Most kids need to be active. Being active is good for our health, of course. But exercise is not just good for cardiovascular health. Kids' brains also seem to function much better when they are able to move and be active. Indeed, research suggests that physical exercise promotes learning in addition to physical fitness. Although all the bouncing ... Continue Reading
Showing all results for: space
Sand in a bottle craft
When pirates aren't on their ship, they are usually near the ocean. In my mind, ocean equals beach equals sand. So when we were doing our pirates unit, I thought it would be fun to create this sand in a bottle craft. :-) Although we did this craft as a tie-in to our pirate unit, it would also be a great way to talk about the layers of the ... Continue Reading
Contact
Curious about something? Want to let me know about something? Send me an email at katie @ giftofcuriosity.com (remove spaces). If you are having trouble downloading or printing my PDFs, please see my PDF troubleshooting page before contacting me as you may find the answer you need faster that way. ... Continue Reading
Book lists
I have always been a major bookworm. Fortunately, I have been able to pass my love of reading on to my kids. I believe that my husband and I accomplished this by developing a consistent reading routine at home and by making story time a time for cuddles and bonding. The result has been that both of my kids have come to love books as much ... Continue Reading
Dancing raisins experiment
I've done a version of this dancing raisins experiment with my kids a couple of times over the years. We initially did this activity as part of our discussions about states of matter. But it also works really well for a unit on density. When I was developing my Density STEM Pack, a comprehensive curriculum for teaching kids about ... Continue Reading
States of matter: An introduction
Matter is defined as "that which occupies space and possesses mass." Matter exists in three primary states: solids, liquids, and gasses. (There is a fourth state of matter, plasma, but we did not cover plasma during our states of matter unit.) In this post I share how I provided my kids with a very basic introduction to states of matter. ... Continue Reading
Comparing Arctic animal sizes
The kids and I have been discussing Arctic animals lately. We've read a few books about Arctic animals. We saw polar bears at the zoo. And the kids have done some pretend play related to Arctic animals. We also did an activity comparing Arctic animal sizes. I had two learning objectives in mind for the activity we did to compare Arctic animal ... Continue Reading
Christmas coloring pages {free printable}
I'm on a mission to create lots of new Christmas printables this holiday season. You can find all of my Christmas printables on my Christmas printables page. With any luck, that page will get a lot longer by the end of the month! And today I'm announcing the newest addition to my Christmas printables collection: Christmas Coloring ... Continue Reading
Holiday gift guide
With the holidays coming up, many of us are trying to figure out what toys are worth our money - and what toys are not. Today I'm sharing Gift of Curiosity's holiday gift guide listing our family's favorite toys. In general, I prefer open ended toys that require imagination and curiosity. I find that these kinds of toys engage my kids much better ... Continue Reading
Sensory play: What it’s all about
I first learned about the importance of sensory play when my husband and I were waiting to adopt our then-toddler son. I learned that children who lack sensory stimulation early on can develop sensory processing issues that affect them in myriad ways. In fact, when we adopted our son at age 1.5 and later our daughter at age 2.5, both were extremely ... Continue Reading