Toddler Summer School: Things That Go Week

Jacksonville is a very unique city - it's on the coast, but it's also "the River City", and has an extensive downtown area.  For little boys who are always on the move, it provides the perfect backdrop for a "Things That Go" themed week of summer fun!

On the first day of our week, we went on a Jacksonville transportation exploration (say THAT 5 times, really fast!).  We started off by taking the Jacksonville Ferry.  It's only $6/car, so totally affordable, and loads of fun!

 

Next, we drove downtown, and picked up the Skyway - a monorail that is free and part of the city's public transportation.  We were totally a suburban family excited to be on/taking pictures of public transportation, but whatever!  So much fun!

While we were out and about, he also got to push the button for the crosswalk, and check out a map!

 

Riding public transportation in your own city is a wonderful way to have new experiences and make some fun discoveries!  You'll be surprised by all the fun things you'll find!

For example, a fun Willy Wonka-esque candy shop called Sweet Pete's, Hemming park had these wonderful, gigantic foam building blocks, and the main library downtown has the nicest Children's Library I've ever seen!

Which leads me to my first section: books.

We love The Little Blue Truck books!  They are perfect for teaching the sounds vehicles as well as animals make!

I also enjoy Richard Scarry's books, you can find them on target.com.  And, of course no week about transportation is complete without "The Wheels On The Bus".  We also found a sweet book titled Choo Choo by Petr Horacek at our favorite little book shop on the beach, The BookMark.

All that reading makes a little boy hungry!  It must be snack time!

I've seen a few ideas for traffic light snacks, but most of them used M&Ms for the red, yellow and green lights.  I was trying to think of a healthier alternative, and came up with this:

I toasted some oatmeal bread, cut it into a rectangle, spread Nutella on top, and placed a half of a cherry, a slice of banana and had a grape on top.  (Don't forget to cut round fruits in half to avoid choking - note next picture.)

 

Needless to say, it was a HIT!

Now that our bellies are full, we can move on to activities!

I found a great recipe for a kid-friendly and edible play dirt recipe at coolestfamilyontheblock.com.  It calls for 1 large packet of instant pudding mix, one cup of baking soda, 1/4 cup of water and 3 tbsp oil.  It turned out perfectly, and was great for our construction themed sensory box!  (As her blog says, while it's edible, it is not meant to be a snack.  Just not harmful for those, like Aidan who still put everything in their mouths!)

A couple days later, after we'd had our fill of fun, I emptied out the box, saved the dirt for later, poured in some baby shampoo, water, added some bottle brushes and turned it into a car wash sensory box!

This ended up being THE MOST fun Aidan had all week, AND he washed his toys, which was an added bonus!

 

I also made Aidan a traffic light matching game out of felt.

 

I already had felt and car ribbon, and just had to buy the velcro.  All-in-all, a very fun and educational activity!

Staying with them traffic light idea, I gathered up some of Aidan's plates - red, yellow and green, and some red, yellow and green toys.  Then, I let the sorting by color begin!

 

 

Of course, Aidan is blessed beyond measure, and has a plethora of transportation-themed toys too!

 

Aidan has this adorable greentoys.com tug boat, melissaanddoug.com train and Melissa and Doug chinky puzzle!  

On to craft time!!!

I cut some rectangles, squares and circles, and had Aidan glue them  on paper to make a train.  Then, I gave him stickers which spelled out his name, and made it a "name train"!

 

Another day, I put a piece of paper in a ziplock bag, squirted some paint in it, put one of Aidan's trucks inside, with the idea that he would "drive" it around, and make track marks.
This actually majorly stressed him out, because he couldn't get to his truck, haha! But, the end result was pretty cool!

 

Let's close out with media:

We watched one of my all-time favorites, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang! (On Netflix, if you want to watch it.)  That Chitty is the trifecta!  She is a car that can float and fly, so all modes are covered!

Toddler Summer School: Zoo Animal Week

I love the Zoo.  Budapest has a beautiful zoo, that I always loved to visit.  At 150 years old, it's one of the oldest zoos in the world.  The top of the elephant enclosure has famous Zsolnay porcelain tiles.  It's gorgeous!

I like Jacksonville's zoo too!  It was just named one of the top 25 zoos in the country by Tripadvisor.  They have regular $4 zoo days, in the summer if the temperature reaches 92 degrees, tickets are half-off, it has a great layout, a water area, a wonderful train, and great elephants and giraffes!

We took Aidan there the other day, and he loved it!

Aidan had SO MUCH FUN with his binoculars!
(I'm pretty sure it's a universal toddler thing, holding the binoculars the wrong way...)

This kiddo loves turtles!

So, I decided our next adventure would be "Zoo Animal" Week!  I don't know what it is about animals, but children almost always seem drawn to them!  This week looked like it was going to be fun, fun, fun!

