Learning to Build

Building is so much fun when you’re two! We loved learning more about how we can do that with our “Learning to Build” theme! This theme is such a great way to practice large motor and small motor skills. We started out by reading some great books about different tools and machines that help us build.

Tools by Taro Miura takes tools to a whole new level. It’s a great book for showing us what kind of tools different people use such as doctors, barbers, painters, and construction workers. As you read this book to your toddlers, try to get them involved by having them tell you what those certain tools are called.

  

I, personally, love books that rhyme and The Construction Crew by Lynn Meltzer is no exception. This book is a fun way of learning how different construction machines work. I was very impressed when my class was able to name them without help maybe yours will be able to also!

 

 

Old MacDonald Had a Woodshop by Lisa Shulman is a fun twist on the classic song “Old Macdonald had a Farm”. Not only can your class learn about different tools, they also can learn about the sounds those tools make. We giggled so much as we read this book!

 

Now for our fun Large Motor and Small Motor activities. My class absolutely loved our first activity and could have played with it for hours.

You will need:
  *Contact paper
  *Masking tape
  *Blocks

Cut a piece of contact paper to your desired length. The size will determine how many children you want building in this center. Remove the back of the contact paper and secure the paper to the wall with tape along the sides - sticky side up. Put the blocks out and your class will be able to build on the wall as they stick their blocks to the contact paper.
Tip: Make sure none of the children place their hands on the sticky paper. Little fingers are stickier than blocks and the whole thing will come down when they pull their hand away.

We all know how our toddlers love playing with blocks, so they will love this next activity.

You will need:
  *Large blocks
  *Masking Tape

I started off by stacking the large blocks in a tower against the wall. Then I outlined the shape of the tower with tape making the square patterns. My class did a great job placing their blocks in each square as they did this activity.

We loved putting on our hard hats as we prepared to build our very own city. This activity is a great way to show your class that construction workers are people that build the buildings we see in our cities. You will need to get out your contact paper again and laminate a paper road to the floor. You can get a free printable for the road here. Now it’s time to get out the blocks and small cars so you can get to building.

 

My favorite part of the week was our dramatic play center. This center may look a little difficult to make, but it was actually one of the easiest I’ve done.

 

We’ll start off by making our tool peg board. You can go a more expensive route and actually buy a peg board, but I think that might be just a little bit hard to tape up to a wall. Since I like to be thrifty, I just used a large piece of brown paper. I wasn’t sure how I was going to paint the black circles on without it taking hours. So I got a little creative and used the end of a glue stick to stamp painted circles onto the paper. The great thing about this is that you don’t have to be a perfectionist. I actually had a two year old leaning on my back as I did this :)

 

Next, you will need to Google some pictures of different tools you want so that you can glue them to your peg board. I added a picture I drew of a tool box to it also, but doing that is completely up to you. Now all you need to do is add some trucks, a car mat, and some pre-made hard hat headbands and you’re all set to go.

This was such a fun week. I can’t wait to do it again soon!

-Sarah