Showing posts with label puzzles. Show all posts
Showing posts with label puzzles. Show all posts

Thursday, 25 June 2015

Free Animal Number Puzzles for Kids

I'll confess. Sometimes I get inspired by a product that I buy for my daughters and I use that idea to come up with a printable activity. In this case, I bought a great pack of Princess sticker puzzles from Michael's. I thought it was such a great idea to practice numbers, so I made a few animal themed cut & paste number puzzles to share with you! Sure, not as much fun as stickers, but just as educational!


Free Animal Number Puzzles for Kids

These FREE Animal themed Number Puzzles come in two levels of difficulty. One set includes numbers 1-16  and another set includes number 1-32. Use whichever puzzles suit your child's skill level. 

Just cut the images along the grid lines, shuffle the pieces and give to your child to glue to the blank grid sheet. For added challenge, have the child cut out the puzzle pieces! 


If you are interested in the Sticker Puzzles product I purchased, here are some Amazon affiliate links:



Monday, 6 April 2015

Free Earth Day Puzzles for Kids

I am very excited to introduce my next guest blogger, Malia from Playdough to Plato. I'm a huge fan of her blog, where she shares tons of free printables and hands-on learning activities for preschool, kindergarten and first grade. She is here today with a set of fabulous and free Earth Day puzzles!

Earth Day Puzzles:

As a former kindergarten teacher turned hands-on mom, I get a little bit giddy about creating fun ways for my kids to learn. These free Earth Day puzzles are a simple way to learn some ways to help the environment AND practice ABC and 123 order at the same time.

Free Earth Day Puzzles for Kids

Getting Ready:

Prepping the puzzles couldn't get much simpler. I printed a copy of the puzzles { HERE } on cardstock to give them extra durability and cut along the thin grey lines to separate the strips. Easy peasy.


My boys and I have talked about Earth Day before so they knew it was a celebration of all-things environmentally-friendly. We worked together to brainstorm a long list of different ways we can help the planet: picking up litter, watering trees, recycling...

Then I showed the boys the mixed up puzzles and invited them to sort the pieces into the correct order, building a photo of one awesome Earth Day activity we'd work on together. I gave each excited child a scrambled puzzle. Piece by piece, they started building.


And in just a couple minutes, both puzzles were complete.


I slid the pieces into separate snack-sized Ziplocs and placed them in my bag so I could easily entertain the boys when we’re waiting in doctors’ offices, restaurants… you name it! Then we set out to make a positive impact on the planet by taking our plastics to the outdoor recycling bin and hunting down the perfect spot for a new tree. Happy Earth Day!


Meet Malia:

Malia is a National Board Certified teacher turned hands-on mom to three little ones {ages 5, 3 and 1}. When she's not digging in sandboxes or playing with paint, she's sharing fun learning activities on her site, Playdough to Plato. Hop over and grab all of her FREE printables - including a super popular Matchbox car alphabet tracing book and road trip activity pack!



Wednesday, 18 February 2015

DIY Photo Name Puzzle (Love to Learn Linky #30)

Today I would like to share a very simple activity that I made for my daughter to help her learn the letters in her name. It literally took 5 minutes to make this personalized photo name puzzle. She loves to do activities with photographs, such as our Photo ABC Cards, so I knew this would be a hit!


Photo Name Puzzle

First, I snapped a quick picture of her with my phone (landscape format), then emailed it to myself. (skip this step if you have a photo on your computer)

I saved and opened up the picture on my computer. It opened in Windows Photo Viewer and I clicked print. In the options I chose the layout with two 5"x7" photos on one page. It will only print the photo once but it leaves plenty of space to write the name. Click print again.



Here is how it came out. I used a permanent marker to write her name, spacing it out over the length of the photo.


Then I laminated the sheet (optional), and cut the photo into vertical strips. Puzzle complete!



Check out these other creative ways for kids to learn their names!

