Toddler Busy Work

السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته

Sometimes, especially at certain times of the year (i.e. end of school year, summer approaching, Ramadan, etc.), it's helpful to have activities on hand that toddlers can access and complete almost independently. The following activities are some that are used just for that purpose and some can be added to students portable writing centres as well.

Everything the toddler needs to complete the activity is stored in the plastic zip-lock bag. Teachers/parents can make several copies (enough for each student/child) of the worksheet (this worksheet is an extension from the activity in this post) and place them in a basket. In a second basket, you can place the plastic bags with the glue stick and pieces that need to be glued to the worksheet.  Students take one worksheet and one bag and complete the activity independently insha'Allaah.

These books need to be assembled by teacher/parent. The pre-assembled book and a sheet with apple stickers is placed in a plastic bag for students to complete independently as well insha'Allaah. This little book (Arabic only) is for students to work on 1:1 correspondence.

Then on to fine motor skill practice and practical life activities:

This is a very common Montessori activity that helps children work on fine motor skills and the pincer grasp (the ability to grasp a small object between the tips of the thumb and index finger).

I added a practical life extension activity so that there was a bit of variety:

From a basket, students take a shirt and a clothes pin and hang the shirts on the line in the correct numerical order. There are shirts for 0-5 pictured here. Each shirt has a teddy bear (or bears) on it ranging from 0-5.

Into this activity you can place Control of Error so the child(ren) can check their work once they've hung all of the shirts on the line. By writing the numbers on the back of the shirts that correspond to the amount of bears on the front of the shirts, children can walk around the line of bears and make sure the numbers are in the correct order - i.e. 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. 

The string that is used for this activity cannot/should not be left up when children are done with the activity. This activity also needs to be supervised by an adult as a choking hazard is present (i.e. the string which is at the toddlers eye level). 

When children are done, they remove the shirts and clothes pins from the line and put them back in the basket and return the activity to the appropriate shelf/space.

Here is the shirt pattern I used for this and the teddy bears if you'd like to use them insha'Allaah. If you'd like to make shirts with bears up to the number 10 here are bears to complete the set insha'Allaah. An alternative is to use stickers to save time cutting out 55 teddy bears.

I also put together some little workbooks for toddlers and preschoolers to pick up and complete with little supervision or assistance (depending on the age of the child)

Above, these are two of the four (4) workbooks for toddlers to work on. The book in the bottom right hand corner is a little math book for toddlers and the book in the upper left corner is a colouring book for transportation.

In the math book, there are two pages that are to be cut out and the child pastes the pieces into the correct boxes on the appropriate page(s) (i.e. the piece that matches the picture on the page). Another activity requires that the child place the correct amount of stickers in each box (i.e. each box has a certain number of circles and the child must put the correct number of stickers in each box. So if a box has three circles, the child will put three stickers in that box - one over each circle insha'Allaah). Alternately, the child can colour in the circles in each box, making sure all circles for each number are the same colour (i.e. for the box with 5 circles all circles can be coloured blue insha'Allaah).

All of the workbooks are: 

- Transportation (Arabic Only)

- Math (Title in Arabic but no words in the book)

- The Shapes (Arabic Only) colouring book and cut & paste activity

- Hadith Colouring Book (this is just a smaller version of this hadith colouring book)

Enjoy insha'Allaah!