Learning about Circles!

This week Sweet E and I began learning about shapes. She is already familiar with basic shapes, thanks to some of her toys and books, but we had a lot of fun reviewing! We took most of our inspiration from Little M&M's circle week in tot school. Have a look!

Circle Prints

We love painting activities! I squirted some paint into small paper plates, and showed Sweet E how to use the cups to make circle prints on the paper. She seemed so curious about it!

She made lots of circle prints!

  

Then after we filled the paper, she looked at me as she slooowly reached her hand toward the plate. 😂 Finger-painting? Sure, I'll allow it!

She looooved this.

And was so fascinated by her hands, each time she dipped them into the paint!

Stacking Cheerios

Cheerios are a favorite snack around here. I stuck a broken spaghetti noodle into a clump of playdoh, and showed Sweet E how to stack the Cheerios onto it. She did a couple.

Then ate a couple. She was quite pleased with herself!

Here she is asking for one more.

Then as she munched, she stacked some more. Great fine motor activity!

Then she decided to pull them off.

And do it again!

Circle Stickers

Next I grabbed our circle stickers, and drew a circle onto paper. I added several dots around it for her to place the stickers onto.

She continued until each dot was covered!

  

Quick, easy activity!

Playdough + Circle Manipulatives

Next I pulled out some playdoh along with circle cookie cutters, beads, googly eyes and buttons.

She was excited to play! First we rolled out some dough.

And then we cut out circles in three sizes.

We talked about sizes, and I asked her which circle was the smallest, then the biggest.

Then we used our accessories to decorate them! I made the yellow face, then offered for her to create faces on the others.

I love the dimension in her faces' mouths. Such character!

Color Hop

The next day we went out to the driveway for a color hop! I drew large circles onto the driveway, and asked Sweet E to "Hop to the purple circle!" She was eager to hop!

We continued with the other colors!

And she had a blast!

"Where's the purple circle?"

I also asked her if she could draw a circle. She did great!

Of course, it kept going round and round, but the idea is there. 😂

And even when we moved on to riding bikes, exploring in the yard, etc. she still kept coming back to hop on the circles. What a great gross motor game!

Watercolors and Circles

And finally, I pulled out our new watercolors. We first used these for last week's spaghetti sensory bin, the grand finale of our color themes! I filled our old baby food containers (which get a lot more use during activities than it ever got for baby food!) with liquid watercolors and water. And I used this laminated circle sheet that I created for our creative table a couple years ago.

Sweet E used a dropper to fill the circles with watercolors.

This is a highly supervised activity, so it didn't leave much time for pictures lol. But she had fun with this for a few minutes. Then to extend the activity, I pulled out a piece of watercolor paper, and drew circles on it with a white crayon. She used a paintbrush to paint over it and reveal the circles!

She really enjoyed this!

Here it is once it dried: 

She still wanted to continue painting, so I pulled out some paper towels next. They looked so pretty all covered in colors!

Squares

Magnetic Pom Poms

This has always been one of my go-to activities, beginning with Honey Pot's very first week of tot school. I printed this square from 3 Dinosaurs.

Do-A-Dot Art

We then reused this worksheet for a simple dot marker craft. At first he was switching off between colors.

But then my husband and I expressed praise in how well he was doing, he was on a roll and finished the whole thing in green.

Square Road

This printable comes from Making Learning Fun. The object of the activity is to drive along the road and become familiarized with its shape. I gave Little M&M one of his miniature cars, but he wanted to use all three of them at once eventually.

Gluing Squares

I cut out squares from construction paper, and provided Little M&M with a gluestick. This is a skill he hasn't had much practice with yet. At first he wasn't too interested in this, but after I did one for him, it renewed his interest and he finished the whole thing himself!

Stacking Squares

I gathered a few of Little M&M's blocks for stacking. He loves this activity, and attempted multiple towers.

Square Stickers

He loves CARS! When I saw these square stickers at the store, I just had to get them for him. Great fine motor practice, as he learned to peel them off himself.

Tape Resist Square Paintings

We love tape resist paintings. We've done snowflakes a couple of times, and the kids' initials as well. Honey Pot joined us for this activity. And they enjoyed themselves.

They each got to choose their own three colors. Little M&M happened to choose primary, while Honey Pot chose her favorite colors.

Here they are before we peeled off the paint.

And here is the final result!

Sorting Circles vs. Squares - Review

Just as we did with our color units, I wanted each shape unit to include one activity for reviewing what he had learned previously. First he learned about circles, so we included that in our review activity. I decided to create a bath-time sorting activity, using shapes that I cut out of foam sheets. He would pick up a shape, and I'd ask him, "Is that a circle or a square?" He would answer correctly, and stick it on the wall. Saying the words out loud has helped instill their names. He had fun. So this was a success!

Shape Pattern Worksheets

I also wanted to include a general shape review for Honey Pot this week. This printable came from 3 Dinosaurs as well. This was a nice activity for her because she loves patterns, and shapes such as a hexagon and a rhombus are still difficult for her to call by name.

Estimation and Measurement with Blocks

We also used her little brother's blocks for some mathematics this week. I provided her with various objects, and asked her to first estimate how many blocks it would take to equal the same length. She guest right with the chapstick.

And the teapot.

She estimated ten for the Kindle, but the actual measurement was six.

And finally, when measuring her Frozen book, she wanted to make a pattern.

Making Polygons with Craft Sticks

This activity comes from Counting Coconuts. We didn't use the word quadrilateral, though. We stuck with the basics and called it a square, as she's still learning some of these. This was a quiet time activity during one of Little M&M's naps, so she did this leisurely right on my bed. Notice the progression of silliness/laziness as she completes the shapes. She did do them all though!

Tracing Shapes

This is one of our laminated pages from a while back, that I put together with various pre-writing activities. We've brought this in the car for long car rides as well as pulled it out during quiet times. The printable comes from Worksheet Fun. So much free stuff there. I love it! 

Square Color By Number

This comes from Printable Colouring Pages, and goes along nicely with Little M&M's square theme this week. Honey Pot isn't too into coloring (neither is Little M&M). She got to use colored pencils, instead of the usual crayons and markers, which helped keep her interest. And the challenge of matching the numbers to the colors proved engaging for her. It was a hit!

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