Ant Masquerade

Using our creativity, we transformed ourselves into ants on Friday.  Colouring, cutting and a bit of string led to our ant masks which had us masquerading as ants at Susan's.  We weren't quite sure what sounds ants make so if you have any ideas we'd love to hear them. :)

A is for . . . Ants!!

What do you get when you mix paint, paper, colouring tools, glue, fingers and the letter A?  Why a fun-filled craft, that's what!  To create ants along our letter A we used our fingers to paint the bodies of these little creatures.  Its always a blast being able to get the colouring tool on our hands on purpose.  The children have a blast learning their letters as they work and experimenting with different mediums.

Motoring Along Finely

Ever picked up a bead?  Strung it on a string?  Managed to fit small pieces of blocks into one another?  Well these are tasks the children do at Susan's as there are many opportunities for them to work on their fine motors skills.  Practice, practice, practice on skills even during play.

Puzzle Fun

On of our young "clients" showed some amazing critical thinking powers, hard work and determination as she skillfully assembled this many piece puzzle.  Way to go!! :)

Take a Look in a Book

Reading continues to be a favourite past time at Susan's.  The children hunker down with a few books and enter into worlds of dinosaurs, princesses, talking animals and endless realms of imagination.

Sand, Water, Fun

The children LOVE playing outdoors at Susan's!!  There is so much to do!!  Whether it's playing with water, having a water fight, feeling the sand under our fingers, building dams/houses/castles, using our imagination in the kitchen and playhouse, inventing our own games, riding bikes on the board walk, singing or doing whatever, we always have a smile on our faces as we thoroughly enjoy our outdoor play time.

Marching Ants

The ants go marching one by one....Aw, a popular "classic" for children and adults alike.  Our ant week continues and today's craft had us creating ants that were walking, marching, crawling or moving however we chose in the grass.  The children are doing such a good job at their cutting and tracing skills and we're always very proud of the work they do.

Ants, Ants, Ants

Our theme at Susan's this week: Ants!!  During the warm months in Saskatchewan these little critters can be found outdoors in many places.  The children love to watch them and study their behaviour.  While doing hands-on activities and crafts, the children learn many cool things about ants such as:

*they can carry up to 20x their body weight
*they have two stomachs: one is for themselves and the other is to share with others
*ants have six legs
*ants are excellent team workers
*ants can be many different colours (ex. red, black, and yellow)
*and, according to the children, the red ants are BAD!

Flower Power

The sun has been shining and the flowers around us are in full bloom!  The vibrancy of the colours and wonderful smells stimulate our senses and brighten the world around us.  This week has been "Flower Power" week and the children at Susan's have been busy making a variety of flowers using different mediums and styles.  We absolutely LOVE getting hands-on and artistic in the crafts and activities that we do.

Today we used our natural painting tools - our fingers!! - to have some fun with finger painting flowers.  We also used cotton swabs to paint our bees (who also love flowers very much).  The children love being able to explore moving paint with different tools.

Opposites Week

Well, we're back from holidays.  Sorry for the delay in blog posts as the resident blogger has been busy moving and getting ready for back to work.  But we're now ready to get things rolling again!!

Our first week back and we delved into the world of opposites.  The first opposite we explored was sour and sweet.  This was a taste-testing day as the children used their sense of taste to decipher the difference between sour tasting items and sweet ones.  They found it very easy to tell the difference between the two.