Girlie Tasks for Work Basket Wednesday!

I have to say, I was some what of a giddy little school girl putting this month's tasks and work baskets together. Being the mom of two boys and the teacher of many preschool boys with special needs, it was a dream to shop for 'girlie' things at Dollar Tree!

So without further ado, I give you 4 girlie work basket ideas with 12 task variations.  Just purchase these 7 Dollar Tree items: a pink and purple tea set, fabric pony tail holders, day of the week princess rings, pink and purple party favor rings, a Strawberry Shortcake piggy bank, a foam number princess puzzle and a set of two 5 inches Styrofoam circles--plus plastic heart barrettes that are not pictured.   

 

I added Velcro coins to the pink and purple tea set to create an assembly task that works on matching with one to one correspondence.

 

You can create six variations of this task by adding letters, numbers, shapes or colors using a Vis-à-vis marker or permanent marker to each plate and each cup for matching practice.  TIP: the permanent marker obviously stays on better, if you wish to use permanent you are still able to change out the concepts by cleaning the tea set with oops cleaner or nail polish remover. 

 

 

Next up a simple put in task with Strawberry Shortcake!

 

And 2 variations for Miss Shortcake using pony tail holders, 2 strips of colored felt, and plastic heart barrettes also from Dollar Tree but unfortunately not pictured above in items purchased. 

 

Task one: use fine motor skills to stretch pony tails holders over the canister for Strawberry Shortcake hair.

 

Task two: cut out two strips of felt and stick them in the slit in the top of the canister.  Then have students put barrettes on the felt using fine motor and sorting skills. 

 

 

You can also do a two step direction put in task by having an all done can and the bowl of barrettes.  "close the barrette then put in all done."

 

 

Next up a ring put in--  Either errorless with one bowl of rings and one container for putting in or a sorting put in task with both the pink and purple rings using the color ring labels that you can find on my Teachers Pay Teachers store. 

 

Variation: add a popsicle stick to the top of the container and have students put on instead of putting  in. 

 

 

Need more?  use the day of the week princess rings and circle Styrofoam for practicing one to one correspondence.

 

Or print the day of the week ring visual, and circle with the days of the week on it from my Teachers Pay Teachers store.  Cut them out and glue the circle to the 5 inch Styrofoam circle. Then have the student assign the rings to the correct day of the week based on the visual.

 

 

For readers, print the visual list to assign the rings to the correct day of the week. 

 

 

And one last activity before I sign off, it is not a work task put instead a fun memory game using the foam numbered princess puzzles, and calling cards from my Teachers Pay Teachers store. Cut the cards out and ask students to put the puzzle piece together in the numbered order you called out. Then turn the card over to the let them to check to see if they were right.  You can watch a video below of my son and I playing the game.  He wants you to be sure to know, he is not a girl though:)

 

 



 

There are a variety of levels in the card set, 3 numbers in order, 4 numbers in order, 3 random numbers and 4 random numbers.   

 

So there you have it, 4 girlie work tasks, with 12 variations-- PLUS a fun memory game!  Be sure to come back next month when I get back in my element and share work baskets and tasks for boys:)

 

But in the meantime, do you have any ideas for making the foam princess puzzle into a work task?  I came up with the fun memory game in lieu of a workbasket because I could think of a good workbasket but I know there has got to be one out there for these cool puzzle pieces.  Please post your ideas below.  (Dollar Tree has boy versions of this puzzle too:)

 

Happy Dollar Tree Shopping and Workbasket Making!

 

-Lindy 

March Work Tasks for Easter

Okay so I know it is a ways off, but I am super excited to share 8 Easter work tasks as part of Autism Classroom News' Workbasket Wednesday!  All you need is a few sets of these Easter erasers from Dollar Tree and the eraser visuals from my TPT store and you have the first 6 tasks at your fingers tips! 

