Parents Corner
Places to Go and Things to See This Summer
This is a booklet I put together for parents. Summer can be long
and difficult if you don’t plan ahead. I am sure there are many
local places and things to do in your county too. This may give you
some ideas of where to start to look.
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Airfield at local Airport |
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Aquarium |
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Beach |
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Construction site |
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Dolphin Shirts |
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Fire Departments |
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Lake or park to feed the birds |
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Libraries |
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Local tree farms and gardens |
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Museums |
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Parks and Recreation; organized events
and classes |
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Pet stores |
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Police department |
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Pool |
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Post Office |
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Print shop |
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Pumpkin patch |
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Radio and TV stations |
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Tour fast food restaurant |
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U-pick fruit farms |
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University farm |
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University animal sciences department
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YMCA or YWCA |
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Zoo |
Things to make
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Playdough and Goop |
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Rainbow Stew
1/3 cup sugar
1 cup cornstarch
4 cups water
Place mixture in a large saucepan and cook until thick. Divide
mixture into 3 parts and put a primary color in a zip lock bag.
Your child can mix and change the colors, with In the bag until
done. |
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Cooked Playdough
2 cups flour
1 cup salt
2 tablespoons cream of tartar
1 tablespoon vegetable oil 2 cups water
Several drops of food coloring
Mix all of the ingredients in a medium saucepan over medium heat
stirring constantly until the mixture is like a thick lump. Turn
out of the pan onto the counter or cutting board and kneed smooth. |
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Squeeze Bottle Glitter
1/3 cup flour
1/3cup salt
1/3cup water, food coloring or dry tempra paint
Mix flour, salt, and water in a mixing bowl until thoroughly mixed.
Add color as desired. Spoon into a squeeze bottle such as a mustard
or ketchup bottle. Squeeze the mixture onto heavy paper. The picture
will sparkle when dry. |
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Weird Stuff
3/4 cup cornstarch
1/4 cup water
Food coloring
Mix the ingredients on a cookie sheet or tray. It should appear
solid when in the tray or being held and can be formed into a
ball but melts away when loose. If the mixture is too thick add
water, if to thin add cornstarch . To save allow the mixture to
dry in the tray and crumble into a baggie. Add water for reuse. |
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Finger Paint
1 cup flour
1 cup water
1½ tsp. salt
Food coloring
Combine all ingredients until smooth. Paint on a smooth surface
such a freezer paper, plastic, or a smooth easy to clean table. |
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Clean and Simple Finger Paints
Spray shaving cream on a smooth surface
Mix Ivory Snow and water with an electric mixer
Pour liquid starch, liquid laundry soap and color onto the painting
surface.
Put colored finger paint in a zip lock bag and tape the top with
duct tape. Your child can move the paint and make designs but
there is no mess. If you put 2 or more colors in a bag you can
experiment with mixing colors. |
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Colored Bubbles
1 cup granulated soap or soap powder
1 qt. warm water
Food color
Plastic straws
Paper cups
Dissolve soap in warm water and stir in the food color. Give your
child a cup 1/3rd. full of the bubble mixture and a straw to blow
through |
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The Shakaroo
1. Staple about 20 strips, of different colored tissue paper,
one inch wide and about 12 inches long to the tube of cardboard
found in the inside of waxed paper containers
2. Using a stapler, staple ends of paper to the end of the tube.
3. The result: a colorful, rustling PomPom with a quiet sound! |
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Noisemakers
Put a few beans or marbles in an aluminum pie pan. Then place
another upside-down over the first pie pan and staple along the
edges. Make one for each child. If made out of paper plates the
children can decorate them. |
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Yarn Decorations
Place glue-soaked yarn around a blown up balloon in a decorative
pattern. When yarn is throughly dry, pop the balloon and paint
the "cage" with spray paint. |
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Let a child help make his own card
game by selecting pictures from a magazine to be glued onto poster
paper pieces or index cards.. Then the children can play matching
games, finding similar items such as trucks, trees, animals or
just dots. |
Cooking
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Mud Balls
Peanut butter
Honey
Chocolate powdered milk
Raisins
Crushed graham crackers
Frozen orange juice concentrate
Leftovers such as dry cereal, coconut, wheat germ, or oatmeal
Mix ingredients together and form into small balls. Roll the balls
in carob powder or chocolate milk powder. |
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Travelers’ Snack
Equal parts: raisins, nuts, and dry cereal
Mix ingredients in a large bowl and divide into plastic bags to
save for later snacks. |
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Children love to cook. Here is a recipe
for a no-cook chocolate fudge
3 oz. softened cream cheese
¼ tsp. vanilla
¼ cup nuts dash of salt ½cup cocoa
2 cups powdered sugar
Mix well and press into greased pan. Chill. Cut and eat |
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Fruit Dip
7 oz. marshmallow cream
8 oz. cream cheese
Cream together until smooth. Serve with strawberries, melon balls,
grapes and other fruit |
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Finger Jell-O
1 envelope un-flavored Jell-O 6 oz. box flavored Jell-O 2 cups
boiling water 2 cups cold water
Stir together the dry ingredients. Prepare as directed for flavored
gelatin. Cut into blocks. as These can be eaten with fingers as
they do not melt as fast as regular Jell-O. |
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Peanut butter play dough
2 cups peanut butter
1½ cups honey
3 cups powdered milk
Mix ingredients in a large bowl. Give the child a piece the size
of a ping pong ball on a piece of wax paper. The child can roll
It around and make shapes or just eat it. |
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Trail Mix
2 cups fish crackers
1 cup dry cereal
1 tsp. Worcestershire sauce
1½ cups pretzels
¼ cup margarine
3 cups pop corn
In a large bowl mix all dry ingredients. In another bowl stir
together melted margarine and Worcestershire sauce. Pour over
cracker mixture. Stir to coat and add pop corn. Spread evenly
in a large baking pan. Bake at 325 degrees for 20 minutes, stirring
once or twice, cool and store in an airtight container. |
Large-muscle activities
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Balance Board
Find a long board 2-8 inches wide and 4-8 feet long. Have your
child walk, run, walk backwards, take tiny stops, take big steps,
walk sideways, or any other challenges you can think of. You may
have to demonstrate if your child has not done it before. |
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Bottle Bowling
Gather 10 large empty bottles such as detergent or soda bottles
and a ball about six inches in diameter. Pour sand in the bottoms
of the bottles and place them like bowling pins on the grass or
a sidewalk. Have your child roll the ball toward the bottles trying
to knock them over. |
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For a game of toss, roll several pair
of socks into a ball and fasten them with a rubber band. Line
up several pair of shoes and throw the balls into them. |
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Provide a large empty cardboard carton
for a playhouse. Let the children decorate it with crayons, gluing
on old scraps of material or pictures cut out of magazines. |
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Put colored paper stepping stones
on the floor in a crooked line, some close and some far apart.
