I love stealth learning. Children learn best when they think they are having fun and don’t realise they are learning.
I used gel bags a lot when Molly was little but haven’t used them with the twins. Now they are three and at Nursery, they are really interested in letters, especially in their names. There are lots of ways to make a gel bag but this is what I always do.
We use:
- Resealable food bags
- Antibacterial hand gel
- Food colouring
- Glitter
- Duct Tape
We add the gel food colouring and glitter into the bags and seal with the duct tape. You can tape them down onto a board or leave them to be a bit more squishy. You can also add lots of other things in to the bags, sequins and googly eyes work really well. I didn’t want to use anything extra this time because it can get in the way of the letters.
I wanted to make these have a Halloween theme because of the time of year. We used Halloween colours: green, purple and orange to look like magic potions. Then I added a witch’s hat, some pumpkins, a magic wand and some star post it notes to write the letters on.
The bags are a lot of fun so for the first couple of times they used them I just got them to play. It is actually really therapeutic and great for stress levels.
After that I got them to trace over foam letters and to copy the letters from their name.
This is a really easy activity to adapt for different ages. For my 6 year old I simply wrote her spellings onto stars for her to practice.
This also works well for phonics practice. Molly practiced all her letter sounds using gel writing when she was in Reception.
For more learning ideas made sure you are following my Fun Education Ideas Pinterest board.