Name and Encourage Your Child to Name

GUIDE SHEET: TOY

BEAN BAG TOSS

Program Year: 2

Supporting Your Child’s Development: This toy will support your child’slarge motor development, as he/she uses his/her large muscles to toss the bean bags into the target. Move the target either closer or nearer as needed, so your child is not too frustrated, but also challenged. Remember to keep the conversation going as you play, as conversation is the foundation of early literacy development. Keeping score will support your child’s early numeracy skills.

Name and encourage your child to name:

New words: bean bag, target, score
Colors: red, green, blue (etc.) bean bags
Shapes: round holes
Sizes: large target; small bean bags
Numbers: several bean bags; keep score
Relationships: Hold the bean bag in your hand. The bean bag fell outside of the hole.
Textures: The felt on the bean bag feels soft.
Causing things to happen: When you aim carefully, you might get the bean bag into the hole on the target.

Describe your actions. Invite the child to describe his or her actions:

General: Let’s pick up a bean bag and feel how heavy it is.
Sorting and Matching: Can you sort the bean bags by color?
Fitting: Try dropping the bean bag into the hole and see if it fits.

Remind the child to think about what s/he is doing:

To Get Child's Attention: If you throw too hard, you will miss the target.
To Make a Choice: Do you want to toss the red bean bag or the blue bean bag?
To Encourage Self-control: Throw the bean bag toward the target, not toward anything else.
To Remember Other Experiences: What other game involves throwing?
To Do Things in the Right Order: First pick up the bean bag, then toss it gently.

Fun activities:

Use other targets for your bean bags. Options might include a waste basket, a laundry basket, a piece of yarn shaped into a circle, or a circle on the sidewalk drawn in chalk.
Several family members can toss one (or more) bean bags to each other. To make a game out of it, one person plays music during the tossing, and then stops the music. Whoever is holding a bean bag when the music stops is the winner.
Bean bag bowling: set up a row or group of empty plastic water or soft drink bottles, and have your child stand behind a line and toss one bean bag and see how many he/she can knock down.