Let's take a look at books:
First, we read the story of Noah from Aidan's Tiny Bear's Bible.  It's one of my favorite Bible stories, and this children's Bible does a wonderful job engaging little ears and hearts.

One of our favorites is Good Night Gorilla.  It's about a zoo keeper, who is locking up all the animals for the night, while unbeknownst to him, a gorilla is following him, and letting them all out.  If you just write the title in the pinterest search bar, all kinds of ideas pop up, on how to create interactive fun for kids based on the book.

We also really like Peek-A Who?.  It's a great rhyming book, and they all rhyme with "zoo", which is great practice for kids of any age, but the younger you can start, the better!

And last, but certainly not least, anything that has to do with Eric Carle is going to be a winner!  (Especially since nearly all of his book are about animals)  Aidan's two favorites are Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? (I could retell you the entire book, without a glance, we've read it so much), and Baby Animals.  Both are spectacular, naturally, and Baby Animals has the added bonus of being a lift-flap and play-a-sound book!

Aidan making his "elephant" sound.

 

Secondly, let's take a look at snacks:

I didn't put as much energy into snacks this week, but I did make Aidan a little oasis, using bananas, grapes and animal crackers!  We had a little picnic on the patio!

 

Next, let's take a look at activities!!!

There are so many ideas out there, I didn't even know where to start!
But, as I said in the beginning, Good Night Gorilla has so much potential for fun!
So, I got started, by gathering up Aidan's gorilla pouch, a flash light, some toy keys, and bought a lock and key.

Aidan had a blast playing with the flash light, and his keys.
Then, we practiced some fine motor skills with the lock and key (which I bought at Home Depot).  At first, Aidan was getting frustrated, but that's a good thing!  It means it was stretching him to learn something new!

 

While I was scrolling through pinterest one day, I saw a wonderful idea on www.toddlerapproved.com for a zoo animal lift a flap sensory board, which I then elaborated on.  You'll find detailed instructions here: Zoo Animal Sensory Board DIY.

I also made an animal-print matching game!

I really enjoy sensory activities, and I've come to find that they are some of Aidan's favorites too!
I put this Zoo Animal sensory box for Aidan, and he has played with it every single day this week!
The idea of a sensory box may seem daunting to you, but it's actually very simple.  For this one, I just used dry rice, zoo animal toys, zoo animal bath-time finger puppets, letters to spell out "zoo", and eventually a miniature decorative bird cage.  (I also suggest putting a table cloth underneath, so if there's any spillage, you're not vacuuming rice for days.)

 

The finger puppets ended up being great, as he could use them to pour the rice in and out.  The bird cage may seem weird and out of place, but to be fair, animals in zoos live in cages, and he had a lot of fun seeing how many of them he could fit in, and figuring out the latch.  Also, having letters he could feel, getting to stick his fingers through the middle of the "O" seemed to tickle him!

Aidan has also been blessed with some super-fun animal themed toys!  Here are just a couple.  Zany Zoo by B Toys, and World Ball by Crocodile Creek.

 

Making his "elephant" noise.

 


On to goopy-messy craft time!

Animals can teach little kids all kinds of useful information, but in a fun way.  One of the easiest, is how animals differ.  What sounds they make, what they look like, and what their foot prints look like.  For our first art project this week, I decided to compare the footprints of three animals through paint.  I chose black for a gorilla, gold for a giraffe and green for an alligator.  I laid them out very carefully, and meant to take a picture, but of course in toddler land everything happens at whirlwind speed, so that didn't happen.  But we really had a blast!  (We made a few, for grandparents, and my brother who is at West Point Military Academy- black and gold are their school colors, and the green for army didn't hurt either!)

I let Aidan choose his first color, and he picked black (such a hipster baby!).  I dipped the gorilla's feet in the black paint, said a quiet prayer for the carpet, and let him stamp away!

 

We moved on to green, and "Al the Gator", and ended with gold, and Sophie the Giraffe.

 

It was all about painting this week!  I rolled up bubble wrap to make it look like an alligator.  Rolled it in green paint, and let him roll it around on paper.

 

Since my parents are visiting, I wanted to make something special for both them and Aidan.  I found some really cool map scrapbook paper, painted their hands gray, stamped them, and added some detail.  What do you think?

Wherever in the World YOU are, know that you are LOVED!

And lastly, media:

I've mentioned this app before, but I really do love the Bible for Kids app.  This week we read Noah's Ark and the Creation story.

We also watched Tarzan (go-ri-lla may now be in our vocabulary) and Dumbo.  (Did you know, that Dumbo was made on a very low budget, to make up for the giant flop that was Fantasia??  It ended up being a HUGE hit!) 

Please share your thoughts!  What would you have added to your "Zoo Animal" Week?  Does your child enjoy going to the Zoo?

Join us next week for "Things That Go!"