Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Cupcake Game

I had problems getting a good picture of this game, so I hope I can explain it well enough that you can follow along.  Here goes.   Someone had given me a large plastic cupcake container from the store.  I put a dollop of paint in each hole (one color at a time as we had to rinse our paint brushes in between each color) and the kids painted the bottom of each cupcake circle (don't skimp on the paint or it will flake off).  Next, I used a hot glue gun and glued the plastic cup cake carrier to the base of the container (its black in the picture).  After it was dry I used a permanent marker and to write a number in between the cup cakes.  Then I put in two rubber bouncy balls.  I chose a larger one and a smaller one, but you could use two different colored ones instead, but they must be different.  Lastly, I hot glued the lid on. 
How the game is played:  The youngest child decided which ball he will use and then the older child goes first.  She shakes the game thus moving the balls around.  Each player must then decided which number they want to use (because some of the holes have 4 numbers around it; touching it) and then the second player decides which number he will use.  The person with the highest number wins that round and the game proceeds on.  
My kids really enjoyed this game because of the fun of shaking the container (movement) and the noise it made!  My kids needed help reading the numbers and knowing their options but older kids will figure it out and be able to do it on their own.


Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Time Game


I went on line to find pictures of clock faces and digital time clocks.  I decided to do an assortment of clock faces since not all clocks look the same in the real world.  One of them (8:00) was blank and I drew hands for the time I wanted.  Since Lillian is new to telling time I followed a few guild lines: All the clocks have numbers for every hour, there are no extra marks for the other minutes, and all the times I chose are on the hour.  Later, when she's mastered this skill, I will do some time to the half hour.  Cole enjoyed helping us play the matching game.  He would choose the clock face and Lillian would find the digital time that matched it.