Every spring bags of plastic colorful eggs appear in stores. They are inexpensive and appeal to kids of all ages. Here are some springtime fun activities with the eggs which encourage discovery and learning.

You will need about a dozen plastic assorted color eggs which come apart in the middle, various small items to fit inside the eggs like pretzels, jelly beans, popcorn, cotton balls, pebbles, pennies, nails, rubber eraser, and cheerios, toothpicks, and dental floss.

Patterns

Spend some time just laying out eggs halves on a soft surface. Count them together. Group the eggs by color. Ask children a few questions. Can you make some patterns like yellow, blue, red, yellow, blue, red? Can you use the half eggs to make shapes like triangle, square, or a circle?

No bring out the little items and place some pieces in each egg. Talk about what you are putting in each egg as you do it. When each egg has something different inside, help children play a little guessing game by shaking the egg and guessing what is inside. How does our sense of hearing help when we can’t see what is making the noise? Does the sound suggest something soft or hard, big or little, rubbery? How many did you guess correctly? You can play the game lots of times or add new items.

The eggs can also be used for a fun container for snacks for little fingers–cheerios, pretzels, small carrot sticks or peas. Younger children may need help to open the egg without spilling the contents.

Let your child hide an egg and then play the hot (getting closer) cold (going away from) game as you try to find it. In the bathtub, children can experiment with eggs that float or sink depending on what they put inside.

Decorate trees

Older children can use the eggs to play simple math games with adding one more egg or taking away one or two eggs from the group. Let them make up some problems for you. Use the eggs to show your answer. Your little ones will have fun using the eggs to decorate the dinner table to help celebrate the coming of springtime.

You can also hang some colorful eggs in the trees. Tie a piece of a toothpick to some dental floss. Poke a hole through one end of the plastic egg with a large needle and poke the toothpick through the hole. When you gently pull the floss back out the toothpick will hold the floss inside the egg. Make a loop on the other end of the floss and use that to hang the eggs on a tree branch.

For more see grandparentsteachtoo.blogspot.com and wnmufm.org/Learning Through the Seasons, live and podcasts; Facebook, and Pinterest.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Grandparents Teach, Too is a non-profit organization of elementary and preschool teachers from Marquette, Michigan. The writers include: Jan Sabin, Mary Davis, Jean Hetrick, Cheryl Anderegg, Esther Macalady, Colleen Walker, Fran Darling, and Iris Katers. Their mission since 2009 is to help parents, grandparents, and other caregivers of young children provide fun activities to help prepare young children for school and a life long love of learning. They are supported by Great Start, Parent Awareness of Michigan, the U.P. Association for the Education of Young Children, Northern Michigan School of Education, the Upper Peninsula Children’s Museum and the Northern Michigan University Center for Economic Education.