#113: Blow Bubbles

Blow bubbles!


If you don’t have bubble mix or a bubble wand, you can make your own.
Materials needed:
small container (deeper is better than wider)
10 mL (2 tsp) dish soap (Joy and Dawn work well)
60 mL (¼ cup) water
5 mL (1 tsp) glycerine (You don’t have to use it, but it will make the bubbles better. You can buy it in most drug stores.)
Thin wire – about 20 cm long (for making a bubble wand)

Mix all the ingredients together in the container. To make a bubble wand, bend the wire into a loop (a circle) at one end. (Make the loop about 5cm or 2 1/2 inches across.) You will dip the loop into the soap mixture and then gently blow through the loop to make bubbles. Wrapping yarn around the loop will help it hold more bubble solution.

Other bubble wand ideas: use a fly swatter, a hole cut in a plastic lid from a yogurt container, or your hands held in a circle shape.

HINT: The bubble mix is better the second day, so if you have the time, make it the day before.


This activity promotes joy.

#112: Build a car, truck or submarine

Using a cardboard box, build yourself a vehicle (a car, truck, submarine or even something else). To make your vehicle bigger, tape two boxes together or use a large fridge box.

To make your box look like the vehicle you want, draw or paint the outside. You can use paper plates to make a steering wheel or wheels. Smaller plates or muffin papers taped or glued on will make great headlights. Draw a speedometer and gauges inside the box. For smaller vehicles, cut leg holes in the bottom of the box so you can walk and staple straps onto your vehicle to help hold it up. Cut out a door...be creative and have fun!


This activity promotes creativity.

#111: Race Sticks

Safety First: Rivers can be dangerous. Stay away from the edge as it is easy to slip in and get swept away. Bring an adult or stand on a bridge above the water.

Each person drops a stick in the river. See which stick moves the fastest. If you are on a bridge, drop your stick upstream and race to the other side to see whose stick comes out from under the bridge first.



Make this a family activity: Each family member races their own stick. Make teams.

This activity promotes judgment based on visual clues (where the water seems to run the fastest and will result in your stick moving the fastest and therefore winning).

#110: Grow a Vegetable

It isn't too late to start growing your vegetables for the summer!



Decide what vegetables you would like to grow and buy the seeds. If it is still chilly at night in your area, you may need to start your vegetables in small pots indoors, then move them out into the garden when it warms up a bit more.

If you plant a few seeds this week, wait two weeks, then plant another bunch of seeds, your vegetables will be ready to pick and eat at different times this summer.

If you live in an apartment or condo and don't have a garden, you can grow your vegetables in a planter on a balcony or in front of a large, sunny window. As well, some communities have community gardens where everyone can come together to grow their own plots in a larger garden.

Have fun eating your yummy veggies! (And don't forget to water them!)


Make this a family activity by getting the whole family involved. Each member picks a vegetable they would like to grow and they take care of them.

This activity promotes food knowledge, independence and responsibility.

#109: Find Cloud Animals

Find a nice comfy piece of grass, lay down and check out the clouds. Are there any that look like animals? As the clouds keep moving and changing, see what animals you can see.

Is that a dinosaur?

Make this a family activity: See what different animals each member of your family sees in a cloud.

This activity promotes imagination and shape recognition.

#108: Charades

One player acts out a word, phrase, movie title, person, or pretty much anything they can think of and the rest of the group tries to guess what they are acting out. The actor cannot speak or make any noises while acting out their charade. The player who guesses correctly gets to act out the next charade.



Here are a few ideas to get you started:
Drink
Swim
Driving
Man on the moon
Cat
Tree
Singing
Baby
Crying
Eating
School
Milking a cow
Making a cake
Birthday party
Fight
Snowman
Watching a movie
Building a sand castle


Make this a family activity: Play with the whole family. Make teams and see who wins.

This activity promotes imagination, social intelligence and kinesthetic learning.

#107: Swtich a Line

Read a sentence from one story and then have a friend read a sentence from a different story. Take turns.




Sometimes it gets pretty silly!


Make it a family activity: Each member reads from their favourite book or magazine.

This activity promotes literacy, listening skills as well as reading and listening comprehension skills.