And what's even better, they are leveled!  Level One- a Simple Put in Task: 

Level Two- Egg Assembly:  (My favorite!)  All you need is three cans and some plastic Easter eggs. Arrange the cans left to right for students to take an eraser, open an egg, put the eraser inside, close the egg and put in all done.  

Level Three-Sorting Easter Erasers to Picture Images:  All you need is the picture images, magnet dots and a muffin tin.  

***If you have a student or two who are very rigid and have a hard time being flexible 

you can add a few erasers that don't below and then a symbol that says 

'this does't belong' (like in the photo below).  Just a little extra problem solving :)

Level Four- Sorting Easter Erasers to Icons: This task helps generalize vocabulary.  For example the purple egg and the pink egg are still both eggs.  It also helps students work toward recognizing icons have meaning for icon schedules and visual communication supports.  

Level Five- Sorting Easter Erasers from Christmas Erasers: All you need is some Christmas erasers and a microwave dinner tray with two sections (or any container with two parts or two cans or bowls).  

Level Six- Graphing Easter Erasers: All you need is the worksheet printable and a can to put the erasers in after the students graph them.  

***BONUS: Print the colored version of the worksheet, put it in a page protector 

and use it as a math or social small group activity using a dry erase marker and a take one bag.  

For students who are non-verbal or have limited language you can use this aided language board to facilitate communication about the erasers the students pick out.  

And before I sign off for the night, two other Easter fine motor tasks using this box of Easter memory cards also from the Dollar Tree.  

All you need is a box and clothes pins and you have a fine motor and matching tasks all in one!

To make the task a little more challenging for students who need to strength their fine motor control use binder clips.  

Thanks for stopping by on Workbasket Wednesday or in looking at the time, Workbasket Thursday!

Until next time 'spring' into some new Easter work tasks!

Lindy

7 Day Work Task Challenge - Day 7: Counting, Sorting, & Pincer Grasp

Day 7 of the week-long work task challenge and I am taking it easy!  A wonderful friend, Vickie Unruh, gave me this medicine tower. Here it is on amazon, but I believe she said she found it at a dollar store.

I simply added sticker dots with numbers to each section. Then, the students can screw them together in numerical order. 

Or they can count out that many pony beads, put them in the section and screw the section to the next color. 

This can be done with a single color bead to demonstrate the one-to-one correspondence counting skill.  

Or you could use beads that correspond to the color of each container to make it an errorless learning activity.  

I also added an all done tube. The students will put the colored tower inside the tube prior to putting it in the finished hamper.  

Instructor's Insight: In my experience, students tend to toss their tasks into the all done hamper, in which case I foresee the medicine tower shattering as it lands.  As much as we train students to sit things in carefully, it doesn’t always happen so the tube will insure the tower’s safety.

One more side note, I used the clear container of the tower to hold the beads, this forces students to use a pincer grasp to grab each bead from the container as it's small and they can’t drag the beads to the side of it and pull them out as easy.  It also makes the task store itself which is a nice feature. 

Love the medicine tower!  Vickie, thank you for donating it for the final task number of the 7 Day Work Task Challenge.

7 Day Work Task Challenge - Day 6: Put in, Sorting & Fine Motor Task

Today’s task is one I have been wanting to create for a long time. It is a little more involved and costs a bit more than the others (mostly because I don’t have any little girls at home to steal hair clips from!). In this task, students have to use fine motor skills to pinch off hair clips and place them in a correctly colored hole.  This task goes beyond sorting by the basic colors and moves on to black, brown and clear.  

 All I did to make the task was cover a box with contact paper and trace the tips of the dowel rods on to the top of the box.  Then, I used an exacto knife to cut out the holes.  I put Velcro on the bottom of each dowel and the inside of the box to make the dowels more sturdy and to make them removable for storage purposes.  

Notice I also velcroed a paint stir stick to the top of each dowel.  This makes it so the students can’t simply slide the clips off the dowel.  They must pinch them off using fine motor skills. 

