Physical Development and Health (MOving With Objects)
An activity for older infants
Materials
- three shoe boxes - toilet paper roll - hot glue gun -hot glue stick -paint (primary colors and black) - paintbrushes - plastic box - Beanie Babies
NOTE: These are the materials needed to make one train. In order to appease a larger group of students, the teacher will need to make about two or three trains.
For an easier challenge: -Replace shoe boxes with Kleenex boxes -Replace Beanie Babies with soft balls
For a trickier challenge -Replace shoe boxes with large shipping boxes -Replace Beanie Babies with large plastic dinosaurs
Follow-up Ideas
-While playing outside, show your infants how to throw or kick balls. Gently throw or kick the ball to them, and see if they try to catch the ball or kick the ball back to you.
-Take the infants to the gym and throw colorful scarves into the air. See if the infants will try to catch the scarves.
Originating Idea
This is a fun, cheap, easy-to-implement activity that the infants will enjoy. The infants not only utilize their gross motor skills to move the box and toys, but they become more independent as they go around the classroom finding toys they want to incorporate into the activity as well.
How to Make Activity
The teacher should use the hole puncher to punch holes into the ends of the shoe boxes. Then the teacher should take the yarn and lace it through the holes. The yarn and shoe boxes will be held together with clothespin (see the picture on the right for reference). You can reinforce this by putting a little hot glue between the clothes pin and shoe box and connecting them together. Then the teacher should hot glue the toilet paper roll on top of the first shoe box to make the smoke stack. The teacher should then use the paint and paintbrushes to paint the shoe box train. She should paint the boxes red, blue, and yellow, and then paint the smoke stack black. She should also use the black paint to hand-paint wheels on the side of each car.
How to Implement Idea
During large group time, the teacher should she set up several trains in the middle of the rug along with a box filled with Beanie Babies. She will then say, "This is a choo-choo train, and these are its passengers! Where do you think the train should go?" She should then observe how the children interact with the train and the Beanie Babies.
The infants will either go play with the train or the Beanie Babies. Those who play with the train will feel the string and the box. They will then start dragging the box around the room. Those that go for the Beanie Babies will follow the train and put the different "passengers" into the different train cars. The children will then also stop and dump the passengers out of each car. They will probably enjoy filling and dumping the Beanie Babies out of each car.
Once the infants have been able to explore the activity in full, ring a bell and say "Five more minutes and then we're going to have snack!" Once five minutes have passed, say, "Okay, lets bring the choo-choos to sink so we can wash our hands!" The teacher can gently help the students bring the train to the sink if they are struggling, but she should let the infants try to do it themselves first. The teacher will put the train and Beanie Babies away while the infants wash their hands and get ready for snack.