note: this activity was done during a week long camp
called “way back when…” for 4 & 5 year olds at our local museum.

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i know i’ve seen this recipe for a long time…just never made it.

but i am teaching a week long camp at the museum based on pioneer days and i wanted a “baking” looking color to go with our enamel dishes. usually i do a plain play doh with a bit of cinnamon.

this year i also made a batch of chocolate play dough…the first batch not working (way too crumbly…not sure what happened). very quickly the chocolate and cinnamon/vanilla batches are blended.

chocolate play dough:

combine (i do all the mixing in my kitchen aid):

1.5 cups flour

.5 cup cocoa

3 tsp cream of tartar

boil:

2 cups water

1 cup salt

2 tbs oil

mix it all together (at this point i had to add quite a bit of extra flour…not sure how much)

first posted in 2008.  now is a good time to start drinking and start collecting little things for some new alphabet i spy bottles!

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my kids were glad to help drink 26 bottles of gatorade and vitamin water so i could have wider-mouth bottles.

the preschoolers help me fill bottles with rice and then i hide something inside correlated to a letter.  i tape the lid on with colored duct tape and write the letter on the lid.

so far there is one little apple hidden in the A bottle

a plastic baby, a bird and a button hidden in the B bottle

plastic cows hidden in the C bottle

dice hidden in the D bottle

an egg and an elephant hidden in the E bottle

i’m thinking feathers in the F bottle, blades of grass in the G bottle, horses in the H bottle, ivy in the I bottle, jacks in the J bottle…on and on.

a little guy told me today that the A bottle was his favorite thing at preschool. wow.

i did this for micah’s birthday once with a dinosaur theme.  at preschool we use this for any letter of the alphabet since we can hide anything in the ice (except maybe u or x things…ideas, anyone?)!  appleseeds, counter bears, coins, dinosaurs, elephants, fake flower petals, green things, horses, jewels, keys, lace, money, nuts, o ring shapes, paper clips, quills, red things, snakes, turtles, valentines (plastic hearts), white things, yellow things, zoo animals.

but i like to use it during i week since that’s kind of a tricky letter to find things for.

ahead of time the teacher fills containers of any kind with water, then drops in some objects that won’t break when hit, then freezes.

preschoolers are offered tools for excavating the treasures…wooden blocks work the best in my experience.

take this as an opportunity to discuss the wonder that our eyes will blink or squint to protect themselves.  encourage this against the flying ice. : )

and if it is warm outside, take it all out!  when i week falls in a cooler month, we wear our mittens and break the ice chunks on art trays.