In this activity, children are invited to learn more about gravity, engineering and architecture in a fun and hands-on way.

I'm not generally one to take pictures of buildings. Sure, I admire certain made-made structures but I've never felt compelled to take multiple pictures of non-historic buildings. Until I went to Dubai, that is. 

When I asked my family living in Dubai, "Why should families visit Dubai?" and one of the answers on the list was, "Architecture (Dubai has a mix of both Arabic and modern contemporary buildings which creates a unique and interesting landscape)," they weren't wrong. Out of the desert pops this quite amazing spectacle. I had never seen buildings like them. They appeared to rise out of the ground, often so tall that they looked like they were on a lean (perhaps some were?). A new shape and design around every corner. Everywhere that we drove I found myself constantly going, "Wow, look at that one!", "Woah! Check that out." and scrambling to take a photo before we drove on. You can see some great views of Dubai from the air in my earlier post.

When I got home, my kids thought the buildings looked fabulous. Going through photos together brought up all sorts of questions and discussions. Opportunities for learning.

How do they make the buildings stay up? Why don't they fall over? How do they get them so high? How did they make it that shape?

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A while ago we were contacted by the makers of the super creative construction kit for kids, Fort Magic. One look at their website and already I could see the huge potential for years of fun and learning so eagerly agreed to write a review and give away a set to one of our International readers. You can see what we had to say about Fort Magic here.

With our last giveaway being so popular, Fort Magic have generously offered another set for us to give away! So, have a little look at how we've been playing and learning with our Fort Magic set over the past 4 months and then enter the giveaway at the bottom to win your very own set!

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Here is a fun construction building invitation to play that I set out to occupy my toddler (currently aged 2.5). The main components for this easy set-up activity are simply playdough and blocks. Making the playdough a grey colour to simulate concrete and providing a couple of little construction tools all added to the scene but aren't necessary to still have a fun and creative activity for kids of all ages. My kids loved this little bricklaying activity.

We used this activity to further language skills, fine motor skills, building skills, knowledge of gravity, understanding of bricklaying, sensory development, imagination, role play and more.

Ages: 12 months+

(See the handy tips at the bottom for ideas to suit your child's needs)

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This is a sponsored post

Fort Magic is an innovative and creative construction kit for kids, and as such, when they contacted me to see if we'd be interested in reviewing one, we absolutely jumped at the chance. One look at the possibilities for fun and learning this kit contained, and I was very eager to see what it was really like and if it could live up to it's potential. At $199 USD, it's the kind of item that you'd want to think was good quality, that your children would gain from and was going to last you for years to come. If you're interested in finding out what we thought and for a chance to win a set, keep reading.

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See below for your chance to win a complete set of Spielgaben

Today's activity is part of an ongoing series, Exploring Reggio. Our co-creators for the series are, The Imagination Tree, An Everyday Story, One Perfect Day, Twodaloo and Racheous- Lovable Learning.

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Age: approx. 6 months to 2+ years (see bottom for tips)

(N was approx 13 months here. See bottom for tips to simplify or extend to meet your child's needs)

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Today I set out an Invitation to Play for my daughter. Using just 2 different materials that most people have at home, Books and Cars, she engaged herself in building and balancing, experimenting and exploring and a whole fantastic imaginative world full of language development.

Ages: 2-6+

(For ideas to simplify or extend this activity, see the Handy Tips at the bottom)

Materials: Books (hard cover are easier) and Cars

To create this Invitation to Play, I put out a pile of children's books, set a couple of them into small tunnels and provided a couple of wooden cars. Entering the room to find them, she was already excited.

She quickly swept away what I'd set out and got to work building and balancing

Creating Ramps at varying heights and angles produced different results

The books became tunnels, ramps, roads, mountains, garages, houses and more. Yep, just books.

The dialogue this activity produced was incredibly beneficial and my favourite outcome

The amount of time she spent on this activity even surprised me. I'll set it out again with extra/different materials next time.

For more fun Building Activities with stuff from around the house click on the Picture

 

Handy Tips:

- Simplify this activity by providing smaller, sturdier books. Board books would be perfect for this. Assist your child in creating simple structures like a garage for the cars or one long tunnel. Set up a few basic book ramps for your child to race their cars down.

- Extend this activity by challenging your child with all different sized, shaped books. Try soft cover books and see if they make a different. Have your child experiment with varying heights and angles for ramps and include a measuring tape for added maths skills. Challenge your child to use every single book in one long continuous tunnel. 

- Mix it up by providing other materials to build with to provide different challenges. Ask your child to look around the house and see what ideas they come up with. 

- Make your child aware of the problem solving they are doing. "How are you going to get that ramp to stay leaning up against that book without it falling over?" "Putting the 2 books back-to-back like that for extra sturdiness was a great sollution/idea. Well done!" etc


- Instead of always giving your child directions as to how they are expected to play, I like to mix it up and create "invitations" to play where children can explore and figure out for themselves what they can do. This type of open-ended activity allows the child to take the activity to a level they are comfortable with while giving them the freedom to explore different angles. Your child may come up with other fabulous games/activities with just these 2 materials.


