Thursday, January 31, 2013

Busy Bag: Building Shapes

As a math teacher, this bag just warms my heart.  Theo likes watching the Sesame Street shapes video (and I love hearing James Blunt sing "Triangle") and had developed a real interests for shapes.  Every time we went for a walk last summer he'd point out the octagons and circles.  So that was the perfect time to introduce this bag.



 Materials:  Popsicle sticks, peel-and-stick Velcro pieces

Assembly:  Simply attach Velcro to the ends of sticks.  For shapes with an odd number of sides (triangles, pentagons) you need to put one Velcro piece on the first side of the stick, turn it over, and put the second piece of Velcro on the back of some sticks.  Many of the craftier-than-I mothers online color code the sticks or at least use circle stickers on the end of each stick.  I was very proud of myself for doing some nice color coding, and Theodore almost immediately took off all the stickers.  It was a little frustrating. 

Activity:  connecting the pieces to make lots of shapes.  He could make equilateral triangles,  squares and rhombi, and various regular and irregular polygons. 

2 2/3 years old


2 comments:

Ashley said...

I like to belt out, "My triangle...my triangle..."

But really, I'd like your ideas that would have worked with a Theo a year ago :) Liam does like the pom poms now...I have him put them in an old wipes container.

Shannon E said...

I know, I wish I had started these bags sooner. I've pinned some future ideas for Eli already. I think he would actually probably like these though-the Velcro is fun to attach and pull apart. You might check my post called: Easy Activities to Keep a Two Year Old Busy.