First, there’s the Botany Cabinet with its wonderful leaf shapes. You can ask children to bring in leaves and then compare them with the shapes and name the trees and bushes that they come from. And don’t forget that the large leaf, tree and flower puzzle are included in the cabinet.

Moving on to craft ideas, last week Shelley suggested letting older children use glass paint to decorate glasses. You could use washed jam jars and cover them with flowers – bluebells, buttercups and daisies are all easy subjects to paint. But you could also get the children to use their imagination to create new specimens! They can then give the jars as gifts – posy bowls or even night-light holders – or tie string around the rim and make a handle and hang them in the window so that their flowers catch the light.

For younger children you could pick flowers and help them to press them. Then use these with self-adhesive film to make bookmarks. For each child, just cut a piece of coloured card approximately 22cm by 5cm and a piece of film 22cm by 11cm. They can stick the flowers down one half of the piece of film in the pattern they prefer, press the strip of card down on top of them and then take the backing paper off the rest of the film and carefully fold it over the card so that the flowers and card are sealed in plastic to make a durable book mark.

Again for older children – or with a bit more help from you – they could cover the front of a scrap book or creative book with pressed flowers and then protect it with clear film.

Finally, nothing beats getting out in the fresh air; so if you want some ideas for gardening with your children go to the BBC website for some great projects for 4 to 7-year-olds – both indoors and out.

napkins

cups

bunting

flag-bunting

paper bowls and plates

hand flags

copy colour packs

More Jubilee Craft Ideas

This crafty little project to make your own Union Flags is a great way to start. But, if you fancy getting the children to have a go at something a little more creative, why not let them make their own Diamond Jubilee Souvenir plates.

What you’ll need:

paper plates

glue

decoration such as:

paint

people paint

metallic paint

glitter paint

Plastix crayon pack

pearl paint

Giotto Turbo Maxi felt tips

Giotto Maxi Metal pens

Metallic wax crayons

glitter

iridescent glitter flakes

acrylic jewels

buttons

poms

coloured feathers

shapes

glitter stars

glitter dots

foam hearts and flowers

sequins

silver doilies

natural feathers

red white and blue display paper

Blu tack

What to do:

This really is very simply. Just give each child a paper plate and let them decorate it in whatever way they like. Some ideas to get them started:

use silver doilies as the background on the plate to give a suitable regal feel, then draw a crown, decorate with metallic pens, crayons, glitter, iridescent flakes or acrylic jewels

create a picture of the queen’s head, like on a stamp, using people paint and natural feathers for hair

create a Union Flag using red, white and blue paint or, for a more regal feel, use metallic paints

Then, when the plates are done, finish off the display by mounting them on a red, white and blue poster paper background.

Older children could make souvenir glasses using cheap glasses picked up from second hand shops painted with Glascol glass paints, which are on sale at the moment with 25% off!

Geography Lesson

Why not use some of our fantastic Montessori items to teach the children about the countries competing in the London 2012 Olympics? We have a superb selection of country flags, including Asia, Europe, North and South America and Africa that could be used alongside one of our sand globes or our world puzzle map.

Make Your Own

If you fancy letting the children’s creative juices flow, you could create a huge map of the world for the classroom wall. Once you’ve done this, the children can create and add flags to it – this could be a project that lasts several weeks as there are plenty of flags to choose from – over 190 in total! You can find the flags for every country on Flagpedia.

To create this project you would need:

sky blue poster roll

Blu tack

rainbow paper A4, A3 and A2 size

glue

black marker pen

printable world map

light-weight white card A4

watercolour class pack

What to do:

Depending on the age of the children, you can either get them to do this part or do it yourself so that the world map is ready for the children to add their flags to:

use the sky blue poster paper for the background and fix to the wall using blu tack or double sided tape

use the printable map as a template and cut out the country shapes in different coloured paper, name the countries using black marker pen and attach them with glue

cut the A4 card in half to make A5 and give a piece to each child

now ask the children to choose a flag to reproduce using water colour classpack pens

once the flags are finished, each one can be added to the map using Blu tack

Have fun!

Keeping Teeth Healthy

This may seem obvious but the health of a child’s teeth is largely determined by what they eat. That not only means what their teeth are exposed to on a daily basis from eating food, but how much nutrition they receive from their diet to build strong teeth in the first place. Clearly, calcium is important in building strong teeth so kids need to eat plenty of calcium rich foods. And this does not mean only dairy! Thankfully, there are loads of other calcium rich foods to choose from.

So, What are the Alternatives?

Some of the best food groups to eat are dark, leafy green vegetables such as broccoli, kale and cabbage. You could also introduce calcium rich seeds and nuts, such as sesame, sunflower, almonds and hazelnuts into breakfast cereals. There are also a number of milk alternatives such as hemp, rice, almond and soy as well as soy yoghurts, tofu and tempeh. And, if you really want to be adventurous, the Holy Grail of calcium-rich foods is seaweed.