Let a child walk on them. For greater challenge he can do it while
trying to balance an object on his head. |
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Balloon basketball is lots of fun.
Bend the loop of a wire hanger into a circle. Hang it on a doorknob,
bending the circle straight out from the door. Stand four feet
away and throw a balloon into the loop. |
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Throw and Catch
Using balls of a variety of sizes have your child throw to you,
throw at a wall; catching the balls as they come back to them
or s you throw them. |
Small-muscle activities
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Give a child a magazine and suggest
several things they might look for to cut out. |
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Help a child make their own piggy
bank. Make It from a salt box, using the spout for a snout, spools
for legs, and a colorful pipe cleaner for a tall. Make the eyes
and mouth with magic marker. |
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For an older sick child at home from
school, have them cut words from a magazine and make sentences
from them. |
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For a funny game, color eyes, nose,
and mouth on a paper plate. Place two flat buttons on the plate
and jiggle It. If the button lands on each eye, score ten points;
if on one eye, score three points. The score of twenty wins the
game. (For older children). |
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Camp-in can allow peaceful coexistence
while you entertain.
Let the youngsters take sleeping bags and a packed dinner to a
camp-in site - the playroom or a bedroom, where they have privacy.
They will be content and the parents can entertain their guests
in peace. It will remain a special treat for them if the number
of times they are allowed to do this is limited. |
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Create a variety of necklaces by stringing
macaroni, colored paper squares, circles, and stars, and pieces
of plastic drinking straws. String a variety of buttons (large
for safety) on a string for necklace |
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Grease a large cake pan and sprinkle
with flour. It is ready for finger painting. |
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Make a jigsaw puzzle by gluing a large
picture on a piece of cardboard. Cut the picture into interesting
shapes to make a puzzle. This is especially fun if a real photograph
is used. |
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When busy in the kitchen, tape a large
piece of butcher paper to the refrigerator door and give your
child some felt-tipped pens or magic markers to draw with. This
will keep the child busy and creative. |
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Water play is very entertaining and
a summer treat. Let a child stand on a sturdy chair at the sink.
Set a pan of water in the sink and give them a funnel, small plastic
pitcher, measuring cups and spoons, or bathtub toys to play with.
For soap bubbles, give them a plastic drinking straw and a cup
filled with a mixture of soap flakes and water. Add a bit of cooking
oil and the bubbles will float in the air without breaking. Be
sure the child is old enough to blow, not suck, |
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When stormy weather keeps the children
indoors, they can "draw" on the carpet or floor with
pieced leftover yarn, and they love it. They can make houses,
animals, people, or room length missiles. The best reward is the
ease in cleaning up. |
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FEEL BOX: Using cardboard, mount various
different textured objects.
Different kinds of materials cut in pieces
Furs and feathers
All kinds of paper
All kinds of plastic pieces
Diferent sizes and textures of buttons
Christmas decorations
Cotton
Rubber bands
Seeds |
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FEEL BOX: Cover a cardboard box. Cut
a hand size hole in one end and have child feel and identify various
objects. Fill box with objects that the child can identify or
let him match textures from the list above. |
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SMELL BOTTLES: Collect various uniform
bottles. Put cotton in each one with a drop of scent on each.
Use extracts, perfume, juice and spices. |
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LOTTO GAMES: Cut out magazine pictures
of uniform size. Mount on boards in 4 columns. The first column
will have the object to be matched. The next three columns will
have one picture that matches the picture in the first column
and two other pictures. The object is for the child to match the
two similar pictures. |
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ROCKET SHIPS: Make rockets out of
a toilet paper roll, with a single egg carton section for a top,
and a square of construction paper as a base to which the rocket
may be glued. The children can paint these. |
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WALKIE-TALKIE: Make a Walkie-Talkie
out of two juice cans, or similar cans, with a hole in the bottom
and about five feet of wire or nylon string held taut. If one
child talks and another listens, this really works. |
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SOUND GAMES: Play guessing games with
containers, all the same size, with an object inside. Have the
child identify the object by its sound. Use marbles, bells, seeds,
salt, cotton, pebbles, liquids and string. |
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Simple Puppets: Start with small paper
bags folded flat so that the square bottom of the bag overlaps
one side. Color the puppet's face using the overlapped area as
the puppet's mouth. Eyes, ears, and other features can be added
to make the puppets more interesting. |
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Tissue paper designs on colored construction
paper, draw the outline of a simple shape. Cut large sheets of
tissue into small squares and roll into wads. Dip wads Into glue,
then press side by side to fill in the outline. |
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