Valentine's Day Sensory Box with Dollar Tree Items

I love making different kinds of Sensory Boxes to go with themes or the Holiday seasons for my girls. Sensory boxes are great things to make for your kiddos because not only will they have fun with them but it also helps them with their FINE MOTOR SKILLS in their hands that will help them with writing with a pencil or cutting with scissors when they go to school. By pouring and scooping things up in this sensory box, children work the muscle in their hands to help them in the future in school. I wanted to share with you  guys a Valentine's Day Sensory Box that I created for my girls with Dollar Tree Items.

The materials I used was a plastic tub, dry uncooked rice (but you can use white dry beans as well), heart measuring cups, and some Valentine's Day items. All the items pictured above I got at Dollar Tree.

I poured the rice first and then added the items I purchase at dollar tree.

I found some red plastic cups that I had and added it to the sensory box to go with the Valentine's Day theme. I also put in the heart gems and buried some in the rice so that Bri could explore to find them.

Then I let Bri have fun and explore with it. I did add some alphabet magnets one day to the sensory box and as she found them in the rice, I would ask her what letter it was and the sound it makes to practice letter recognition. Another day we practiced counting by counting the heart gems every time she put some in a cup. This sensory box not only helps with fine motor skills but it can be adapted in so many ways to teach other things as well to your kiddos.

What are some fun Valentine's Day theme learning activities do you do with your kiddos? Let me know in the comments below. 

Don't forget to LIKE, PIN, or SHARE this post if you liked it or if you found it helpful.

XOXO

RIA

Valentine's Day Heart Theme Pattern Practice

Hello Everyone! So I know we are still in January but I wanted to share with you some VALENTINE'S DAY  HEART THEME PATTERN PRACTICE activity that I did with Bri when I used to teach her at home during PRE-K and PRESCHOOL time. I always like to change up LEARNING ACTIVITIES to fit the HOLIDAY THEMES because I feel it keeps the kiddos interested in LEARNING when LEARNING ACTIVITIES change up and go with different themes. Bri enjoyed this learning activity and it didn't cost much or take to much time to set up.

All of my materials came from DOLLAR TREE. The HEART shape buttons I found in the craft section and the ice cube tray I found in the the kitchen section of DOLLAR TREE. I made the grid pattern paper myself on Microsoft Word by creating a table and change up the size the of the squares so that the squares would be a little bit of a bigger size then the HEART buttons.

If you can not find the HEART shape buttons then you could also use these HEART candies that are also at DOLLAR TREE.

First I put all the buttons in this HEART shape tray that I also found at DOLLAR TREE. Before we started on PATTERN PRACTICE, I asked Bri to separate the HEART shape buttons by COLOR so that we could also practice COLOR RECOGNITION.  

After Bri was done separating the colors we then started on our PATTERN PRACTICE.

I began the lesson by creating a basic pattern and then asked Bri what is the pattern that she notices on the first line. Once she told me the right pattern, I then told her to finish the pattern herself to the end of the row.

I did the same thing with the next few lines.

The last few rows I let her CREATE her own patterns and as you can see by the picture some were not exactly a pattern LOL but I let her explore and then we cleared the sheet and began again.

This was a cheap, simple, and easy LEARNING ACTIVITY to set up that my child was interested in and had fun while she was learning which are all things that I love in a LEARNING ACTIVITY. Leave me a comment below about some of your favorite VALENTINE'S DAY HEART THEME activities that you like to do with your kiddos.

DON'T FORGET TO LIKE, SHARE, OR PIN THIS POST IF YOU LIKE IT AND FOUND IT HELPFUL.

XOXO
RIA