Obstacle Course Mom

One concept that comes up in evaluations and therapies is being able to determine what things go together (like hammer and nail, bowl and spoon, etc.). This usually involves the child looking at a picture of something and having to choose from another set of pictures what goes with it.  Being able to match things up like this requires the child to access prior knowledge and if there is no past personal experience than use reasoning skills and logic to determine what makes the most sense. The concept of matching objects with their functions or knowing what objects go together is part of a child’s cognitive development.

A Great Find To Build Knowledge Of Things That Go Together

This was a concept I wasn’t sure if Andrew was grasping when we first began doing My Obstacle Courses with him.  I knew this would fit in perfectly as a station activity and had lots of ideas for how to do so.  While I try to use real objects when I can to help reinforce and build concepts and skills with Andrew, there are some times when it’s not practical or possible and when that happens I love using things that are easy to set up and are also fun and kid-friendly.  I found some Winnie the Pooh Go Together cards at Walgreens (this was years ago and I’m not sure if they still sell them at Walgreens so I’ve attached an Amazon link: for Pooh’s Go Together Game click here ).

I bought them because while they were appealing and inexpensive,

they were helping to build vocabulary as well as making connections between objects

and were self-checking.

When a game or activity is self-checking, it usually means that when the cards or cutouts are flipped over, they will either make a picture or give some indication through symbols (letters, numbers, shapes, or colors) that the choice was correct or incorrect.

I like this because it takes the parent aspect out of the picture a bit – it’s not me determining that it’s right or wrong. If the picture doesn’t match, it is not the correct choice. With this particular game, when the correct match is made and the cards flipped over, they make a picture of Winnie the Pooh characters in a scene using the objects that “go together.”  This is great because we can find the objects in the picture and talk about how they are being used together to help out the characters.

Here is how we have used these cards as My Obstacle Course stations in our house:

My Obstacle Course Station Activity:  Match up the pictures that go together

My Obstacle Course Station Activity:  Clothesline Clipping Things That Go Together

This station activity allows you to combine the concept of things going together with the fine motor skills and motor planning that are necessary when using clothespins to clip two cards onto the clothesline.  (Click here to see a previous post on using clothes lines.)

This is such an easy station activity to set up and can give a lot of information about a child’s ability to determine which objects go together. These cards allowed me to learn about Andrew’s knowledge of things and what experiences we needed to introduce him to. We could talk about how the things were being used with some favorite characters and most importantly, we were having fun together as we flipped the cards over to make pictures. I have to say my $2.00 Walgreens purchase proved to be a wonderful investment!

Engage, Encourage and Empower!

Unexpected Find = Fun, Engaging Activity

I was wandering through the aisles of my teacher supply store and saw a package of these droppers in the science section.

I thought that they would be great to introduce a little bit of experimentation while also building his grasping skills.

My Obstacle Course Station Activity: Experimenting with Color

When teaching kindergarten I always loved teaching about the primary colors (red, yellow and blue) and how to use them to make the secondary colors (orange, green and purple).  The children were always so excited and amazed as though I were a magician magically creating different colors right before their eyes!

I decided that I would set up a My Obstacle Course station that would combine the droppers with making colors. This station activity was not only easy to set up and take down, it was also a huge hit!  Andrew’s exact words were, “This is fun. It is just like Easter!”

My Obstacle Course Station Set Up:

• droppers
• food coloring
• 3 small bowls, cups or ramekins with some water
• 3 small bowls, cups or ramekins that are empty
• rimmed cookie sheet to catch spills
• paper towel or old towel to wipe spills and hands

I used one of my rimmed cookie trays (I have to use them for something since I don’t bake!!), some ramekins (If you worry about breaking the ramekins, you could also use small Dixie or plastic cups or bowls.) and added a few drops of red, yellow and blue food coloring in: red, yellow and blue food coloring. I did this part with Andrew so he could also work on stirring but you could do this for them or ahead of time.  It is kind of cool for them to see the water take on the color of the food coloring drops.

We talked about the colors we were seeing as we added and stirred the food coloring. I told him he was going to use the dropper to get some colored water from one bowl, squeeze it into an empty bowl and repeat with a different color.

These are some questions I asked him as we were doing this:

• What do you think is going to happen?
• What color is going to be in the new bowl?
• Which colors combine to make new colors?
• What happens when you add more of one color?

He used the droppers to combine red and yellow to make orange, yellow and blue to make green, and red and blue to make purple. He had a ball experimenting with these colors and had no idea that he was building skills like motor planning, fine motor grasping skills as well as going through the scientific method by questioning, predicting, experimenting and making conclusions based on his personal experience with the materials. All of that AND he was totally engaged and having fun with me.

Engage, Encourage and Empower!