Playful Penguin Pastimes -
Between staying warm, raising chicks, finding food and avoiding predators, a penguin’s life may not sound like much fun. But penguins have some playful pastimes — many of which are surprisingly similar to human hobbies!
Tobogganing: Penguins lie on their belly and toboggan through the ice and snow. This helps them move quickly.
Surfing: Penguins are often seen surfing through the waves onto land. It is also fun to dive into the water!
If you are a penguin your dinner will consist of seafood. A penguin’s main diet is fish, though they’ll also eat squid, small shrimplike animals called “krill” and crustaceans.
If you look closely at a penguin’s bill you’ll notice a hook at the end, perfect for grabbing dinner. They also have backward facing bristles on their tongues that help slippery seafood from getting away.
Penguins don’t live near freshwater — at least none that isn’t frozen. Instead they drink salt water. They have a special gland in their bodies that takes the salt out of the water they drink and pushes it out of grooves in their bill. A handy in-house filtration system!
Read more at: http://www.kidzone.ws/animals/penguins/facts9.htm
Why not take a minute or two and look through our website’s selections of toddler learning toys which include alphabet and number puzzles. Our Counting penguins 3d wooden puzzles have just arrived in our latest shipment and are once again available for your children. These wood puzzles are for ages 3 and up and are painted with lead-free, non toxic paint.
Have you wandered through our selection of wood puzzles lately? Several of our toddler learning toys have been out of stock but we are happy to announce that most all of our 3d wooden puzzles have just arrived in our lastest shipment.
Included in this shipment of our 3d wooden puzzles were our brightly colored butterfly alphabet puzzles and our counting penguins. Both of these wood puzzles are excellent tools for parents and preschool teachers to help teach children their abc’s or counting numbers 1-10.
Butterfly Facts for Kids
Butterflies belong to the insect order Lepidoptera, which is Greek for “scaly wing.” Butterfly wings are made of tiny scales that create beautiful colors and striking patterns. The dark colors help the butterfly keep warm by absorbing heat from sunlight.
Because they are cold-blooded, butterflies cannot produce their own body heat. There are about 20,000 species of butterflies and they can be found in every part of the world, except in Antarctica.
During their lifetimes butterflies change form three times – from egg to caterpillar to chrysalis to butterfly. This is called metamorphosis. When the caterpillar hatches from the egg, all it wants to do is eat. It gains so much weight that it has to shed its skin four or five times. The last shed produces a hard case called a chrysalis or pupa.
Some species wrap themselves in silk before they change to a chrysalis for extra protection. Though it’s not visible, a dramatic change takes place inside the chrysalis. The caterpillar turns into a butterfly. Some species make the change in few days; others may take years!
Read more about butterflies on the website where I located the above information: www.theworldalmanacforkids.com
Celebrate the season with a decorative collage pot full of vibrant spring flowers! When you have to stay in because of the spring rains that will surely come a bright, new craft idea will help entertain your kids age 5 – 8 years old.
This activity is appropriate for:
kindergarten – 3rd grade / 5 – 8 years
You will need:
- Collage Pots – Set of 15
- Lakeshore Fully Washable Liquid Tempera – Pints
- Collage Buttons
- Lakeshore Heavy-Duty Brushes
- Best-Buy School Glue
- Art Tissue Paper
- Pipe Stems
- Construction Paper – 9″ x 12″
- Safety Scissors
- Super-Safe Craft Tape Center – 1″
- Yarn Laces with Tips
I found this craft idea at: http://www.lakeshorelearning.com/general_content/free_resources/teachers_corner/projects/springFlowers.jsp?f=featured. Go here for the directions to make this pretty pot of flowers.
In the market for a new 3d wooden puzzle? See our six piece cat family puzzle or our six piece dog family puzzle. Both are popular wood puzzles for kids 3 and up. Painted with non-toxic paints. Each puzzle piece is its own cat or dog toy.
Want a unique toy for your child’s Easter basket? Our three chicks wood puzzle will put a smile on your child’s face and be her/his favorite Easter toy this year!
These delightful chicks are made from splinter-proof hardwood and painted with non-toxic paints. Each chick is different and consists of two pieces. This 3d wooden puzzle is geared for children 3 and up.
Our wood puzzles have chunky pieces that children can easily grasp but because of the small pieces there is a choking hazard warning and this 3d wooden puzzle is not for children under three.
In stock and available from our website, All I Can Imagine.
A snail lives in a shell and moves very slowly. To teach kids about snails it helps to have a live specimen available.
If you have a garden you probably have a snail nearby. Did you know garden snails feed on both living and decaying plants which can damage your garden’s crops? Because of this fact, snails are not very welcome in your garden and are considered pests.
Regardless that the snail is a pest they do make an interesting educational lesson for your children. Snails are neat to learn about and fun to watch.
