Everyday Learning: Walking & Graphing Car Colors

I love taking walks around the neighborhood with my kiddos in the afternoons.  It's a good way to get some fresh air and get their wiggles out.  Sometimes we just walk, but many times we have a "goal" on our walks.  Last week, we used one of our walks to tally and graph the colors of cars we saw.  It's very easy to adapt an activity like this to meet the needs of many different ages of children all at once.

Each child brought a notebook and a pen.  Before walking, we made color-coated spots for tallying (red, orange, yellow...etc).  Using color coating instead of words made it possible for even my 3 year old to participate.  Older kids can practice their color words by just using the names of the colors for tallying.

Then we were off!  Each time they saw a car, they stopped to mark a tally on their chart.  My 7 year old knows how to tally 4 lines and mark it off with a 5th, and my 5 year old just marks lines. My 3 year old was simply focusing on trying to put a line on the correct color spot.  I was honestly a little shocked at how focused my 3 year old was on the task at hand.  

Later, we took time to graph their results.  I printed some simple graphing charts from online.  To adapt for age differences, I gave my 7 year old a graph that counted by 2's, and my 5 and 3 year olds a graph that counted by 1's.  

Once they were finished graphing, we practiced reading our graphs:

"Which car color did you see the most of?"

"Which car color did you see the least of?"  

"How many blue cars did you see?"

"Were there any colors you didn't see any at all?"

"Which car color was your favorite?"

It was an easy way for us to incorporate some "learning" into an everyday event...taking a walk!  

How do you incorporate learning into everyday things?  

Fall Walks & Nature Play

I LOVE fall.  Love.  Love.  Love it.  It is my favorite season by far.  Taking my kids on walks during the fall is also my favorite.  There are so many beautiful things to find, touch, smell, and take home with you (sure, you can take things home during the summer, but  picking leaves straight off someone else's tress or flowers out of their garden beds is frowned upon in most places).  Above are some of the goodies my girls found on our walk today.  The tiny acorns are my favorite...I've never seem them so small!  We've walked by the house dozens of times and I had never noticed them before.  Zoe's favorite was the brown ball things (bottom right).  When they get crushed, there are a bazillion cotton things in it (anyone know what they are called?).  Ellie's favorite is the brown banana shaped things.  The beans inside are hard and she calls them her "maracas".  She always finds them and then shakes them throughout our walks while singing at the top of her lungs.

The tree above is the crab apple tree in our front yard.  The leaves have all turned orange and red, and about half have fallen to the ground.  Most of the green crab apples, though, are still hanging on the tree.  It is so beautiful to look at.

We used the bottom of our stroller to collect our items, but if you don't use a stroller, you can always allow your children to carry along a bucket or bag.  Once home, the girls put their bucket on the table.  I gave each of the girls a set of number cards.  Depending on your child's age, you can choose lower or higher numbers (Zoe, 3, got #'s 1-5, Ellie, 5, got #'s 15-19).  You can also do math equation cards for older kids (4+).  Then, you can have your child match the correct number of items to the number cards.  

Then Ellie (5) ordered her items from smallest to biggest, and then the opposite.

You can have younger kids sort by shape, color, etc.  

Tomorrow Ellie has requested a glue bottle and paper so she can glue her items to paper.  

Who knew a fall walk could be so fun AND educational at the same time?

Yay for fall!