Earth Week Green Smoothies

Naturally colored smoothies are a healthy way to celebrate our planet this April.  It takes some tweaking to create the earth motif; perhaps you could have an Earth Day contest to see whose earth looks the most recognizable.  Enjoy!

Ingredients:

• Coconut milk
• Fresh baby spinach leaves, preferably organic
• Blueberries
• Bananas and/or pineapple
• Fresh lemon or lime juice, optional

How to make it:

1. Blend two separate batches of smoothie mixture, one with milk, bananas, and spinach to stay green; to the second batch add blueberries until a bluish green color is achieved.  
2. Pour the darker blue-green smoothie into drinking glasses or cups.  Drop the lighter green smoothie mix into the blue-green smoothie and with a straw or other untensil, shape the lighter green drops into continents.

Discover more healthy recipes at Pennywise Platter Thursday.

Earthworm Encounters: A New Sensory Activity (+ a Favorite Song)

The lowly earthworm is such an important creature.  A songwriter called Mr. Nicky captures some of the many reasons why in his delightful song, "Earthworm."  Some facts that he highlights are that earthworms:

1) help gardens grow,
2) are nocturnal, and
3) are covered in slime.

The slime never bothered me too much as a child, since I managed to collect earthworms for my worm farm and impale them on hooks for fishing bait.  And my children love to find live earthworms in our backyard too.  But for a slime-free approach, I made some segmented worms out of plastic drinking straws.

Materials:

• plastic drinking straws
• sharp scissors (to be used by an adult)
• fake dirt* (black rice and stale Grape Nuts cereal in our case) or sand
• medium to large container
• ruler or tape measure, optional

Methods:

1. Carefully cut segments in the straws, being careful not to slice all the way through.
2. Fill a container with fake dirt or use a sand box.  Hide the worms under the dirt or sand.
3. Ask the kids to find the plastic earthworms.
4. Optional: Use a ruler or tape measure to measure each earthworm found.

First we measured one worm.

Then we put two worms together and measured again.

* For fake dirt, you could also use birdseed, coffee grounds, or wood shavings.

Additional Resources:

You can find more facts about earthworms at the Worm Facts Page.
 This post is linked to It's Playtime, where more fun ideas abound!

Rainbow Games, Part 2: Using Paper and Felt

Instead of the Hunger Games, my kids and I have been exploring more cheerful themes, like rainbows.  My previous post featured games that get kids moving on a bigger scale.  These next activities involve more focused movements, like coloring and aiming smaller objects like coins or cotton balls.


Rainbow Board Games

1.  Color Toss Game

This could be a great waiting room activity when you have a wiggly toddler or preschooler along.  Or just play it at home because it's fun.



To Make It:

Cut a rainbow from 6 colors of felt.  Attach curves to a felt backing with thread or tacky glue. I decided to only attach the purple and leave the other 4 colors as puzzle pieces.

To Play:

Toss cotton balls and/or coins, aiming to get one to land on each color.

Variations: 

                   a) Use paint or paper scraps to create the rainbow on scrap cardboard
                       instead of using felt.

                   b) For a math challenge, assign point values to each color band.
                       Or add up the value of the coins that land on the rainbow.

2.  Rainbow Shuffleboard

To Make It:

Print out and color the rainbow page (scroll down below to find it).  Overlay the rainbow with a long sheet of waxed paper, about 2 to 3 feet long. 


To Play:

Slide coins or glass stones across the waxed paper toward the color bands on the rainbow.  Count up who gets the most objects to land on the rainbow.

Printable Rainbow Coloring Page

This post is linked to Show and Tell
and It's Playtime.

Rainbow Games, Part 1: Using Chalk and Bins

Rainbows are a symbol of hope.  They illustrate the colors and wonder of creation and remind us of the promise given at the end of the story of Noah's ark.   I find the rainbow theme to be an inspiring springboard for learning and play.

Rainbow Games and Activities

1. The Rainbow Twist Game

Draw a giant rainbow on pavement with colored chalk.  With or without a Twister game spinner, call out right or left, hand or foot, and a color.

Variations:

• Sometimes we make this a bilingual game by saying the names of the colors in Spanish or another target language.  For example, "left hand azul!"
• You can turn this into a tossing game by using rolled up socks.  Aim to toss the sock ball onto each color band.

2. The Rainbow Clean Up Game

If it is time to clean up a fairly large mess of toys, papers, etc., enlist children to sort the objects based on their color and then put them away.

Tip: Provide a matching container for each color, or label containers before the clean up begins.  You may want to assign a particular color (or colors) to each child.

This post is linked to Show and Tell
and It's Playtime.