Rainbow Name Puzzle by Still Playing School

Learning your Name Playdough Puzzle by Growing Book by Book
Learn to Spell your Name Parking Garage by Growing Book by Book
Preschool Literacy: Learning Letters in Our Names by Teaching 2 and 3 Year Olds
Roll a Die and Make your Name by Toddler Approved
Chicka Chicka Boom Boom Name Craft by Toddler Approved
Clothesline Names by Pre-K Pages
Easy Homemade Name Puzzle by Happy Hooligans
Spell your Name Game by No Time for Flash Cards
Name Activity using Toy Cars by Buggy and Buddy
Spider Web Name Recognition Activity by Messy Little Monster
Flower Garden Name Game by Fantastic Fun and Learning
5 Simple Name Activities by Fantastic Fun and Learning
Quick Name Activities by Fantastic Fun and Learning
Letters in your name Cookies by JDaniel4's Mom
Name Practice Letter Hunt by Inspiration Laboratories
Name Practice Water Game by Inspiration Laboratories
Spiced Name Activity for Five Senses by School Time Snippets
Clothespin Name Activity by School Time Snippets
10 Ways to Help Children Learn to Spell their Names by Play to Learn Preschool

LOVE TO LEARN LINKY


Visit my co-hosts to see their posts and features!

Rube Goldberg Machines for Kids + YouTube Video! from One Time Through
25+ Easy Science Activities that Fizz, Bubble, & Amaze! from A Little Pinch of Perfect
St. Patrick's Day Rainbow Slime from Left Brain Craft Brain
Love to Learn Linky

Now it's time for some more links! I hope you'll join me and a couple of friends for a brand new linky party!

Bloggers, link up your posts every Thursday and watch as we round them up and share them all over the place.

Almost anything goes, we're just hoping your activities teach kids (or us!) something. (science, art, cooking, behavior, crafting, parenting, etc...)

The Love to Learn Linky is Hosted by:

Totschooling: Viviana is a blogging mom to a toddler and a preschooler, sharing ideas and resources for early education. She specializes in unique, hands-on printable activities that are educational, fun and inspire creativity in young minds.
Left Brain Craft Brain: Anne is an ex-engineer, current stay-at-home mama writing about crafty ways to encourage creativity (and brain power!) in our kids. Each of her projects gives kids the chance to learn about a new subject and do something crafty at the same time.
http://www.alittlepinchofperfect.com/ A Little Pinch of Perfect: Katie combines creativity, play, and learning for the perfect mishmash of fun activities that keep kiddos entertained throughout the day. She wholeheartedly believes in the power of play and feels that all activities naturally provide a fun way to learn.

One Time Through: Sue is an Elementary School Teacher currently on leave to be at home with her preschooler son.  She shares ideas for connecting and learning with kids through meaningful, play-based activities that nurture curiosity and creativity, as well as positive parenting tips.

Love to Learn Linky Etiquette:

  • Posts should be about educating our kids in any way - science, art, cooking, crafts, behavior, parenting, etc. Please keep them family friendly and please no Etsy shops or giveaways unless they are relevant to the topic.

  • Upload your direct post link to the InLinkz widget. Link up to 3 posts.



  • Post our button on your site.

  • By linking up, you agree to have your images shared with credit.

Link up and grab a button!
Love to Learn Linky





Thursday, 12 February 2015

Train Number Puzzle for Toddlers

When my first daughter was 2 years old, I created this train puzzle for her to practice counting and number recognition. At that time, she was not very interested in it, so I put it away and forgot about it. I found it again the other day and showed it to her (she's 3 and a half now), and to my surprise she loved it and has been playing with it every day!


The Number Train! Free printable puzzle

As you can see this puzzle is pretty big. It consists of 11 pieces: the front of the train plus 10 train cars filled with animals and numbers 1-10. I laminated it and made sure to cut off the sharp corners.

Another way to use this puzzle is to hang it on the wall as an educational wall decoration.






Thursday, 29 January 2015

Letter and Number Heart Puzzles (Love to Learn Linky #27)

My daughter has always loved puzzles. She gets very excited when I come up with something new for her to put together and solve. With Valentine's Day coming up, I recently created this free printable set of heart puzzles for her to practice letters, letter sounds, numbers and counting.