Let’s get back to the “snail trail hunt”. So where do you look for snail trails? Most garden snails live in and around moist areas such as near ponds, in the woods, and of course, in the garden. They usually travel in irregular paths, oftentimes in a circle and sometimes even upside down.
Take the kids for a walk on a cloudy day along a nature trail or at night in the backyard to see if they can spot any snail trails. Hunt for snail trail in the garden along walks and walls or beneath stones, leaves, or flowerpots. Follow the snail trail to see where it leads. Be aware, however, that not all snail trails are the same. It could belong to the slug instead. A slug is simply a snail without a shell. So how do you tell the two trails apart? If the snail trail is continuous, then it’s a slug. If there are breaks in the trail, it’s a snail.
If you find a snail have your child capture him and put it in a clear container with a lid and air vents. When disturbed the snail will retreat back into its shell. This is how they also sleep and hibernate during the winter. Find more snail facts online or at your library.
For craft ideas you may like a website I just located: http://daniellesplace.com/HTML/snailcrafts.html
If you have a young child 3 and up who is learning his numbers he will love our snail 3d wooden puzzle. This wood puzzle is made from splinter-proof hardwood and measures 6” x 5”. Painted in bright primary colors that kids love each chunky piece has an individual number painted on it.
Every childhood expert agrees that having a strong emotional/social connection with your children is absolutely key to growing strong, healthy people. In order to really know your children, you must have an open line of communication; and the earlier you start the better.
Recent studies show that the toddler who feels heard and connected grows up to be a teen that is willing to open up and communicate more. Choose your timing. A preschooler who has been with 15 other children for several hours will probably feel over-stimulated and overwhelmed.
Don’t start interrogating him in the car on the way home! Let him decompress and relax back into the energy of his home. Maybe dinner time or bath time is a better choice.
Take out a wood puzzle and work on it together. When the focus is off the child he will open up and share his feelings and open ended questions won’t put him off.
Educational playtime is of the utmost importance. Parents and educators alike believe educational childrens toys that promote creative play provide great educational value for your children.
3d wooden puzzles are just one of the many children’s toys that are recommended for homes, schools and as waiting room toys. It is a well know fact that children most often play with toys that provide fun play as well as creative learning opportunities.
While providing children with a new wood puzzle as often as possible you will observe your children engaging in a unique learning experience without them even knowing it. 3d wood puzzles are a good idea for beginner puzzles and they may be incorporated into other play activities because they are chunky and easy to grasp.
As with the Monkey Tree Puzzle shown above, and many other 3d wooden puzzles, an individual puzzle piece may be a complete whole character/animal. These seperate figures will be a welcome addition to incorporate with your children’s playsets and other games or to play with alone.
The year was 1915 and history was being made in Waterford, New York. The opening or the new Erie Canal from Waterford to Rexford began as the Tug Schenectady entered the Waterford Flight of Locks on May 15th.
Over the next three years, different sections of the Barge Canal would open as completed. Soon, backyards throughout New York State would feature long barges loaded with goods of all kinds, pushed and pulled by sleek and unassuming tugs, whose smooth lines and tranquil appearance while at rest would belie massive steam (and later diesel) engines below, giving them tremendous capacity to do their work.
Belching gigantic clouds of black smoke; these unique canal-going tugs, with their beguiling lines and sparkling brass, enchanted children of all ages from Waterford to Whitehall and Tonowanda. Gazing upon these fire breathing dragons moving effortlessly through the water, many would dream of someday taking the place of that kindly Engineer or Captain leaning up against the wheelhouse – taking a puff on his pipe, and giving a wave of his cap.
Kids of all ages were fascinated by watching tug boats and for twenty-four hours a day, communities had – permanently ingrained in the backdrop of their main streets and rolling fields alike – a constantly changing collage of these proud, magnificent vessels. Tugboats were as common a sight as a man walking a dog, or a child riding a bike. Oh, how times have changed.
Bring back the excitement in this time of history with a tug boat wood puzzle toy by ImagiPLAY.
From an article, “First Tug on the Barge Canal”, written by Capt. John C. Callaghan – see pictures of real tug boats and read his full article at: http://www.nycanal.com/history/tugsonthebargecanal.html
Are we inadvertently depriving our kids of important tools for learning and growth? Experts tell us that wooden puzzles and board games are two of the best substitutes for electronic games.
Wood puzzles provide kids many opportunities to learn and practice the important skills important for success when they enter school. Playing with puzzles may at first seem dull or a waste of time compared to the excitement of electronic games, but children still love to play with all the differently shaped pieces and are drawn to the bright primary colors just as we were as children.
Important for building eye hand coordination you will want to have many puzzles on hand in varying degrees of difficulty as children mature at different rates and could get bored with their current selections. When a toy becomes to easy you will notice your child will set it aside and stop playing with it.