A friend of mine asked me if I made name labels to keep track of school supplies… well, I didn’t but I do now! As a former teacher, I would have been grateful if parents would have used labels instead of a sharpie to personalize their child’s belongings or supplies and as a parent I am excited that this will save me time.
I like to edit these with a tracing font to get my little one to help!
I have a (semi) love-hate relationship with stickers. My kids peel them off and stick them all over the place and I am unsure what their purpose is at times other than leaving residue on things they stick to. Having said that, I have YOUNG children who don’t exactly keep track of small items or use things practically.
Sean Patrick got some cool toys at his birthday party this year, but I hid several of them because I wanted to use them sparingly. When I pulled out this sticky mosaics activity last week, it turned out to be a real gem.
There were 5 different vehicles made up of different colored shapes, and he picked the helicopter.
We decided early on to make it for his uncle who works for the US Aviation so it was really special to encourage him to finish so we could give it to his Uncle Nathan.
The best part is that we have been working on this a little every day ALL week and have only finished ONE vehicle template. I have been waiting until Mckayla falls asleep because she likes to destroy Sean Patrick’s art projects so it has been super fun one-on-one time working with him on this project.
This is what happens when the 19 month old is around the stickers.
And here are just some of the things he has been practicing with this activity:
Fine motor skills – Strengthening his control and coordination in his hands in order to peel the stickers off their backing and to stick them carefully onto the outline of the shape. Shape and Color identification – Identifying the shapes and colors needed in each part of the project. Spatial Awareness – Turning the sticker until it covers up the whole shape. Matching – Matching the accurate color and sticker to the individual outlines. Visual Discrimination – After selecting a sticker, trying to find that particular colored shape “hidden” in the page. Counting Practice -Counting how many more blue triangles you need to fill a space we were working on at the time. One-to-One Correspondence – Having manipulate one sticker to one outline at a time took lots of discipline as well.
Daddy helped with the very last part of the project to complete the tail of the helicopter. When he finished he was so proud and he asked “Now I get to work on another one?” Well, that was an easy one to answer.
So proud of himself for finishing 🙂
I seriously think I am going to order two more of these (one masculine and one feminine), stick them in the closet where I store my gift bags, and have a go-to present for the next birthday party we go to!
Here are the other ones they have on amazon:
I really love to hear from you…
Do dread having another sticker activity in your house?
Do you think your little one is at an age where he/she would enjoy this?
Do you know of any other sticker activities that are worth checking out?
Sean Patrick is obsessed with my husband’s bedtime stories… and now I am obsessed with them, because he let me in on his secret.
My husband, Patrick, has been weaving subliminal messages into the imaginative night-time stories he tells Sean Patrick.
His stories about animals in forests or athletes on the field all have hidden messages in them that encourage patience, perseverance, integrity, problem solving, etc. It’s genius! Books always have morals and lessons so why shouldn’t our bedtime stories right?
Sean Patrick likes to be the main character in the stories we tell him; So, Patrick might tell him a baseball story where Sean Patrick is up to bat and misses but he doesn’t get upset or give up, he just tries again.
Or, an alligator might have Sean Patrick’s fishing pole so he has to wait until the alligator falls asleep to get it back like waiting until a friend is done with a toy before taking it back.
I have started to weave subliminal messages into my teaching tips too…
My recent story was about a boy named Sean Patrick who had the strongest alligator chomp (his pencil grasp) that he could chomp down on a wild crayon but the crayon could never break free from his super strength. And when he would write letters they would come alive…. the letter S would slither off of the page like a snake and he would have to catch it with his alligator chomp before it could get away.
Can you tell we are letting our imaginations run wild over here?
Following up with Tracing the ABC’s tips about coming up with little sayings to help form the letters, I wanted to share a COUPLE quick tips about differentiating “b” and “d” because they are so easily confused among young learners….
Every time I draw lowercase “b” I say a phrase I picked up from Shannon Hannaman (K Teacher- Baton Rouge) “Baby ‘b’ fits inside of Momma ‘B’s Belly.” This phrase has never let me down. Once kids learn this phrase they seem to automatically know “b” from “d” – You can also say “Baby ‘d’ doesn’t fit in Daddy “D”s belly.” Ooh, and maybe “Papa ‘P’ and Princess ‘p’ wait patiently in line.”
I also wrote the word “bed” on an old little tikes bed and it is a word that will be ingrained in my kid’s minds from seeing it so often.
Please continue commenting with your experiences…. I love to hear this and it gives me some tips for my little one too 🙂 What are your tips to differentiate “p” and “q”?
A Mommy Teacher named Meg shared this comment yesterday on the Tracing The ABC’s Book Post– “Just wanted to say that I purchased this yesterday, printed it off, laminated it at home and my 3 year old did every single letter! I did not expect that at all. I thought she would get bored, but she loved doing it! And we had fun coming up with little sayings about each letter (P was a man and then he put his hat on, etc).”
So maybe if “p” is a man/”Papa P” who puts his hat on then “q” is a queen whose hair flips out ! Share Your Thoughts…. 🙂
Because Sean Patrick is so into tracing right now (and because he is a perfectionist), I decided to make him a book that he could use dry-erase markers and Mr. Clean magic erasers to practice his tracing over and over again without getting frustrated about markings on his paper (courtesy of his little sister).
I printed the pages of my tracing book onto card stock and laminated them with my inexpensive laminator that I bought at WalMart.
We work on it a little each day and I encourage him to do whatever letters he would like to practice making, but I always try to make the formation fun for him. For example, when we were writing “A” I told him to slide down this slide (the left slanted line) then to slide down that slide (the right slanted line), and then to climb across the monkey bars. He said exactly what I said as he traced A the next few times. And for lowercase “a” we rode around the merry-go-round and then climbed down the ladder.
“Slide down, slide down, climb across the monkey bars”
If you don’t have a laminator and you don’t want to get it laminated you can also just print it and let your little one trace the pages individually with crayons 🙂
/c/ /c/ crawl around the /c/ /c/ curve to see the /c/ /c/ cow
CLICK HERE to purchase this Tracing Book individually from my TeachersPayTeachers Store.
OR Click HERE to become a member – get unlimited access to ALL The Mommy Teacher Printables!