Fun Learning About Teeth

For an art project why not get the kids to make themselves a really big smile? It’s simple and fun and we have everything else you’ll need to make some super smiles.

What you’ll need:

large lolly sticks

glue

people paper

heavy-weight card

coloured

skin tone crayons

Ferby colouring pencils

decoration such as :

glitter

acrylic jewels

glitter dots

multi-coloured pipe cleaners

tinsel pipe-cleaners

scissors

examples of smiles:

http://www.youworkforthem.com/img/eps/E2057/E2057_02.jpg

http://image.shutterstock.com/display_pic_with_logo/525955/525955,1270797714,30/stock-vector-cartoon-vector-gray-scale-illustration-mouth-50524072.jpg

http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=smiling+cartoon+mouths&view=detail&id=104C7765614F9E7902024D8B99C93D6C5D50BDC8&first=61&FORM=IDFRIR

What to do

start by giving each child the choice of card or foam to make their smiles

now, with a marker or pencil, get the children to trace out the shape of the smile they want and, once done, cut it out

now they can decorate their smiles with people coloured paper or crayons for a realistic look or they can go wild and use brightly coloured glitter and jewels to make fun smiles

once decorated and dry simply get the children to glue the smile to a lolly stick

now they can wow each other with their great smiles

It’d be great fun to take a photo of the class all holding up their smiles. And, not only can this be put in their scrap books, but you could send it along to the National Smile Week gallery.

If you need further information about this event The University of Manchester Website has some great learning resources to work from and the National Smile Month website has plenty of activities for your children to take part in.

Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

Plus, the mere thought of a manxom monster whiffling and burbling through a tulgey wood is wonderful!

So as well as your children thinking of rhymes, also encourage them to play with words. Get them to invent words – combining well-known words to make something exotic and different. You could make some suggestions. What do you get if you combine an elephant with a hippopotamus? Or a pterodactyl with a diplodocus? Then use the moveable alphabet or the sand tray and let them spell out their words. But remember – their word, their spelling.

Then I started searching for suitable monsters on the internet that children could use as inspiration if they wanted to create a Carroll-like poem of their own. And that’s when the National Geographic site for kids popped up and I went off at a tangent! If you’ve not seen this site before, it’s well worth a visit – it certainly distracted me for ages.

It provides games, videos, information on animals, countries and science. In fact, lots of information that you can take and then use as the basis for your own work with the children. In addition it’s got a ‘fun’ section which contains a list of ‘crafty’ ideas for things to make. There is a wide variety – from presents for Father’s Day, through adapting old shoes as decorative flower pots to making a costume for dressing-up as a lion. And most of them can be made using things you can obtain easily here at Artful Dodgers. So, when you’ve got a minute (or an hour) to spare, check it out. And I warn you – some of the games are not as easy as they look. Who said putting a snowflake back together after it had been turned into a jigsaw was childsplay?

Anyway, back to IMD. This year’s theme is Museums in a Changing World and aims to explore how museums can compete with other avenues of finding information, such as websites and social networking. But, as this theme may be a bit of a stretch for the young minds in your care, why not look at museums in general?

Who’s Been to a Museum?

You could start with a small class presentation project. Ask if anyone has been to a museum, where it was and what they saw. They could prepare a short talk on it and, bring in any information, photos or souvenirs they have to show to the class.

What Can You Find in a Museum?

Another task might be to ask the children what they think they can see in a museum. I’m sure they’ll be able to come up with the usual suspects and, as a hint, you could ask if anyone has seen the film ‘Night at the Museum’ if they get stuck. You can use the answers as the basis for a number of different art projects. But in case you are struggling, here are some ideas to get you started:

we have some great papyrus paper with a hieroglyphics information sheet so the children can make Egyptian inspired paintings, like these

they’ll also need:

paint or crayons – our Lyra Colour Giants have 25% off!

black A2 paper

gold, silver and black markers

glue

gold display paper

Blu-tack

What to do:

create the picture on papyrus using paint, crayons and markers

once dry, mount the pictures onto a black A2 paper

now fix to a gold display paper background with Blu-tack . Once the display is finished with the children can stick their creations into their scrap books

We also have everything you’ll need to have some dinosaur papier mache fun. Below are two projects, one really that’s really easy – a dino bone – for the younger class members and another more difficult one – dinosaur hats – for the older ones. And, our cellulose adhesive paste powder is currently on offer – what could be better?

