Monday, October 18, 2010

Teaching Colours

Autumn is a great time to teach your tot colours.  We found the most amazing coloured leaves on the ground at our local park ... red with speckles of yellow - how cool is that!

After we picked up a few unusually coloured leaves to bring home, we stomped around the leafy wooded area, grabbed handfuls of leaves, threw them up into the air and watched them come floating down.

At around 22 months of age I introduced my son to the Melissa and Doug 'Sort and Stack Board' and now at almost 2 he understands which colours go on the matching peg, and he's able to count them on and off fairly well.

The board can be purchased at ToysRUs or online, or if you enjoy making crafts, then you might like to try making the board at home.

Homemade Stack and Sort Board

You'll need:

1x shoebox
5x chopsticks (1 each painted red, blue, yellow, purple and green)
Pieces of coloured felt or foam (cut into shapes eg 5 red hexagons, 5 blue squares, 3 yellow triangles, 2 purple rectangles and 1 green circle), or painted penne pasta or very large coloured beads (large enough not to be a hazard for an older preschooler .... just for teaching colours)

Turn the shoebox upside down (paint or cover with a fun colour if you wish)
Poke the 5 painted chopsticks into the upturned box
Add the coloured felt or foam pieces or beads onto each stick

Stay with your child, when using this tool.  They will love your encouragement ... claps and cheers when they've sorted and/or counted the colours onto the board, and it also helps to stop pieces going missing if you are there to supervise.

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