COVID-19

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Why It’s Important to Show Children Your Grownup Emotions—Especially Now

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Lately, we’re feeling all the feelings. There’s nothing like a global pandemic to bring out all kinds of emotions—the anxiety of not knowing what’s coming, the sadness of missing our loved ones, the irritability that comes from staying home with our families all the time—and emotions are tricky, complicated things. Add in our kiddos, and it feels more like a constant struggle.

Parents and caregivers: We see you. This is a tough time to say the least, and we’re all struggling to figure out the best ways to handle our emotions—especially around the children in our lives.

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At Home Activity: Nature Prints

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Running out of ways to play outside? Today’s activity gives you and your kiddos another reason to be outdoors—and has the added bonus of encouraging them to deeply inspect the grooves and veins of leaves, petals, and other parts of nature.

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Chromatography: Uncovering the Hidden Colors in Markers

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A clear juice glass holds a paper towel with purple marker ink; a clear jar holds a paper towel with blue marker ink; a clear vase holds a paper towel with orange marker ink.

Did you know that inside every water-based marker lies a whole world of painting possibility?  

Today’s at home activity explores those possibilities through the use of chromatography, otherwise known as “color writing.” 

When you stick a water-based marker into a cup of water, the different pigments (or colors) inside the marker will actually separate based on their density (or weight). Some pigments will sink, some will float, and some will land somewhere in-between.  

By using water and a paper towel, your kiddos can explore this fascinating phenomenon, all while creating a beautiful piece of art.  

Goals: 

  • Recognize that a single color of ink is made up of other colors 

Children will: 

  • Use water and paper towels to map the hidden colors in water-based markers. 

  • Note how two markers of the same color may consist of different hidden colors.  

What you’ll need: 

  • water-based markers of as many colors and brands as you can find 

  • paper towels. 

  • Clear containers, for instance plastic or glass jars or drinking glasses 

  •  tape (masking works best) 

  • Some scrap paper in a light color.   

How to: 

• Choose the colored markers you’d like to investigate.  Cut a paper towel into narrow rectangles for each color.  The rectangles should be at least one inch taller than the container you plan to use. 

• With one marker, draw one thick horizontal line with each of the colors one inch from the bottom of the paper towel rectangle. 

Stand each rectangle up in the container so this line is close to the bottom.  Fold the blank extra inch at top over the rim of to the outside container.  Secure it with tape or a binder clip. 

•Carefully pour one half inch of water into the jar, so it’s just below the line.  Make sure it’s enough to wet the bottom edge of the rectangle.  Keep the rest of the rectangle dry.  

•Watch!  The water at the bottom of the container will quickly climb up the paper towel, taking color pigments with it.  

•When the water reaches the top of the paper towel, pull out the wet paper towel and lay it on a light-colored paper or washable surface.  (The wet rectangles may leave some color on the surface underneath). 

• Repeat this process with several more markers. Which color markers have blends of different pigments? What colors do you see? 

•Compare the results of two or three markers of the same color, but from different sets or different brands. What do you notice? 

 

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At Home Activity: Crystal Painting

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At Home Activity: Crystal Painting

Epsom salts are great for grownup bath time—but did you know that they also make for an easy, low maintenance art activity for your kiddos?

Today’s at home art activity for children takes everyday materials you have at home and turns them into a sparkly painting experience.

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At Home Activity: Bump-It-Up Paint

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With today’s at home activity, you can combine a few easy-to-find ingredients to make your own textured paint. Your little ones will satisfy their inner chemist by creating their own paints, then use those paints to create three-dimensional works of art.

It’s an easy, fun, win-win art activity for your whole family.

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At Home Activity: Whirl Its AKA Thaumatropes

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Today’s at home activity involves a $10 word: thaumatrope.

What’s a thaumatrope, you ask?

It’s an optical toy with a picture on each side that, when spun fast enough, appear to blend into one because of persistence of vision.

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At Home Activity: Cardboard Beads

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Staying at home gives us a lot of opportunity to reimagine what might otherwise be, well, boring.

Take cardboard, for example.

We’re exploring the different ways you and your kids can use the cardboard lying around your houses for fun, valuable play time, like today’s art activity, Cardboard Beads.

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At Home Activity: Build a Ramp

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The uses for empty cardboard boxes seem endless—but they can also be opportunities for trial and error, exploring spatial reasoning, and sharpening measurement skills.

Today’s at home activity encourages your little ones to be their best scientific self by using all three of those skills, and more.

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At Home Activity: Shadow Play

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At Chicago Children’s Museum, one of our favorite things about play is that you really don’t need much to make it happen.

Today’s at home activity shows how a sheet, a lamp, and a flashlight can make for hours of fun—plus fine and gross motor development.

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At Home Activity: Cardboard Tubes

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Toilet paper isn’t as hot a commodity as it was a few weeks ago, but we’ve got one more reason to think twice about this otherwise boring item: the empty cardboard rolls.

Today’s at home activity focuses on another way to upcycle those rolls into a STEM focused, spatial reasoning exercise for your little ones.

So save whatever cardboard rolls you’ve got and let your kids discover their inner architect.

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At Home Activity: Puppet Parade

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Let’s throw a parade in our honor. We deserve it, don’t we? The homeschooling, the working from home, the socially distant Zoom birthday parties, and constant hand washing—we are all something to celebrate.

Trouble is, who do we celebrate with?

Today’s at home activity is all about making your own crowd. Gather some puppets, stuffies, and toys— and throw yourselves a parade.

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At Home Activity: Marionette Play

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By taking a familiar toy or stuffy (one with limbs that move easily) and turning it into a marionette, your little ones will have a whole new way to play. They’ll work on their hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills, plus their sense of self expression and creativity will come alive.

So grab a flexible toy and some string and let your littles be the puppeteers.

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At Home Activity: Cereal Box Guitars

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What do Raisin Bran and rock ‘n’ roll have in common?

Find out with today's at home activity, Cereal Box Guitars. Not only will your kid end up with a sweet new axe, they’ll learn the relationship between vibration and sound, and investigate what makes pitch.

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Parents and Caregivers: You're in Timeout

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In these times of added stress and uncertainty, one of the most important tricks in the Parenting Playbook is the timeout.

No, no, no. Not that kind of timeout.

We’re talking about a mental timeout to recharge your personal batteries and tend to yourself. Plus, who wouldn’t mind a little extra quiet time in this all family, all day era?

Read the weekly Timeout, a new feature of Chicago Children’s Museum’s Parenting Playbook, for the best in self-improvement and escapism from across the internet.

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Celebrate International Family Equality Day Online!

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Since 2012, Chicago Children’s Museum has recognized International Family Equality Day (IFED), a day held annually on the first Sunday in May to celebrate and recognize the diversity of LGBTQ families around the world.

Usually, we’d pack our Great Hall with activities and resources, tie pride rainbow ribbons along our staircase, and host performances to celebrate and honor the diversity of the families that come to Chicago Children’s Museum.

This year, we can’t make that happen. But that doesn’t mean that we can’t celebrate.