Letter & Number Heart Puzzles

These puzzles include two levels of difficulty:

2-piece heart puzzles:
- matching uppercase and lowercase letters
- matching number to quantity 1-15

3-piece heart puzzles:
- matching uppercase and lowercase letters, as well as pictures that begin with each letter sound
- matching number to quantity, and number words 1-15



For a set of winter themed puzzles, try these Snowman Letter Matching Puzzles:

Check out these other heart-shaped learning activities from the Love to Learn Linky:

Light Up Circuit Valentines by Left Brain Craft Brain
Valentines Heart Hide & Seek Game by A Little Pinch of Perfect
Valentine Sight Word Delivery by Growing Book by Book
Sprinkle Math Fine Motor Activity by Sugar Aunts
Valentines Counting & Color Sorting by Teaching 2 & 3 Year Olds
Valentines Fine Motor Activities by Pre-K Pages
C is for Color Connections by Eager Ed
Heart Number Puzzles by Mom Inspired Life
Valentine Name Puzzle by How Wee Learn
Valentine Counting Activity by Spark & Pook

LOVE TO LEARN LINKY


Visit my co-hosts to see their posts and features!

Valentines Day Learning Activities from One Time Through
Penguin Crafts & Activities for Kids from A Little Pinch of Perfect
Love to Learn Linky

Now it's time for some more links! I hope you'll join me and a couple of friends for a brand new linky party!

Bloggers, link up your posts every Thursday and watch as we round them up and share them all over the place.

Almost anything goes, we're just hoping your activities teach kids (or us!) something. (science, art, cooking, behavior, crafting, parenting, etc...)

The Love to Learn Linky is Hosted by:

Totschooling: Viviana is a blogging mom to a toddler and a preschooler, sharing ideas and resources for early education. She specializes in unique, hands-on printable activities that are educational, fun and inspire creativity in young minds.
Left Brain Craft Brain: Anne is an ex-engineer, current stay-at-home mama writing about crafty ways to encourage creativity (and brain power!) in our kids. Each of her projects gives kids the chance to learn about a new subject and do something crafty at the same time.
http://www.alittlepinchofperfect.com/ A Little Pinch of Perfect: Katie combines creativity, play, and learning for the perfect mishmash of fun activities that keep kiddos entertained throughout the day. She wholeheartedly believes in the power of play and feels that all activities naturally provide a fun way to learn.

One Time Through: Sue is an Elementary School Teacher currently on leave to be at home with her preschooler son.  She shares ideas for connecting and learning with kids through meaningful, play-based activities that nurture curiosity and creativity, as well as positive parenting tips.

Love to Learn Linky Etiquette:

  • Posts should be about educating our kids in any way - science, art, cooking, crafts, behavior, parenting, etc. Please keep them family friendly and please no Etsy shops or giveaways unless they are relevant to the topic.

  • Upload your direct post link to the InLinkz widget. Link up to 3 posts.



  • Post our button on your site.

  • By linking up, you agree to have your images shared with credit.

Link up and grab a button!
Love to Learn Linky





Tuesday, 13 January 2015

Free Winter Printable Pack for Toddlers & Preschoolers

Winter is in full swing and my girls are starting to get restless from spending more time indoors. This Winter themed printable pack will be great to keep them busy and learning on those cold winter days! This pack is designed for toddlers and preschoolers to develop early learning skills such as alphabet and number recognition, counting, letter sounds, letter cases, size, shapes, colors, patterns, visual discrimination, prewriting, scissor skills, puzzles and more!

Winter Learning Pack for Toddlers & Preschoolers



This FREE Winter Learning Pack features 45 hands-on activities, and it is available for Free to all email subscribers. Here is what's included:

Literacy Activities:
-Cut & Paste the Missing Letter
-Letter Sound Matching
-Sight Word Matching
-Word tracing
-Letter Sorting
-Matching letter cases
-Labeling Snowman Parts
-Circle all the letter W
-Circle all the things that begin with W
-Word puzzle
-Sight Word tracing and cut/paste

Math Activities:
-Numbers 1-5 Puzzle
-Numbers 1-10 Puzzle
-Numbers 11-20 Puzzle
-Counting 1-5
-Counting 6-10
-Cut & Paste the Missing Number
-Number to Quantity Matching
-Patterns
-Cut & Paste in Order from Smallest to Biggest
-Sorting by Size
-Shape Matching
-Color by Number

