More Oceans of Fun

My boys are still loving the ocean stuff. I think Daddy's California roots are influencing them. Not that I mind at all. There's few places in the world I love more than California, especially San Diego. When Mike and I strike it rich and have millions of extra dollars, we will relocate to that beachy city and live in a sweet little (but not too little...) beach cottage. We will lay on the beach, dining alfresco, kids playing happily together in the sand. I will be gloriously tanned, thin and relaxed.

OK, so that's not reality, but a girl can dream, can't she?

Back to the ocean of learning at our desert abode. Here are a few more fun activities to whisk us away to the beach, if only momentarily.

Ocean Puzzles:


These puzzles were shared by some fabulous kindergarten teachers I worked with. They were always a big hit in the classroom, and Andrew liked them as well. You need a puzzle board (cardstock), with only the rectangles and letters at the bottom. The puzzle pieces (also cardstock) have the letters and puzzle picture. I laminated both and cut up the puzzle pieces after laminating. I also made a die (just a blank wooden cube) with each of the letters written with a Sharpie on the sides. You roll the die, and place the puzzle piece on the puzzle board that corresponds with the letter rolled. If you roll the same letter, just roll again. You can easily play with a partner and take turns rolling and piecing the puzzle together. Andrew got frustrated with rolling the same letter over and over, so we did a little "cheating" to finish them up. Whatever works. I also have these puzzles for other themes, such as farm, color words, and cowboys.


Here are the words used for the ocean puzzles. Because you only have 6 sides on your die, you have to be a bit creative in your word choices.

1 fish*
1 crab *
8 arms (octopus)
1 star * (starfish)
2 claws (lobster)
1 horse (seahorse)
1 whale

Fishbowl water color:


Often, paint makes me super nervous, but this art project is a simple one, and not too messy. Either print off a fishbowl outline, or draw one with a permanent marker. Have your child color and ocean scene inside the bowl. The important part is to color DARKLY and not use too much blue. Light, bright colors, such as yellow, stand out best. After you color the scene (do not color the water, leave background white), you watercolor the entire bowl blue. (If you have blue tempera paint, you could water that down and paint with that instead.) Let it dry and you have a fun little fish bowl. For a little extra pizzaz, when I taught, I would sometimes make a black construction paper fishbowl, cut out the center, and put extra laminating film on the inside and staple this to the front of the painting to make it look like a "glass" fishbowl frame.


Finding Nemo Concentration:


I actually cut this off of a Kellogg's cereal box many moons ago and saved it. I am glad I did. There are only 8 matching pairs, which is just about right for us now. I'm sure you could just as easily use some clip art and make your own set. I liked that the names were printed below the pictures, and that there are more than just fish.