Do your toddlers or preschoolers like airplanes, colors, and games?
Here’s something fun and easy you can do indoors or outdoors. Take a sheet of colorful paper ( 8.5 x 11) and tear/cut in half. Then with one half make a toddler paper airplane using the steps below. I call them “Toddler Paper Airplanes” because I like to fold down the nose of the airplane so that they aren’t too pointy.
- Fold the half in half.
- Then open up and fold the corners in to the crease.
- Fold the tip down just about a 1/4 to 1/2 inch.
- Then fold along middle crease, bringing the wings together.
- Fold each wing down leaving about an inch for the body.
- Then fold up the ends of the wings just about a 1/4 inch. ( Or just use your own method of making a paper airplane. :) )
Then take the other half of the colored paper and draw a dotted line down the middle for the runway. Depending on the development stage of your toddler/preschooler, you can also add a shape, letter, or number to the end of the runway for learning opportunities.
Now put the runways down on the floor and have your toddler step back with the paper airplanes to see if she/he can have one land on its runway. Or you as the adult can see if you can do it too! Remember to talk about the color of the plane as you make it fly and when it lands, talk about where it landed. “I’m going to make the yellow paper airplane fly. Oh look it landed next to the green runway that has the square on it! Can you fly the blue airplane to the blue runway with the number 1 on it?”
Toddlers love activities where they can move around, so if you can’t make any of the airplanes land on their runways, that’s really ok! (I wasn’t very successful at first. ) You just want to find a way to be active, provide learning opportunities, and have FUN!
- You can do this activity/game in a hallway and have your toddler start at one end of the hallway and keep flying the airplane all the way to the end where the landing strip is.
- You can put the landing strips in a different room as where the planes are. Then have your toddler help you get the airplanes to their landing strips, walking it through the house to find the right landing strip.