Friday, September 23, 2011

Wish List: Light Table

Since I've been blogging, I've connected with lots of other early childhood teachers and bloggers. The benefit of these connections is more and more ideas. And more and more things I would like to try with my kids. So now I have a wish list for my classroom.

The top of my wish list at the moment is a light table or light box. Of course, I'd like to get one as inexpensively as possible - and that usually means making it myself. 

I think I'm going to use this idea I saw on happy hooligans. It seems easy to do and also uses a light source that doesn't need to plug in. In fact, I've already purchased one of these lights from Walmart.

Deborah at Teach Preschool also has experimented with making her own light table - a larger version and a mini version.

Amy at Child Central Station also has made light tables. I really like her wooden one.

Why do I want a light table? So I can so things like these:

Painting on the light table (Teach Preschool)

Look at colorful disks (Teach Preschool)

Explore Salt (Child Central Station)

Create Sand Art (Filth Wizardry)

Examine colored water (Kreative Resources)

Play with water beads (Child Central Station)

And explore all kinds of objects - ideas from Irresistible Ideas for Play-Based Learning (and even more ideas); from Rhythm of the Home; from Filth Wizardry; from Pink and Green Mama; and from Strong Start.

So...I wonder what I'll be doing this weekend? (Here's what I did.)