Posts tagged ‘bubbling’
Bubble Party: Tips for Bubbling with a lot of Kids
Need Wands? Order your bubble kit today!
We do lots of bubbling during warm weather.
Here are some tips for hours of happy, bubbling fun with lots of kids. These guidelines use the Big Bubble Wands and recipe available on this blog.
1) Make Bubble Juice: Make at least 2 gallons of bubble juice. It’s cheap and you don’t want to run out. The recipe comes with the wands or you can find it under “Bubbles” on this blog.
2) Create a Bubble Zone: The wands stay in the bubble area.
3) Tray Placement: Place bubble trays in the Zone, a good distance apart. I usually place 5 trays and have 10 wands. Older kids can place and fill the trays with juice.
4) Safe Wand Use: Bubble wands are for making bubbles only. This ensures that no one gets hit with a bubble wand accidentally. Bubble poppers use their hands. If necessary, remind kids that wands are not swords or weapons.
5) Have Other Activities: Have other activities to do besides bubbles such as play structures, hula hoops, ball games, water games, etc. Allow kids can enter and exit the Bubble Zone at will, leaving the wands for other kids to play with. This way you only need 10 wands for about 20 kids. Plus, remember that some kids love to pop only. This is fun to watch.
6) Clean-Up. The juice is sticky, so kids may need to wash their hands afterward. The wands, trays and mixing bowls clean up easy with water.
Most of all, have fun. Kids love bubbles. I have had very few behavior issues with bubbles. I think this is because bubbling is non-competitive and beautiful. It also helps to have lots of wands and trays and other things to do at your party.
You can find Diane Schwartz bubbling at the Goodman Community Center where she is a K-5 teacher. She leads hiking, skiing and biking adventures. In her spare time, she sells bubble wands and does outdoor consulting.
For a free 11-page Bubble Activity Guide, just go to the home page and subscribe to this blog.
Gearing up for Summer Fun!
School’s almost out for summer.
That means Summer Camp is just around the corner. At Goodman Community Center, we offer a 10 week program of summer fun. Biking, field trips, insect adventures, arts and crafts, swimming, fishing and hiking are just a few of the activities available to kids.
The best part of summer is that I get more time to do activities with kids. We can take bike rides to the Capitol. We can plant bug traps and explore insects at our leisure. We can go swimming and be lazy and just stare at clouds. We can make gimp key chains and sand art and other classic summer crafts.
As I kid, I loved doing these things and I still fondly remember hanging out at the local park playing wink and making gimp necklaces with the recreation staff.
As a teacher, I get to give kids these memories.
I can’t think of anything that’s better than that and I look forward to sharing my triumphs and challenges here with you.
Are you excited or scared about summer? What do you do with your kids? What works? what doesn’t? Remember it’s a short season, so have fun!
Diane Schwartz is a K-5 teacher at the Goodman Community Center in Madison, WI. She leads hiking, skiing and biking adventures. She also sells bubble wands. For a free 11-page Bubble Activity Guide, just go to the home page and subscribe to this blog.
Reading, Bubbles & Sidewalk Chalk
Today feels like summer.
The sun shines warm. The wind blows hot. And the sky is deep blue.
So, it makes sense to do summer things with the kids like sidewalk chalk, bubbles, and reading.
Yes, reading.
The first Tuesday of the month, we have a read aloud with Tracy Moore, the children’s services librarian from the Hawthorne Library. She usually reads two stories and then does an art project with the kids. Today she read, “One Stuck Duck” by Phyllis Root and did a felt board story about a pig going on a picnic.
Afterward, we went crazy with the sidewalk chalk. We made cats, butterflies and princesses, traced our bodies, played hop scotch, and made lots of scary faces and designs. The bubbles blew quickly through the air in the warm wind. It was magical and perfect day.
I love making connections between the outdoors, reading and art. Hopefully, this pattern will stick with the kids and leave them wanting more of all three. This summer, we’ll continue our library reading program to help keep them active with books and learning. We want our kids to enter the school year ready to learn.
I hope that you get creative with kids now that the weather has turned gorgeous. Try adding a book into the mix to add some literacy.
Diane Schwartz is a K1 teacher at the Goodman Community Center in Madison, WI. She specializes in getting kids outside. For a free 11-page Bubble Activity Guide, just go to the home page and subscribe to this blog.
Bubble Trouble
Kids love bubbles. They love making them, popping them and watching them. That’s why for the past three months, I have tried just about every homemade and store bought bubble recipe to find one that works and is inexpensive. It’s no fun to run out of bubble juice when kids are having fun (See Bubble Recipe post). I’ve also tried an assortment of homemade bubble wand methods: pipe cleaners, coat hangers, tin cans with both ends cut off, paper funnels, strainers, plastic food containers and a lot more. These wands worked great for a short while, but didn’t last. The cans rusted, the paper funnels got soggy, and the coat hangers were easily bent. I needed something that would last, so, I looked for store bought wands. They worked better, but they started at around $10 each. Again, this wouldn’t work with lots of kids. I kept searching the net for inexpensive wands that worked. I found them at www.bigbubble wands.com. I ordered a kit and tried them out. They worked. Then I got the idea to become a distributor for these wands. Just click on my Bubble Wand page for more information.
I guess that’s why I call this post ‘Bubble Trouble’. I never knew that my passion for getting kids outside would lead me to starting a business. I’m busier than every with working full-time with kids and getting my business off the ground. It’s exciting and exhausting. It’s fun to sell a product that provides such joy to young and old.
If you have any questions about bubbling and bubble wands, please let me know. I’d be happy to help you wand through the tangle of information on the web and elsewhere.
Happy Bubbling!
Easy Bubble Recipe that Works
Here’s the bubble recipe that I recommend for use with my wands:
