a Homeschooler has a free printable pond pack that includes the color duck cards.

Living Worldsapart my free printable Mucky Ducks pack for both kindergarten and tot.

Living Worldsapart pinterest board for Ducks in Muck.

The Mitten Tot Bag

Finally, I have a new literature based tot bag! This one has been in the works for months.  A new tot bag based on The Mitten by Jan Brett. The Mitten is about a young boy, Nicki, who asks his Grandma to make white mittens. She is hesitant because white mittens can get easily lost in the snow. Nicki does lose one and it becomes a temporary home to several animals. Let me tell you about my tot bag.

First, I made the animal characters in the story. I rarely ever sew without a pattern and I searched high and low for a pattern for the animals. But I could not find anything to make my life easier. So I used the clipart from KPM Doodles as my pattern for our softies. They came out cute and I am happy with them.

Then I had to create a mitten for the animals to fit but when I considered felt, I figured that it would be too unforgiving when the tot tries to fit the animals in. So I made a mitten shaped drawstring bag. This was hastily hand drawn and sewn using knit fabric that I had left-over from another project. All of the animals easily fit into the bag for storage. The animals will be used for retelling the story and such. We will probably do a hide-n-seek game where the tot has to find the animals. Also, a game where the tot has to toss the animal onto the mitten could be played.

Next, I added some mittens that I cut from felt that I had. I used every color of the rainbow and added pink for my girl. This is a two-fold game. Since I am working on colors with the tot, we will play where is the snowball? I will hide the snowball under a mitten and we will use our color words to find it. Secondly, the mittens will be used for a practical life application. Kaleb will hang them on a clothesline with clothespins (fine motor practice). He can also match them as well. The idea for the mitten game came from Kiwi Crate.

Kaleb loves magnetic activities, so I could not disappoint. After much searching, I could not find a simple mitten 2 part puzzle for the tot bag. So I created my own using clip art from My Cute Graphics. Her graphics are so cute and they are free! If you would like the pdf file, click here.

Next, I enlarged mitten clipart and made a sewing card for more fine motor practice. I could not help myself but I had to print and laminate the characters for the book. These are adorable and can be used on our felt board. I will also make some games to go with them. I may add them to our salt tray and have the tot uncover them with a paintbrush.

I added some mittens for practical life - teaching the tot to put on his mittens. They can also be used for matching. I totally love the sparkly white mittens that my mom made for J. We will have fun with these. One game will be to place a small item inside and have the tot guess what it is just by feeling the mitten.

I will be adding sparkle white play dough as soon as I make it. The recipe comes from My Small Potatoes. We will be working on some simple mitten art projects as well as making mitten cookies! I have a fun tot week planned (sprinkled with kindergarten activities), please come back and see my tot bag in action.

Gingerbread Tot Week

This past week, J and I worked through our first Christmas fun theme of gingerbread. I thought that my tot should be able to join in the fun, so I created the Gingerbread Tot Bag for his enjoyment. Here are some of the activities that Kaleb did.

First, I changed the sensory bin for the month of December. I dyed twisty noodles (all I had on hand) green and red. Then I scoured every drawer and bucket for items to put into our bin. I made candy canes from pipe cleaners. I added red and green shiny pom poms, bells, and buttons in the shapes of stars. I added red and green counting bears for fun and a small piece of tinsel for good measure.

Here, he is checking it out....will it pass the test? Will he take all the stuff out just to play with the noodles?

I think he likes it! This time, he didn't take everything out. He just scooped and poured with all of his cups and such. He has played with this every day since I have changed it. The only thing I don't like about it is the smell - to dye the noodles, you add vinegar and food coloring. I left them out to dry all night but the vinegar smell is still there. Hopefully it will go away soon.

I gave Kaleb the gingerbread cookies I made from felt, a spatula, and a cookie sheet. He had fun with this - picking up the cookies and placing them on the plates.

He is telling me to eat!

Next, we worked with the shape puzzle. He liked matching the shapes but I wish the shapes were somewhat larger.

He worked with the gingerbread puzzle. I made this magnetic so it would be easier to put together. This didn't hold his interest as long as the shape puzzle did though.

On to dressing the gingerbread with all of the clothes!

We worked with the size sort. We talked about big and little but Kaleb was more interested in sticking the pictures to the cookie sheet (his favorite thing to do). We worked with these activities all week, some he liked more than others.

Gingerbread Tot Bag

In honor of our Gingerbread theme week, I decided to put together some activities for the tot. This tot bag can go along with any Gingerbread man/baby book. We are using Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett and The Gingerbread Boy by Paul Galdone. Here are some of the items I included in my tot bag.

 The first activity is a play dough mat. This will be used two different ways: (1) with gingerbread play dough (recipe follows) and (2) with some candy magnets. Both were free printables and the links are listed below.

On the back of the play dough mat, I added a shape match picture. The shapes are magnetic which my tot loves. I found this at Making Learning Fun (link below).

I made a gingerbread puppet to use while reading the story and a felt gingerbread for Kaleb to dress. The puppet was a combination of patterns that I found and the clothes for the gingerbread were cut free handed.

I also made six simple gingerbread cookies. I added these with a spatula and a cookie sheet for some cookie flipping fun. These were very easy to make. I was able to sew them by hand while watching a Christmas movie.

Lastly, I included a gingerbread size sort and a simple gingerbread puzzle. I made the puzzle magnetic to make it easier to put together and stay together. All of these activities were free to print and easy to make. All of the materials I used, I had on hand, no extra shopping trips.

I hope this encourages you to make a tot bag for your little ones whether for the holidays or just for fun. I love being able to grab a tot bag if I need something to occupy my tot in a hurry. It seemed only fair that he gets to participate in some Christmas themed fun!

Links

Living WorldsApart my gingerbread pinterest board

Pre Kinders has the free printable play dough mats. One set has numbers for older tots and another set is just the house to print.

Play Dough Recipe has the recipe for gingerbread play dough to use with the play dough mats.

Homeschool Share is where I found the candies to print. These can be used to practice patterns and addition for older children. This file has other printables but I felt they were too old for my tot. I will be using them later though.

Making Learning Fun has the printable shape match game I used.

Things for Boys has a printable pattern for a gingerbread puppet. I used this for the outline.

KizClub also has a printable pattern for some puppets - a gingerbread man, snowman, santa and a reindeer.

The Iowa Farmer's Wife gave me the idea for the gingerbread dress activity.

She Wears Flowers gave me the idea for the cookie flip. I made my gingerbread because we don't have cool stores like Jo Ann's here.

Homeschool Creations has a free printable pack for the Gingerbread Baby. This is where I found the simple puzzle and the size sort. Again, this pack is great but too advanced for my tot at the moment.

Ten Apples on Top! Tot Bag

My newest tot bag is based on Ten Apples On Top! by Dr. Seuss. It is our book of the week and it was only natural to create a tot bag to go along with our reading. The idea behind my tot bags is to include my son while we do school. I am in no way saying that tots need schooling. These are just activities to give your tot while you work with your older children. I try to include some fine/gross motor activities and just plain fun stuff.

We own both the complete hardcover book as well as the board book (in 'Merica) for this title. If you have the board book, it is not as long and as detailed as the hardcover version. But it is still good for short attention spans. Here are some of the activities I have planned.

I printed and laminated a size/color sort that I found at Homeschool Share. This can easily be adapted for the magnetic board or as a fine motor activity by adding color worms to tong on matching apples. Right now, we will be focusing on colors. I made some mini apples from bottle caps. These can be used a variety of ways - as fine motor by dropping into a milk bottle or spooning into a bowl, as counters, or as playing pieces for an apple game. I made ten apple foam blocks that Kaleb will try to balance on top of each other. You can make these larger by adding apples to wood blocks. I made mine small so they would fit into the storage bag.

I printed the three characters from the book and added foam apples. This activity will be used with water and a glass door. The apples will stick to the glass door, Kaleb will try to put the apples on the characters' heads. I had to make something magnetic. Kaleb loves magnets. I found an apple page with apples numbered from one to ten. I added magnets and a picture of himself so he can place apples on his head. These are good for number recognition but for now, he will just place them on the board.

Lastly, I made some apple beans bags from left over fleece that I had. These can be used for tossing games or balancing on heads. I found some plastic apples and a scoop. I think I will put the apples in water and have Kaleb fish them out with a scoop or net. Give him a bowl of water and some scoops and he will be entertained for an hour!

This was a simple tot bag to create. All of the materials I had on hand and did not buy anything. I am a firm believer in trying to use recyclables and such to create my tot bags. This helps to keep costs down as well as helps the environment. I hope this tot bag will encourage you to create your own. I would love to hear any ideas or suggestions that you have.

Links

Making Learning Fun has tons of ideas for this book. There is a felt board pattern to recreate the story, printable mini books, and such.

Homeschool Share has links to other printables and projects for apples. I love this site.

The apple bean bags were just circles sewn together with a felt leaf and stem. The characters that I printed came from a website but I don't have the link, sorry.

If You Give A Mouse A Cookie tot bag

My new tot bag is based on the book If You Give A Mouse A Cookie by Laura Numeroff. Kaleb's favorite lovey is the mouse from these stories, he carries his mouse everywhere. It seemed only natural to make a tot bag for this book.

Here is a quick view of my tot bag.

First activity is a brown cookie that Kaleb will put magnet chocolate chips on. This can be used with a cookie sheet as the magnet board. He loves magnets so I had to include them. We will count the chips and later, you can use this as a math activity. I also made some felt cookies. There are chips on one side and the number on the other. I made ten cookies. Again, this can be used for math, counting, etc... I plan to first use them for a bean bag game - toss the cookies into the jar or can you find the cookies?

I added some straw activities. In the book, the mouse asks for a straw. Kaleb can thread the straws onto pipe cleaners as a fine motor activity or just drop them into the bottle. He likes these type of activities.

Kaleb loves playing with my mini dust pan and brush. In the book, the mouse cleans up, so why not have Kaleb work on cleaning up the pom poms? (think dust bunnies, ha ha) If Kaleb was a tad older, I would have also added napkin/wash cloth folding as well. Every day skills that he needs to learn.

I made cookie milk caps. These can be used a variety of ways - as counters, as a fine motor activity to drop into a milk jug, for math as I will use with J later this week. I enlarged a picture of the mouse and added it to a paper towel tube. I cut open the mouth and Kaleb will "feed" the mouse cookie beads. I was hoping that the milk caps would fit but I just couldn't get the mouth enlarged enough. I may try again. Please use discretion when handing a child small beads.

On hand, I had these cookie shape matchers that I found at a yard sale this past year and a circle sewing card for more fine motor practice. I am a firm believer of using materials that I have on hand for my tot bags. If I can make it, I will. I try not to buy items to create these. The sewing card could easily be made - a cookie to sew or a mouse.

This tot bag will be used this week for our book of the week activities. Here are some additional links for the book. I hope this encourages you to make your own tot bag to use with your kids. If you have any ideas, I would love to hear them. See this as well as other activities for the book in action - this week.

Links

Preschool Experiment the idea for feeding the mouse came from here. I didn't want to use food so I made the cookie milk caps.

Mom to 2 Posh Divas she did a unit for her girls on this book, she has some cute ideas for older kids which I will be using later this week.

Izzy, Mac, and Me also did a unit on this book with cute ideas. I love the tear and paste cookie.

Erica Bohrer's First Grade  has a cute graph/mouse to make. Have the family try out different cookies and see what they like the best.

Book of the Week - tot

I have such a long list of books that I want to enjoy/work with this year. But we were not done with our color words (doing one a day), I decided to enjoy another book with colors. The book for our week is I Went Walking by Sue Williams.

It is on the same line as Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? I went walking and what did you see? I saw a black cat looking at me. What I love about this book is the the animals are not immediately noticeable in the pictures until you turn the page. The child has to guess what the animals are based on visual clues. 

For the tot version of this book, I went with a farm theme. Most of the animals seen can be found on a farm. So here is what we did.

Here is a picture of my activity bins for the week. All of the activities are from my I Went Walking tot bag. You can find the post for my tot bag here.

Kaleb and I read the book and then used the props to retell the story. We practice animal sounds, which he is very good at.

Kaleb then played with the magnets that I made. He could name most of the animals on the board and we practice (with help) matching each animal.

I let him work with the horse sewing card. I did not add of the sewing cards in his basket, only one or two will do. I did not want him to get overwhelmed.

I added the tonging activity and he surprised me by actually grasping the pom poms with the tongs. This can also be a color sorting activity but I just started him with putting them into the bowls.

He loves magnets, putting them on...taking them off. I gave him the animal sort and he placed the animals on the cookie sheet. Again, we worked with the sounds the animals made instead of the sizes, which will come later.

He loved the puppets. We played with them for awhile.

I then hid all of his farm animals in his shredded paper sensory bin. He had to find them. Instead of moving the paper around to find the animals, he just dumped it out.

Lastly, I gave him some brown play dough and some farm animals to play with. He made tracks in the mud dough. He is still trying to figure out play dough so I don't give him too much to play with. We still have an art project that will involve chocolate pudding, yum! All of these activities will be in his bins all week in the hopes that he will work with them while I teach J. I hope these tot bag posts will encourage you to create your own tot bag. 

I Went Walking Tot Bag

My new tot bag is based on the book, I Went Walking by Sue Williams. This was a simple bag to create since I had most of the items on hand and I didn't have to make much. I based many of the activities on farm animals since most of the animals can be found on a farm. Here is what I included...

I created storytelling props by using some clipart that I had from my Mailbox subscription and I scanned the image of the "walker" from the book. I colored the clipart on my computer and used the colors from the story. I then laminated the character and added velcro so we could use them on our felt board.

The animals can also be used for a sorting activity that includes some fine-motor practice. I will place the animals inside bowls and have my tot use tongs to place pom poms into them. At first, these will be just for the practice of using tongs, then we will use it for a color sorting activity.

I added a farm animal matching activity which I made magnetic from Frogs in my Pocket (link below). I printed two copies of the animals and laminated them. Kaleb can match the animals to the pictures.

Another magnetic activity I made was a size sort game that I found from Creative Preschool Resources (link below). I know Kaleb is too young to sort the sizes of the animals right now but he will be able to do this later. For now, we will use these to practice animal sounds. He just loves to stick the pictures on the magnet board.

I also added farm hand puppets and sewing cards for retelling the story and hand-eye coordination. These were bought from a store so I didn't make them myself. However, if you do not have any puppets or sewing cards, these would be easy to reproduce (links at bottom).

The final activity I added was Little People farm animals. Again, we had these on hand and I didn't have to buy anything. I will use these for the sensory bin. Currently, our sensory bin has shredded paper in it. I will place these animals in the bin and have my tot  find the animals. These would also be good in a rice or bean sensory bin.

To see my tot bag in action, please check here. I hope you enjoyed this addition to my tot bags. To read about my other literature based tot bags, please check here.

Links to Create your Own

Creative Preschool Resources - this is a great free printable pack that I found the size sort. There are other activities that you can print as well.

2 Teaching Mommies - another free printable farm pack. They have some great units!

Lawteedah - another free printable farm pack.

Frogs in my Pockets Blog - this is where I found the farm animal matching game that I laminated and added magnets to.

3 Dinosaurs - has a great farm printable pack with several downloads. I love her stuff.

Zitman Fam - make your own farm puppets, complete with patterns!

Gratefully Growing Grace - if you don't want to make large puppets, you can see her farm animal finger puppets here.

Love and Lollipops - has a great farm sensory bin complete with popsicle stick barn.

Creative Preschool Resources - has a simple pig craft which can be added. We are planning to do this and I may let them paint the pig with chocolate pudding!

Worldsapart (me) - here's a link to my pinterest farm activities for tots. I am still trying to figure out how to add the pinterest button, it just doesn't want to work for me.