Dinosaur eggs

Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs! 

 

One of my current charges favourite things at the moment is Dinosaurs! If you need to know anything about dinosaurs such as Who eats meat?,  Who eats plants?,  How did dinosaurs die?, Which dinosaur is the biggest? Etc etc then J is the little man to ask ( warning he will become a friend for life if you ask too many questions though!) 

There's only so much dinosaurs stomping roaring and hatching from an egg I can take, So I needed to find something which would not only keep J interested but was also going to let his twins sister M and I move away and do something different. 

M and J have started school this year so time for arts and crafts and other such activities has become limited, that's when I decided we would do something which could be done in stages. 

Paper mâché is one of my pet hates - I can't stand the stuff it's boring, sticky and takes forever! 

But every child has to experience it at some point in their lives, so now was the time to use it to create Dinosaur eggs. 

As it was the first time for J and M, I kept it small and went with the flow. I started by blowing up 3 small balloons, and cutting up large pieces of kitchen paper and set to work glueing the paper onto the balloon, I told them both they have to cover it until you couldn't see any of the colour from the balloons - this took about 3 layers and LOTS of glue. 

I would recommend a few more layers to make them stronger but attention span was fading (me just as much as the children) 

We then hung them up to dry over the weekend, I explained we needed to let the eggs "grow" and get stronger before they become real dinosaur eggs. (Just to add to the imagination they don't really grow but do become stronger as they dry) 

By the time I had returned on Monday they had dried and were harder, so we set about decorating the "eggs" with a bit of colour, I let J and M chose their own colours and we all painted them differently, once all painted again we hung them to dry overnight. 

Once the paint had dried it was time to find out if all our hard work was about to pay off or become a complete waste of time. 

I carefully popped the balloon and watched in anticipating as the "egg" held its shape! 

We have since been using our dinosaur eggs to add to the dinosaur world/islands and dinosaur figures for small world imaginative play. Because we all decided on different colours J says that this is because there are different dinosaurs inside each - Diplodocus, Triceritops, and T-Rex to name a few. 

Painting with plastic eggs.

I've seen this activity a lot on Pinterest and pinned it as to remind me since before Easter and finally I've remembered to do it now in May! 

I filled the plastic eggs with a little squirt of poster paint and closed them back up again, I then set the painting activity up with the eggs for my 3year olds. At first they both looked at me like I had gone completely mad but then explained the things which they could do with the eggs to create their marks. 

They were both more convinced and started to tap the eggs on the paper to make them "crack", once they had done this with all they eggs I was then asked "what do we do now?" I explained they could do what they wanted with it, one of them decided to close it and roll the egg around in the paint whilst the other child kept it open and used both halves to print circle patterns. 

Unfortunately the children I chose to do this activity with we're not as interest as I thought they would be but we still discovered that we could create lots of marks in different ways using the same tools. 

This just shows that not all children are willing to join in with all activities but can still learn something by talking about it and watching others as well. 

Painting with large lolly sticks

I used large lolly sticks for this painting activity with my 2 year olds which created some great marks and colourful patterns too.

Painting with pipe cleaners

Here is another alternative to painting with something other than a paint brush.

Painting with......Pipe cleaners!

All you'll need is some paint and some pipe cleaners.

Shape printing

I wanted to introduce printing to young toddlers (under 2's) but wanted tools which were strong and hard wearing, whilst still leaving a good Print! I rummaged around the toy boxes and found 4 objects which I felt were perfect for what I wanted. ("shape sorter" shape, Duplo tunnel piece, mega block and a cotton reel) 

I put a small blob of paint into each bowl and arranged a different object in each bowl, 

I then just let the children explore the objects in their own time and watched there creations 

all the children enjoyed this opportunity to get creative with printing and could all use the objects without any support. 

Finger Painting

Finger Painting is a great way to introduce even the youngest of
 children to world of art 

use either shop brought finger paints, poster paints 
or 
make your own with this easy recipe 

2 cups of corn flour 
4 1/2 cups of Boiling water
2 cups of Cold water 
food colourings 

1. Mix the cornflour and COLD water together, 
2. Pour in the BOILING water until it forms a "gloopy" consistency, 
3. Separate into individual pots and then add the colouring 

Bubble Painting

A Fun and different way of creating patterns on paper 

You will need: 

Poster paints in a variety of colours

washing up liquid

water 

straws 

cups/pots 

1. Put a small amount of Paint into a cup with a little squirt of washing up liquid

2. add enough water to make the paint running 

3. cut small holes in the straws (to prevent sucking up the paint) 

4. using the straws to blow the paint to create lots of bubbles 

5. Place the paper onto off the bubbles to leave coloured bubble prints 

alternatively you could put the cup on top of the paper and allow

the bubbles to print as they over flow the cups. 

Flavoured edible paint

Worried about little ones eating the paint during a craft activity ?
Then try this Homemade Flavoured Edible Paint
-mix together 2cups of cornflour with 1 cup of cold water
-pour in 4.5cups of boiled water and mix together,
-pour into individual pots before colouring
-Add a few drops of individual food colourings to the separate pots along with a few drops of food flavorings or essences mix together and allow to cool.
We used yellow colour and lemon flavorings, green colour and peppermint and red colour with strawberry flavorings.
Smells delightful! 

Blow Painting Monsters

What you will need 

*Thick paper or card 

*Poster Paints in two colours 

*Googly eyes 

*a little water 

*Drinking/craft straws 

How to do Blow painting 

*Choose two different colours of poster paint and add a little water to make it runny, 

*Pour a small blob of one coloured paint onto the paper with another next to it, 

*Now with a straw blow very hard, this will make the paint move around the paper.

*Once a shape has formed for your monster add some googly eyes (as many as you wish) 

You could also add other features or use more than two coloured to make different monster creations  

Water Painting on chalk boards

Chalk boards can be great but with younger children they allows seem to eat the chalks!! 

So why not let them be creative with water and a paintbrush instead 

Hand Prints -- Elephants

All you need is... 

*Grey Paint

*1 Googly Eye

*and a hand!  

Large Scale Painting

Who says painting have to be done on A4 size paper? 

How to entertain 5 children under 5 on a wet and windy day?! 

By painting on a large scale and a wide variety of painting tools and materials, That's how! 

I used a roll of paper taped to the table long enough so all the children could have their own 

section, then arranged a variety of different coloured paints in dishes. The children used 

Stamps and tactile sponges (pictured below), cotton reels, plastic blocks,

glue spreaders, and feathers to paint a variety of patterns, I also provided each child with a small pot of sequins and confetti shapes to add to their giant masterpiece too. 

Once finished the paper can be kept and used as wrapping paper for those special gifts. 

   

Patterned stamps and tactile sponges