Going for walks is something that I do with my girls daily. DAILY! Most of the time we just walk around the neighborhood, head to a park or ride bikes. But today I tried to add a different element to our walk.
It is just a piece of white paper with clips holding it to a piece of card board. I took a black marker and drew the lines to make squares then colored a small square of a different color in each box. The green square use to be pink (which is why it looks weird) but then I found these stickers and there wasn't a pink sticker! I got the colored stickers from the dollar section from Target! LOVE THE DOLLAR SECTION!
So the point is to go for a walk carrying the paper and stickers (you don't have to have stickers that match the color, they could be just plain star stickers or even just whatever stickers you have lying around). As you walk look for things that match each color and place a sticker in the box for each thing that matches. Sam loves anything to do with stickers so I knew she would be all over this.
She liked looking for the colors but was a bit confused about where to put the stickers. It took many practices for her to get what she was doing.
The most amusing part was that Sam needed to sit down to put the stickers on and it didn't seem to matter where she was or who's yard she was in, she just sat down and put on her stickers!
This was a really great activity but at two years old it took A LOT of guidance. I had to be constantly asking her what color things were, where she should put the stickers, correcting color mistakes that she made, etc. With the heat and Avery being very crabby we didn't last as long as I had hoped.
Great activity though. Definitely one you should try!
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The Nitty Gritty!
I got this activity from . The author suggested making tally marks to count the number of times a color was found. I knew that Sam wouldn't understand tally marks, she barely understands counting, so I came up with the sticker idea to simplify the concept.
The neat thing about this idea is that you could adjust it to so many different things. It is basically a scavenger hunt tailored to have a hands-on component that even a two year old can do. You could do a similar thing with pictures of things for them to find (birds, trees, animals, flowers, insects, etc.) and then just use the stickers to mark how many of each item they find. I have something kind of like this in my Scavenger Hunt page on the sidebar, complete with "clipart" type pictures that you can download and print off.
Another great way to do a color walk is to go Home Depot or any hardware store and pick up some free paint chips. As you do your walk give a color to the child and ask them to find the color in nature. When they find it give them a new one. We do this with our preschool groups and they love it. Its amazing to see where they find the color match.
Posted by: stefanie | 07/21/2010 at 08:42 PM
LOVE this! We're going to have to try this one...I think Brianna would really enjoy this!
Posted by: amber | 07/21/2010 at 10:00 PM
Stefanie you are absolutely right. We keep our "color wheel" in our adventure backpack all the time. Sam loves using it. I wanted to see how that would compare to a color matching activity that had a "counting" element with it. But the color wheel is neat because you can use more obscure colors or shades of certain colors that they have to match.
You can check out our color wheel on the "Tools" Page on the sidebar.
Thanks so much for sharing the idea! Always great to hear what other educators are doing.
Posted by: abbie | 07/22/2010 at 05:16 AM
Those are some cute photos of your sticker-lover hard at work.
Posted by: 6512 and growing | 07/22/2010 at 08:25 PM
Oh neat activity, I am trying to get out more for walks with my daughter, will definitely try this out :) you have lovely blog too!
Posted by: Eva | 07/24/2010 at 12:39 PM