Dinosaur Bones

To make the dinosaur bone you’ll need:

cellulose adhesive paste powder

clear adhesive tape

newspaper or scrap paper

water

large cardboard tubes

large bowls

people paint

We suggest that you protect against rogue paint and papier mache as this can get really messy! We’d advise using teddy splash mats for the floor, smocks for the kids and cover-all’s plastic covers for the tables.

What to do

screw up newspaper or scrap paper and push it into the ends of the cardboard tube and mould it into a bone shape

fix in place using clear adhesive tape

mix up the cellulose adhesive paste powder and leave to thicken

get the children to tear newspaper or scrap paper into strips

now, they can dip the strips into the glue and stick it on the bone shape

leave to dry

once dry, paint and it’s done

Dinosaur Hats

Now on to the more complicated papier mache dinosaur hats. This is a week long project as the hats will need at least a day to dry in between stages.

You’ll need all the materials listed for the dino bone, but instead of the bone coloured paint, get bright paints

You’ll also need:

balloons

black markers

decoration, such as

paper eggs cut in half

paper balls assorted cut in half

pom poms

spotted feathers

wiggly eyes

glitter

acrylic jewels

scissors

craft scissors such as wave, pinking or zig-zag

foam sheets

glue

string

What to do:

so to start, make up the cellulose adhesive paste powder and leave to thicken

cut each child a one inch section of cardboard tube, this will act as the base to sit the balloon on as the hat is being made

next, get each child to blow up a balloon and secure it to the base using a little self adhesive tape – the balloon should be longways to represent the long face of the dinosaur

find the half way point on the balloon and mark it with a get each child to mark it with a black marker

now the children can start the newspaper or scrap paper into strips, dip them into the glue and place them on the balloon, taking care not to pass the half way line. Theahtt will need at least three layers of papier mache and each layer will need to dry out thoroughly before starting the next one.

now pop the balloon

make two holes in each side of the balloon and thread through a length of string to make chin straps

now it’s time to decorate. Here are some ideas for different dinosaur head shapes:

Styracosaurus

Triceratops

Dilophosaurus

Lambeosaurus

or just let the children use their imaginations and add whatever decoration they like

done!

Origami for the Older Ones

If there are older children in the class they might want to have a go at this origami dinosaur. It’s not that easy, but this video does have clear instructions to follow. Or for an Egyptian theme, there’s this pyramid.

We have some great papers to use for these projects:

origami paper

natures textures

safari print

Learning With Songs

Songs are a great way to learn, so why not have a good old sing-a-long in honour of Eurovision? There are loads of songs for kids to enjoy, from traditional ones to educational ones to just silly ones. To help them learn the song, it might be a good idea to get the children to copy out the words first. This helps with memorising the song, gives them writing practice and they can look up any words they don’t know so they’re also learning new vocabulary.

What you’ll need:

The list of what you’ll need is pretty much the same as you needed for last week’s NaPoWriMo project. But, to save you having to go hunting for it, I’ve listed it again for you below:

A4 paper or card – pastel, intensive, white or our seasonal spring pack of card and paper will do the job perfectly

display paper

felt pens or crayons such as Berol Colourbroad gold or silver markers or Ferby colouring pencils

glue or Blu–tack

decoration:

glitter

acrylic jewels

coloured feathers

sand

iridescent glitter flakes

foam shapes

glitter dots

glitter stars

foam hands and feet

wax crayons

ready mix paint

What to Do:

get the children to write out their favourite songs on a sheet of A4 paper or card. Or, use the printout sheets below as templates to copy from

meanwhile, attach some display paper to the wall ready for the finished A4 sheets

when they’ve completed copying the words, it’s time for the fun bit – decorating!

once dry, fix the A4 sheets to the display wall using Blu-Tack

The Songs

There’s a variety of songs here, some to help with learning specific tasks, such as counting, others to learn new things, like body parts or another language, some that get the children up and moving and others are just for fun!

Don’t forget the fun dancing sequences that go with these:

A Ring O’ Roses, Oh Those Bones, The Wheels On The Bus.

If You’re Happy And You Know It

I’m A Little Teapot

Here We Go Round The Mulberry Bush

Sing these in a round:

Do Re Mi

Row, Row, Row Your Boat

Introduce some French with:

Frere Jacques

Alouette

Some counting songs:

Ten in The Bed

This Old Man

One Two

And Simply silly songs

There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed A Fly

Pop Goes The Weasel

There’s A Hole In The Bucket

Waltzing Matilda

When you’ve finished with the display, take the songs down and get the children to fix them into their scrap books.

Diamond Jubilee Goodies

We are very happy to announce that we have lots of Union Jack goodies in stock, just waiting to make a special appearance at your fabulous Diamond Jubilee street parties. We’d advise you stock up early as we are sure they are going to sell out fast! We’ve got:

napkins

cups

plates

bowls

flags

bunting

tri-bunting

Get them quick!