I then cut three squares on the top of the box and outlined them with white, black, and brown For black and brown outline, I used permanent marker and for white outline I used an Elmer’s Paint Pen.   Next, I taped two pieces of cardstock as dividers for inside of the box so it could be self checking. 

Just add the hair clips and Ta-Da, you have a fine motor sorting task.  To make it an easier task, I can remove two of the dowels and just have the student put in one size clip.  The large clips can be easiest for little hands or sometimes even the medium sized clips are easiest depending on the student.   

Another variation is covering two of the square wholes and having the student work on taking off and putting in, rather than taking off and sorting to put in.  

Or yet another variation that is a little trickier is taking all the clips off and having students pinch to open them and put them on the right sized dowel. 

So there you have it a hair clip task that works on fine motor and can work on put in, sorting by color or sorting by size!  What do you think?  What tasks can you make from hair clips?  I see lots of potential with them.  

New Year's Resolution Update & Task Box Countdown: Task Box # 10 - Pincer Grasp Bead Grab

Today is the final task in my Taskbox Countdown.  As you may recall, my New Year's Resolution was to use my classroom materials in a more purposeful and sequential order. 

Post Update:  I really did have the very best of intentions to get my classroom organized this year. Unfortunately, life had other plans.  The sickness of my own boys, as well as managing daily stresses like classroom paperwork, new students, IEPs, and inservice trainings have kept me busy recently.  However, I owe it to my readers to press on with my New Year's Resolution. Frankly, this blog keeps me accountable and I refuse to be one of the 92% who do not keep New Year's Resolutions!

So even if it gets done December 31, 2013, I will get it accomplished! Stay tuned & please keep me accountable! In the meantime, I'd love to hear about your classroom happenings and how you adapt my ideas in your classrooms.  Join the discussion on Facebook! 



Task Box Countdown: Task Box # 10 - Pincer Grasp Bead Grab

Several years ago, someone donated small tackle boxes of pony beads to the classroom.  For the longest time we used them to make bracelets and necklaces at the art center until I came up with this special function.  

Melissa, an occupational therapist in our school district, explained to me that children can really exercise their pincer grasps by digging small items out of little cases and containers.  For example, instructing them to use their thumbs & pointer fingers to pull out coins or beads from film canisters.  This is an excellent fine motor activity! 

With this idea in mind, I created two different tackle box activities that work on fine motor skills to strengthen students' pincer grasps while simultaneously providing students an opportunity to review colors, numbers, and counting.

In the above task, the students take the film canisters from the top row, read the color on them and put the same colored bead inside the canister. They then put the lid on them and place the canister in the third row (a.k.a. the "all done" row).

In the above task, the students take the film canisters from the top row, read the color and number label on the canister and then fill them accordingly.  When finished, they put the lid on the canister and place it in the "all done" third row.

Teacher's Tip: Although this task serves two purposes, I am able to store them together in one tackle box to save space.  (Keeping in line with my New Year's Resolution!)

Task Box Countdown: Task Box # 9 - Magnetic Answers

This taskbox is an oldie...but goodie!  I originally created this activity while in college, as a supplement to a magnetic theme I submitted for a thematic unit assignment. It was long before I knew anything about task boxes and work systems.  But makes for an excellent task box because it could easily be used for a variety of learning concepts. 

Simply make a worksheet of questions with Yes/No  answers.

Then, glue the worksheet to the inside of a file folder.  (Teacher's Tip: Laminate the worksheet before gluing it to the file folder for added durability.) Next, program the back of the file folder to showcase the correct answers by hot gluing circle magnets to the back of the folder directly behind the correct answers.  Finally, glue another file folder over the top of the magnets to hide the answers. 

Provide your students with magnetic dots to answer the questions.  They simply read the question and cover the correct answer with a magnet.  It is a fun self-correcting activity that could be used for any age to review concepts or for test prep.