Tot School: Textured Ball and Rock Bin, Letter B, Counting Honeycombs and Cubes, Shape Tossing

B is 41 months Z is 11.5 months It is our second week of returning to organized tot trays or what I now refer to as tot school along with 1+1+1=1 blog.  I have primarily decided to share these on my blog, because I have found other blogs who share their ideas extremely helpful and motivating.   If you want to read a little more about how I set up my bins it can be found in my first Tot School post.   
*Many of the links are affiliate links, so I will get a percentage if you choose to order something through one of our links, but at no expense to you.  We personally own (or have read from the library) everything I have included in this post.

• Exploring Bin- I filled the exploring bin this week with smooth rocks and small neon textured balls (both purchased at the Dollar Tree).  I added our plastic penguins, nesting barrels, stacking cups, tweezers, and a few other empty containers.  This was one of B's favorite sensory bins to date.  He love the neon textured balls.  He refers to them as, "nature sauts!"  I have no idea what that means or where it came from, but he had a blast with them.

Zoe wanted to get in on the action too.  No, I would not recommend this activity for children her age.  However, anytime she is playing with something small I sit and watch her.  It was totally worth the few rocks I had to remove from her mouth, because she thoroughly enjoyed herself.  B usually plays with these bins when she is sleeping, but he asked to play with it in the afternoon and I said yes deciding I would watch her closely. 

• Alphabet Bin- Last week we focused on the letter B making the bee craft from Totally Tots.  He traced the upper and lower case B on his alphabet dry erase cards (which I found for $1 at Target) and we read What If There Were No Bees? and Bear and Bee which we checked out from the library.

I would recommend both of the books seen below.  What If There Were No Bees is a book about how our world would change if there were no bees.  The illustrations are great and the text is simply enough and help a young child understand the importance of bees in our ecosystem.

Bear and Bee has a very sweet story line.  The bear has never seen a bee, so he is clueless that he is talking to a bee.  He assumes bees are big and scary, but the bee convinces him otherwise.  B really enjoyed this book and asked me to read it several times.

• Manipulatives Bin- I found this counting puzzle at the Dollar Tree that went perfectly with our B week and our bee books.  The puzzle required B to count the honeycombs to figure out where it fit on the puzzle board.  

The puzzle was a little difficult for him, because the pieces had to be turned multiple times before they would fit. 

We then used our Wood Counting Cubes to build towers on each number.  B really enjoys the wood counting cubes.  We have been using them a lot for counting.  

• Later in the week I switched to a Counting Floor Puzzle which he really enjoys, but we still made towers with our counting cubes on each number.

• Free Bin- I filled the bin with various shaped buttons and and spread flashcards with matching shapes on the floor.  Directions were to throw the shaped button to the matching shape card.  B does not naturally gravitate toward throwing activities, so this was a good way to incorporate the activity.

• I gave Zoe a box filled with various plastic lids that B used for Flip Top Lid Fun when he was about 18 months old.  She enjoyed herself, but is much more interested in doing what B is doing.