A Poetry Day

Why not get your children to think of poems they love, nursery rhymes are a good place to start. You can then have a reading session with the children reading out their favourites. Or, get them to copy out the original text onto a piece of A4 card that they then decorate with appropriate illustrations for display on the classroom wall. You would need:

A4 card – either pastel, bright or white,

display paper

broad-tipped markers, such as Berol Colourbroad, gold or silver markers, Berol water-based coloured markers or Berol water-based black markers

decoration, the usual suspects, such as:

glitter

acrylic jewels

coloured feathers

sand

iridescent glitter flakes

foam shapes

glitter dots

glitter stars

foam hands and feet

wax crayons

ready mix paint

glue

Blu-tack

If you attach these to the display paper with Blu-tack, you can detach them easily and they can stick them into their scrap books

Rhyming Games

A simple game to teach the rhyming sounds is to write matching pairs of words on cards that are then shuffled. The children think about which words sound the same by repeating them out loud. This can be done as pair work or as a class activity. To help, you could colour match the card.

You’ll need:

A4 card

Berol water-based black markers

letter to trace around

Or, give the class one word, such as ‘cat’ and ask them to write down or shout out all the other words that rhyme with it. Another way to do this is to start with the ending of the word, such as ‘at’ and then work your way through the alphabet to see if adding a letter to the start of ‘at’ makes a new word. If they miss any you can prompt them and it’s a great way to introduce new words to increase their vocabulary too.

For the older children it’d be fun to get them to fill in the endings of short poems. Here are some to get you going:

My brother is annoying

He really is a pain

And if I had my way

I’d ………………………………………

Example answer – flush him down the drain

I love my doggy dearly

He’s so much doggy fun

But, when he digs the garden

He ……………………………….

Example answer – gets told off by my Mum

The woods are great for hiding

I’m always climbing trees

But when my Mum comes calling

I …………………………………

Example answer – know it’s time for tea.

If you’ve not already visited the official site, I’d recommend it. You can download a brochure and a poster; there’s a game for the classroom; FAQs about the topic which you can use when discussing it with the children and an animation of the water cycle.

But you can also get the children involved making these things themselves. Get them to make their own World Water Day posters using:

Intensive Card to provide a colourful background

Ready Mix Paint for trees, grass, crops and flowers

Cotton Wool for clouds

Sand for desert areas and Glue to stick the cotton wool and sand.

You could also put together your own water cycle model using the same ‘ingredients’. Or, you could make life easy and use our felt water cycle. The different parts and flow arrows can be removed and re-attached using Velcro and there are a series of laminated labels to name them.

Moving on, you could use the globe to discuss where conditions are particularly arid, or where vegetation is particularly lush – and why this is the case. Look at how people manage to survive with very little water and how they have adapted.

Then, nearer home, use the Puzzle Map of the UK to discuss why some parts are dryer than others and how everyone can save water. A good site for ideas is www.wateruseitwisely.com/kids/ and on a more general theme http://kidsforsavingearth.org/index.html

Above all, get the kids thinking and making suggestions for how they can make their own contribution, not just on one day – but all year round.

Sakura Classroom Decorations

This is a fun, and messy, way to create pictures of cherry blossom to adorn the classroom in honour of Buddha’s birthday. Don’t forget to explain what cherry blossom flowers represent.

You’ll need:

white A4 card

red and green marbling ink

pink, cerise and white tissue paper or our assorted warm colours tissue paper pack and blue and brown tissue paper

water pots

glue

glue stick

straws

What to do:

give each child a piece of A4 card, either pastel or white and a straw

mix green and red marbling ink in a sturdy water pot with a small amount of water

now, get the children to put their straws in the marbling ink and then put their finger on the top of the straw, trapping a small amount of ink

with their finger still place, move the straw onto the A4 paper and release the top

get the children to blow the ink into tree shapes

leave to dry

whilst the trees dry, the children can prepare the flowers by scrunching up small pieces of cerise, white or pink tissue paper into balls

they can also prepare sky and ground pieces by tearing blue and brown tissue paper into rough shapes

once dry, apply glue in dots to the tree branches and place the tissue paper balls on the glue dots

allow to dry

once dry, use glue stick on the top and bottom of the picture and stick on the blue sky tissue paper and brown ground tissue paper

mount the pictures on black poster paper for effect

done!

Or follow this video to create simple cherry blossom pictures with paint and mount them on black backgrounds, using black poster paper and glue.

Discovering Religion

This is a great opportunity to introduce different religions to the children. With today’s multicultural society, it’s entirely possible that you already have a Buddhist in your class. If you do, why not ask them to prepare a short presentation about their beliefs and, if they celebrate Hana Matsuri, what it involves? You can then turn this into a monthly activity, with the focus on a different religion each month.