Pre-Writing:
-Trace the Shapes
-Trace Horizontal Lines
-Trace Vertical Lines
-Maze tracing
-Word Tracing
-Snowman Tracing

Visual Discrimination:
-Matching Snowmen
-Matching Winter Kids
-Matching Snowflakes
-Sorting by Color
-Sorting by Picture
-Circle all Winter things

Scissor Skills:
-Cutting straight lines
-Cutting zig zag lines
-Cutting & pasting numbers & letters
-Cut & Paste Build a Snowman

Puzzles:
-Word Puzzle
-Numbers 1-5 Puzzle
-Numbers 1-10 Puzzle
-Numbers 11-20 Puzzle


This Winter Printable Pack is FREE for all Totschooling subscribers!


What can I expect as a Subscriber?:
-You will receive free printables that are not available for download on the website. This includes holiday and seasonal packs, as well as other themed activity packs.
-You will get access to a growing collection of Board Book Printable Activities.
-You will receive 2-3 emails per week with new posts, freebies, sales and additions to the site.
-You will receive a special subscriber discount for the Online Store.
-Your information will never be shared with anybody else.


Monday, 22 December 2014

Christmas Art Skills Printables

Kids love coloring pages, but sometimes they can be a bit... boring (gasp!) so I created these FREE Christmas Art Skills Printables that work on scissor skills, tracing and coloring at the same time!


Free Christmas Art Skills Printables

These FREE Christmas Art Skills Printables include 3 scenes: Santa riding his sleigh above a skyline, Santa next to a Christmas tree, and a nativity scene.

Directions:
-cut paper along the thick gray lines
-assemble the puzzle and glue onto the blank page
-trace along the dotted lines
-color the picture!


(Note: If you have problems printing these, please email me at totschooling@gmail.com) 

If you enjoy these printables, check out 


Monday, 15 December 2014

Christmas Tree Learning Activities for Toddlers & PreK

Let's get into the Christmas spirit with some fun, hands-on Christmas Tree Learning activities! These FREE printable activities are designed for toddlers and preschoolers to practice math and literacy skills such as counting, number recognition, number quantity, shapes, alphabet recognition, letter cases, visual discrimination and more!

Christmas Tree Learning Activities

These Christmas Tree Learning activities are available for FREE to all email subscribers. Here is what's included:

Math Activities:

Number Tree Puzzle, including 1-10, 11-20 and 10-100 in both color and black & white.


Roll & Cover Game: Includes 2 difficulty levels. For an easier game, roll 1 die and cover the correct number (1-6) with a candy, pom pom or any other small object. For a more challenging game, use 2 dice, roll and add them up, then cover the correct number (2-12). Keep going until all numbers are covered.


Christmas Tree counting and matching 1-10 with pom poms. Includes both color and black & white, so can also be used for color matching. Printable comes in 2 halves that you tape together. 


Christmas ornament shape matching. Includes 10 shapes. Can be done as a cut & paste activity, or cut out the shapes for your child.


Literacy Activities:

Letter matching, both uppercase and lowercase included. This can be a cut and paste activity or the letter can be glued to bottle caps. Kids can match uppercase letters, lowercase letters, or uppercase and lowercase letters to each other.


Letter Case Sorting. Use the same letters from the previous activity and sort all the uppercase letters on one tree and all the lowercase letters on the other tree.


Visual Discrimination Activities:

Visual Discrimination matching. Print 2 copies of the sheet, leave one copy intact and cut the other one. Match the loose cards to the images on the sheet.


Memory Game. Use the same cards as above. Print 2 copies of the cards, cut them all out, put them face down, and play a classic memory game. Use only a few cards for an easier game.


These Christmas Tree Learning activities are FREE for all Totschooling subscribers!


After entering your email address, you will receive a confirmation email to complete your subscription. You will shortly receive a Welcome email that includes a link to this pack. If you have not received this email, please check your spam folder, or email me at totschooling@gmail.com. Thanks!

