Bambino Cut and Paste Activity & Printable

::: Bambino Academy :::

~ Surfer Dude is 39 months ~

Surfer Dude has been completing sticker/cutting activities for awhile now. I am sure you know the ones I mean. Place a row of stickers onto a strip of paper approximately 2cms in width and then the child cuts the strip into pieces, keeping one sticker on each piece. I can't be certain but I think the first place I may have seen this was over at the wonderful Counting Coconuts.

I've been wanting to extend on that activity for awhile now and today the opportunity arose. I simply drew everything freehand for Surfer Dude, but have since put together a simple little printable that has made it easier for me to prepare this activity....which by the way, he adores!

You will need two sheets of grid paper (see printable link below), I print one in colour so it is easy for Surfer Dude to tell them apart, stickers, enough to fill the sheet and small enough to fit within in each grid square, child sized scissors (if they are cutting) and a glue stick.

I prepared the first stage of cutting the coloured sheet into long strips and placed all of the supplies onto his tray. If you are doing this for the first time you might like to start with just the strips and the stickers and slowly move through the steps from there.

Surfer Dude then chooses his stickers and places one within each grid square. With a younger child you might like to remove the backing around the stickers, this makes it much easier for them to remove the sticker itself with greater success.

After one strip is full he then cuts it apart on the lines provided.

Once all stickers are in place and each strip has been cut apart, the next step is to glue each coloured square onto the second piece of grid paper.

This is quite an involved piece of work with many steps. You will need to decide for yourself what level your child is at and work from there. Right now I can give all the materials to Surfer Dude ( I only cut apart the inital long strips) and he does the rest all in one sitting.

The first time he did this it took him at least 30 minutes, his perseverance, concentration and determination was amazing. Such a simple activity covering such a wide variety of skills.

This is the very first one Surfer Dude completed, where I simply drew the grids by hand and did not provide him lines to cut on. You can choose to go either way with this, again depending on the child.

Download the grid pattern printable by clicking here

Check out the Linky Party's this is linked up to

Bambino Academy: Flower Arranging

Children of all ages love this simple activity and you can make it really easy for toddlers to do.

Next time you are the lucky beneficiary of flowers be sure to keep the tray and the flower foam. (you could also just go and buy some, most 'cheapy' stores sell this)

As you can see, ours is nearing the end of its life span, it has been well used. Having this makes flower arranging very simple.

I purchased three bunches of different flowers from the $2 shop, pulled them all apart (leaving the stems in tact) and B pushes them into the flower foam.

Simple, fun and looks fabulous when they are done.

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Bambino Academy: Busy Toddlers During School Time Part 2

Keeping toddlers busy during school time can be challenging.

This is a continuation from my post a couple of weeks.

Today I am sharing a few more ways I keep C entertained and challenged at the same time (if he isn't challenged at just the right level boredom quickly sets in) so I am basically free to spend time with the others when they need me.

A sheet of stickers is always great value (at least for the toddler, not for the purse when they go through them at the rate of a sheet every 5 or so minutes). For a bit of interest choose stickers with a variety of textures, these are the puffy, pop out ones.

For toddlers that still find stickers fiddly, peel off the entire backing sheet, leaving just the stickers behind. This will allow them to remove the stickers much easier. Have a container of coloured pencils nearby so they can continue to decorate their creation.

Shape sorters are generally a good indpendent activity, this one is just above C at the moment and he did tire of it, telling me, "Too hard mummy, too hard!" He did sit at this activity for quite a while though.

Playdough is always a sure fire way to keep little hands busy. Every now and then I roll a tray of snakes and give him a butter knife and let him cut away. This is great practice and will lead him nicely to more advanced practical life knife skills.

I find that as long as I rotate my activities and he gets to do some kind of cutting, gluing or playdough type work everyday he is generally happy to run off to the play room and play quietly with his cars after finishing 3 or 4 activities I have prepared for him.

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Bambino Academy Basics - Eggsellent Egg Trays - Recognising Colours

This information has moved. It can now be found here - TODDLER COLOUR SORTING ACTIVITY