My son’s all time favorite activity we’ve ever done was our  Angry Birds Water Balloon Game.  With warm weather and a half day of school yesterday was the perfect day to get drenched in the front yard and do a little Learning After School.  We did this with math but it would be as simple to make letters , shapes or sight words as targets. Here is what we did .

1. Gather your materials. You will need some water balloons, a sharpie, some number targets , page protectors, bean bags,  and hula hoops. You will also want a laundry type basket to carry the filled balloons.
2. Start by making the targets. I chose the numbers 7, 9 ,10 ,and 15. All the equations will equal one of these numbers.  I used picmonkey.com to make simple ones. Printed them out and slid them into page protectors.
3. Fill your balloons . Carefully write equations that equal the numbers on the targets such as 3+4 or 15-5 .  For younger children you could simply have them match numbers.
4. Set up your targets. I added bean bags inside the page protectors to weight them down.
5. Get ready.
6. Go! Read the equations, find the answer on one of the targets and throw!
7. They loved this. My son would read his sister’s equations and tell her where to throw it. I was seriously amazed at how accurate he was. I should have remembered that later when we filled up more to throw at each other. It was kids against Mom and the kids won.
8. After the game – play more! We ended up using all the extra balloons and running through the sprinkler before retreating to the house.

Learning After School is our series of simple learning activities for families to do together after school. They are meant to be bite size and engaging . They aren’t meant to replace homework just add a little more learning without making your child feel like they are.

The post Water Balloon Game { Learning After School} appeared first on No Time For Flash Cards.

This is not something I thought up at all. This idea has been around for ages but when my husband had to run to Home Depot for something else I asked him to grab us some nuts and bolts. If you are a regular reader you may know that I am forever trying to get my son to work on his fine motor skills. The way I approach this is to mix them with a task he really likes and excels at. For him that is anything language related like reading or spelling. There are way fancier tutorials out there but I am a busy mom so I needed to make this activity quickly . It’s bare bones but it works.

1. Gather your materials. You will need bolts, nuts and a sharpie. A fine tip one would be best but mine was dried out and I’d already told my son we were doing a project so I used my huge one. Also my nuts and bolts are matte not glossy which makes the sharpie stay on better. Please test yours out to make sure it adheres before playing.
2. Write out simple CVC ( consonant vowel consonant) words on the end of the bolt. We did cat, rug, tub, top, jar and bug. This could easily be adapted for younger children by writing uppercase letters on the bolt and matching lowercase ones on the bolts.
3. Write the letters on the bolt. You can chose to only use a handful of bolts and make your child take them off one bolt to use on another word or make multiple copies of the same letter on different nuts. I decided only one copy of each letter because I was trying my hardest to get my son to work his fingers putting the nuts on and off.
4. Invite your word builder and go for it. The first thing he was to me was ‘ How about we do this together. I will do the spelling, find the letters and you can screw them on. ” Nice try buddy. No. He figured out that it matters which way the bolts go on. Here his U was upside down and bug looked like bng.
5. Soon he had the hang of it and I felt good knowing he was working on his fine motor skills. He told me the words were too easy so I am going to get longer bolts and give him a bigger challenge soon.

After he was done his sister decided she wanted to try. This was really tricky ( near impossible) for her which means you will see some preschool fine motor posts in the near future! If you want to see more check this round up of fine motor activities out.

The post Spelling With Nuts & Bolts appeared first on No Time For Flash Cards.

Most Saturday nights I sit and I scroll through last week’s Link & Learn to see what y’all linked up. All I can say is WOW! When I started this linky I did it because I wanted to share great blogs with others , especially new blogs. I never expected to be bombarded with so many great kids crafts, book related activities, science experiments for kids… seriously it all just plain rocks. Thank you so much for taking the time out of your Sunday to share!

If you have never linked up there is no reason not to. Share a post that you wrote about anything you think our readers will find helpful in their quest to have fun with their kids.

The post Kids Crafts & Activities {Link Up !} appeared first on No Time For Flash Cards.

We have been living outside lately and unless it starts really raining I am not sure the playroom will getting many visitors. Here are some of our old favorite toddler activities that my 2 year old and I have been re-visiting over the last few weeks. I hope you find something on this list to turn into an old favorite !

Color & Clean Car Wash
Sound Safari For Toddlers
Fly Swatter Painting
Sidewalk Chalk Games
Play In The Dirt
Painting With Nature
Gardening For Letters
Painting With Water
Backyard Car Wash
Color Hunt On The Go

The post 10 Outdoor Activities For Toddlers appeared first on No Time For Flash Cards.

Playful Learning’s Put-Ups and Put-Downs is so much more than a product it’s an eCourse that will change your family for the better. When I was asked to write a sponsored review I jumped at the chance. The course is all about teaching your kids respect, the power of their words and why kindness matters.  We may spend all day telling our kids to be nice but we often fail to explain why nice is important and what happens when we aren’t. This course simplifies that for us while modeling the right choices for our kids.

Let me tell you about my experience with this course and not just why I liked it but how my son ( the real judge) did.

The first thing that you will notice about this course is that there are two sections one for parents and one for kids. You don’t have to be a teacher to help your child navigate this course , everything you need is there. The videos are engaging and the suggested books for further reading are spot on. After checking out the parent section I was pumped to dive in with my six year old son. I waited until before bedtime , we closed the door so the sounds of his sister in the bath wouldn’t distract him.  He was captivated. The fun and dynamic videos of children talking about feelings, and the power of their words grabbed him from the get go.  We paused the video countless times to give my son a chance to share his thoughts on what was being discussed . The extension activity went over great but the biggest hit was the little quiz . My son is a results kind of guy and for him doing the quiz was very important. For me it helped show how much he really absorbed.

Not only did Put-Ups and Put-Downs give us talking points it gave us a common language for specific actions and reactions. He begged to show his dad and re-take the quiz the next night.  He also couldn’t wait to print out cards to write Put-Ups on . This is my favorite one.

We took the Put-Ups and Put-Downs eCourse last month and since then I can tell you that our house has been a friendlier place. Even the most loving family has times when they aren’t as careful with their words as they should be and feelings get hurt. Practicing to be more respectful makes more sense when you understand what happens when you aren’t , this course helped teach my son that valuable lesson. I am excited to share this because it’s useful and important.

Now it’s your chance to check out Put-Ups and Put Downs .Check it out  here.

Enter for a chance to win!

One reader will get a free registration for Put-Ups and Put-Downs, a gift certificate so they can gift the course to a friend ,and Mariah Bruehl’s book Playful Learning: Develop Your Child’s Sense of Joy and Wonder .

Enter Here

Fine Print

This sweepstakes is open to American residents 18 years or older. To be eligible for the sweepstakes you must enter your name and email address in the Google document on this page.  1 winning entry will be drawn at random, using Random.org, after the sweepstakes closes on Wednesday May 22n at 8:00pm PST. The winner will receive one spot in the Put -Ups and Put Downs eCourse, a gift certificate for a friend and a copy of Playful Learning: Develop Your Child’s Sense of Joy and Wonder . After the winner is notified he or she has 48 hours to respond with their mailing address for shipping their prize package,or another winner will be chosen at random. No purchase necessary.The number of eligible entries received determines the odds of winning. Any information gathered through the sweepstakes including email and postal addresses will not be used in anyway other than contacting winners and shipment of winnings.   VOID WHERE PROHIBITED BY LAW.

The post Put-Ups & Put Downs {eCourse Review & Giveaway} appeared first on No Time For Flash Cards.