What can I expect as a Subscriber?:
-You will receive free printables that are not available for download on the website. This includes holiday and seasonal packs, as well as other themed activity packs.
-You will get access to a growing collection of Board Book Printable Activities.
-You will receive 2-3 emails per week with new posts, freebies, sales and additions to the site.
-You will receive a special subscriber discount for the Online Store.
-Your information will never be shared with anybody else.

Tuesday, 30 September 2014

Free Halloween Printable Pack for Toddlers & PreK

Halloween is one of our favorite times of the year and I like to use this as an opportunity to create some fun learning activities. This Halloween themed printable pack is designed for toddlers and preschoolers to develop early learning skills such as counting, number & alphabet recognition, letter sounds, letter cases, size, shapes, patterns, visual discrimination, prewriting, scissor skills, puzzles and more!
Free Halloween Printable Pack for Toddlers & PreK

This Halloween themed Pack features 27 hands-on activities, and it is available for Free to all email subscribers. Here is what's included:

Literacy Activities:
-Cut & Paste the Missing Letter
-Letter Sound Matching
-Sight Word Matching
-Tracing words
-Letter Sorting
-Rhyming Words
-Which letter does not belong?

Pre-Writing:
-Trace the Circles
-Trace Horizontal Lines
-Trace Vertical Lines

Math Activities:
-Numbers 1-10 Puzzle
-Counting 1-5
-Counting 6-10
-Cut & Paste the Correct Number
-Number Matching
-Quantity Matching
-Patterns
-Cut & Paste in Order from Smallest to Biggest
-Sorting by Size
-Shape Matching

Visual Discrimination:
-Matching Halloween items
-Matching Jack-o-lantern faces
-Sorting Halloween items

Scissor Skills:
-Cutting straight lines
-Cutting zig zag lines
-Cutting page in 4 sections

Puzzles:
-Cut & Paste Puzzle
-Numbers 1-10 Puzzle

Below is a Sneak Peek:
Free Halloween Printable Pack for Toddlers & PreK

This Halloween Printable Pack is FREE for all Totschooling subscribers!


What can I expect as a Subscriber?:
-You will receive free printables that are not available for download on the website. This includes holiday and seasonal packs, as well as other themed activity packs.
-You will get access to a growing collection of Board Book Printable Activities.
-You will receive 2-3 emails per week with new posts, freebies, sales and additions to the site.
-You will receive a special subscriber discount for the Online Store.
-Your information will never be shared with anybody else.

Tuesday, 15 July 2014

Tangram Shape Puzzles for Toddlers

Tangram Shape Puzzles for Toddlers
This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for your support.
 
My girls have loved puzzles from an early age. When my first daughter was a toddler, I created these Tangram-inspired matching shape puzzles for her to practice shapes, colors and spatial skills in an easy, toddler-friendly way.
 
What are tangram puzzles?
Tangrams are traditional Chinese puzzles made from a square that is divided into seven shapes. These shapes are rotated, moved and arranged to create specific forms and figures using all seven pieces.
Tangrams are very good for critical thinking and spatial reasoning skills. They're a lot of fun for kids of all ages!
 
If you are interested in Tangram puzzles, you can purchase them through my affiliate below:
 


 
The printable puzzles that I created come in 2 difficulty levels. For younger toddlers (around 18-24 months), there are fewer pieces to match and the design is simpler. The shapes and colors are independent from each other, so the child can match either by color or by shape. For older toddlers (around 24-36 months), there is another level of difficulty as they have to match the shape, size and color at the same time. Some shapes are the same size but different colors and others are the same color but different sizes.
 
As with most of my toddler printables, I recommend that you laminate the sheets so that you have a durable and reusable puzzle that your child can do over and over again, and you can use with future children.
 
Note: Some of the pieces in the more advanced puzzles are fairly small, so always use under adult supervision. After laminating and cutting out the shapes, some of the corners may be sharp (particularly the triangles) so I recommend cutting off the corners.
 
Download the Free Printable Puzzles here:
 
 
For more puzzles, check out the Puzzles & Games page!
 
 
Recommended Products (affiliate links):