Quiet activities for 3 & 4 y/o boys

[GymMom]

I'm looking for some ideas to keep my 2 dcb busy - and quiet - during the babies' morning naps. They're not much into crafts but they do enjoy play doh & painting. I'm looking for some new ideas! Also, any board game recommendations for this age??

[Dreamalittledream]

This is actually when I do outdoor time. I grab my video baby monitor and take the older ones out to play.
Activity ideas/games: Help prepare afternoon snack, I Spy (mine love the game as well as the I Spy books), put together my big bucket of car tracks, Mr. Potato Head, big floor puzzles, Kinex building pieces, treasure hunt (I hide laminated shapes, or animals, or whatever in the room for them to find), mine all love books (I often put a basket of books down and they will sit and look at them all).

[Inspired by Reggio]

My group loves playing with the 'treasures' as they call them ... little gemstones we've collected and they are awesome on the light table but work just on a plain white work space to help the colors pop ... they make designs, pictures, tell stories with them, sort and so forth.



We also enjoy 'color scientists' ... food coloring in water with ice cube or other 'sorting/mixing' tray and eye droppers



Water play keeps them quiet and busy ~ if you put out little 'individual' bins it helps keep the water contained and quiet and you can put animals or whatever interests your boys ~ mine like zoo animals or dinosaurs in there.



With the playdoh think outside the box about what you put out with it ~ so sometimes instead of traditional cookie cutter and rolling pins I put out feathers, pipe cleaners, buttons, flower picks and they create 'creatures' with them.




Pom pom sorting is one they enjoy too ~ pom poms, ice cube trays and chop sticks ... they have to pick up the pom poms and place them in the ice cube tray using the chopsticks only if they are not ready for chopsticks you can use 'tongs'.

Games wise I have a few like 'dinosaur bingo' that they enjoy ... you can make up your own themed bingo games online if you google templates for it and than just laminate.

[playfelt]

I have thought about doing the outside time during naptime too but in an emergency when you hear/see something on the monitor that needs your attention a lot of time will be wasted - maybe too much time getting the other kids rounded up to go back into the house to deal with the younger child that it just never seemed safe to me.

Is it new activities you need or new rules for the old activities - volume of voice during naptime. They can still play with the cars but they need to keep their voices down. Banning things like active games, running, balls, etc. makes sense of course but that is a long time to make 3 year olds be still and quiet doing sit down type work.

[Inspired by Reggio]

Ya agreed Playfelt ~ I am not comfortable with having some of my children inside while others are outside specially this time of year.

I do not do quiet time activities if I have a morning napper we just play in the play with 'quieter voices' and our normal options cause well with morning naps I do not really mind if they get 'woken' cause I want to start eliminating those as soon as possible anyway

It is just afternoon nap time when I offer 'quiet stuff' cause the majority are still sleeping and well it is MY quiet/break time too and if they are up I want them sitting 'engaged' so I can be doing my stuff for afternoon prep

[bright sparks]

How about making some sensory boxes. Kind of an I spy but bigger and interactive and you can store them forever and use them over and over. This is an excellent website with wonderful ideas...

http://countingcoconuts.blogspot.ca/...Sensory%20Tubs

I have spent literally hours getting ideas from this woman. Enjoy

[monkeymama]

my 4yo dkb loves playing cards, memory games, big floor puzzles and just coloring in coloring books. he also loves board games: skip-bo, monopoly junior, candy land etc. i have an entire closet of board games and he picks a different one once a week to master lol

[Spixie33]

Yikes - I wouldn't leave kids inside the house alone even with a monitor. I am always scared there could be a fire or carbon monoxide and then you wouldn't even know and it would be hard to explain why you left kids inside the house alone if God forbid something did happen.

Nothing can replace good old ears and eyes inside the house on alert even from a distance.

For the activities....I would love that sort of time with a 3 and 4 year old to do kindergarten readiness type activities. I think that would be the perfect time for them to work on gluing, cutting, handwriting readiness and name printing, colour sorting, patterns, etc one on one with you. I have a group with some under 2s and some who are off to JK this September and I have a hard time getting good learning time with my preschoolers because the little ones always want to join in and I have to sort of entertain two different groups. Having time to do kindergarten/school readiniess stuff alone with them would be perfect. Upper/lower case ABCs...more complex crafts....etc are all good ways to keep the older ones busy too.

[Inspired by Reggio]

...
http://countingcoconuts.blogspot.ca/...Sensory%20Tubs

I have spent literally hours getting ideas from this woman. Enjoy

I her blog too!

[Dreamalittledream]

Thanks ladies on the feedback about outdoor play (with video monitor) while baby sleeping indoors...you've really made me rethink; I guess i had a real false sense of security with the video monitor. Reorganizing my day as we speak....whew it's hard some days to fit everything in; mealtimes, planned activities, nap times, outdoor play.