- Use new language and descriptive words when talking to your child about what they are doing, like, "balancing" and "gravity" This will help with their language development and conceptual understanding.




Happy playing,
Debs :)

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Open Ended explorations for Children are vital in their development and constructive play is a great way to encourage this.

Children love to physically explore and manipulate materials as it helps them to gain a better understanding of their world and gives them the control to move, question and create.

Today M (3.5) and a mini mate, took on the role of 'Builders' and got cracking.

Ages- 2-6+

The Set Up

Creating an "Invitation to Play" is as easy as setting out a few materials to set the intention of the play and then let the kids go for it.

Materials: Empty cardboard boxes of all shapes and sizes. Any play construction toys such as hard hat, hammer, drill, measuring tape etc

I also popped a "broken" stool in for them to hone their fix-it skills

The Play

First it's fixing time

Then time to build. Notice the added containers/boxes that the kids gathered themselves?

Their minds were working hard and were set on their task.

The ever evolving construction site. Builder J is busy drilling the front.

This type of play is fantastic for Collaborative play. 

Working and playing together with their peers leads to skills such as sharing, taking turns, compromising, working together, language development and so on.

Checking to ensure it's been built to specification. 

Note the addition of measuring skills, number recognition and so on.

Handy Tips:

- Simplify this activity by simply providing the basic materials and letting the children loose on it. You could assist younger children with the building process. Talking with them about how to balance the items, which are best for the base, etc.

- Extend this activity by giving your child/ren a "brief" on what's expected. Join the role play fun by being a contractor who is calling in a building team for a particular project. Perhaps you need a building of a particular height, width etc. Add toy telephones to call your workers and explain what's needed. Be sure to add in other materials such as measuring tapes, spirit levellers etc. 

- Talk to your child about what they are doing/building in order to develop their cognitive skills (thinking) and language development. Not to forget the important bonding that takes place between you both.

- Giving children a different scale to work with or a different surface, etc, will affect their behaviour and will involve problem solving processes that they're unaware they're even using. They require concentration and identification. eg. These kids were building on a soft surface which makes their process slightly different to if they were building on a flat, solid surface

- Repeat this activity with different materials, in a different location, with different specifications... etc. Children need to be exposed to experiences more than once and mixing it up will ensure that they are focusing on, gaining or using different skills each time.

- If you don't have "pretend tools" etc... then make some! Let children use their imagination to find something or create something they think could be appropriate for the job.

Looking for more Pretend/Imaginative Play Activities?

Here are some of our favourites

Pretend School

Pretend Washing Up - Water play

Pretend Shop. Learning Numbers

Happy playing,
Debs :)

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Children love to build. It's something to do with the challenge, the skill and probably the knocking down, that makes it such an appealing activity for kids. It's not hard to find things around your house (other than blocks etc) that your children could build with, and today we raided the plastics cupboard to give it a go.

You will need some plastic plates, cups and bowls (or whatever you have on hand really)

I got these from KMart ages ago and at the time they were $3 each set. I think they may be $2 now!

All I did was put them on the floor. Job done, haha. 

Now leave it up to your child to figure out what to do.

It wasn't long before she was building!

That naughty gravity!

The challenge, use ALL of them in one tower

What goes up...

Handy Tips:

- Simplify this activity by just focussing on balancing as many as your child is capable of. Provide a stable surface to begin on.

- Extend this activity by challenging your child to use every plastic item they have in the one tower. See if they can build 2 towers that they can join together somehow. Include a focus on colours and patterns as well.

- Mix it up by providing other plastic items like various shaped and sized containers, funnels, bottles etc to provide different challenges.

- Make your child aware of the problem solving they are doing. "How are you going to get the bowl to balance on the cup?" "I love how you turned the cup upside down to balance it on top of another cup" etc


- Instead of always giving your child directions as to how they are expected to play, I like to mix it up and create "invitations" to play where children can explore and figure out for themselves what they can do. This type of open-ended activity allows the child to take the activity to a level they are comfortable with while giving them the freedom to explore different angles. Your child may come up with other fabulous games/activities with some plastic pieces.


- Use new language and descriptive words when talking to your child about what they are doing, like, "balancing" and "gravity" This will help with their language development and conceptual understanding.

Happy playing,
Debs :)

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In this blog I will be covering many different areas of play including a variety of materials and different ways you can use these same materials to alter or enhance the activity or skills used within it.

Activities range in experience levels and all can be modified to suit young children of varying ages and abilities.

If an activity seems too difficult for your child, take one small element of it and focus on that first. Then, wait a while and repeat the activity. The more exposure to a particular skill, the better and more confident your child will get at it. This could happen quickly or slowly depending on the child.

The great thing with play is there is no wrong or right. Your child is always learning!

Some of the areas i'll be focusing on are:

 Science activities

 Painting

 Drawing

 Sand play

 Manipulation/Building etc

 Playdoh

 Water play

 Pretend play

 Cooking

Rice play

and much more...

Debs :)

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