Jelly Bean Themed Toddler School Lessons

If your toddlers are anything like mine, then you can probably relate to the excitement that comes out when Easter bunnies, jelly beans, and chocolate eggs start to line the shelves at the grocery store. Every time we would walk down the aisle my son would ask to bring some jelly beans home. So, I put together this fun Jelly Bean Themed Toddler School Unit that incorporates the letter J, science fun, and other jelly bean activities. The best part is, this unit can be done at any time of year since it incorporates jelly beans without any other Easter themes. Enjoy a peek into our jelly bean week through a sampling of our activities together.

Lesson Components

Each of the 5 lessons in this unit includes the following activities:

• literacy/language
• math or science activity
• fine motor activity
• gross motor activity
• art activity

If you want to learn more about how to get started planning activities for your little ones, download my FREE guide for everything you need to know about the skill areas we incorporate into toddler school:

Lesson Setup

The first thing I do with my son at the beginning of a new unit is color our cover page for our unit notebook. I fold a large sheet of construction paper in half and glue the cover page on with stick glue. It’s a great way to introduce the new unit while getting in some much needed coloring practice.

Sensory Bins

To kick off the unit, we played with a Jelly Bean Sensory Bin. This bin was created as a fun sensory experience where your child can play with the jelly beans using various tools. As you progress through the unit, you will add letter and number learning components to the bin. Since this unit is best for a 2-3 year old child, it is best to give free exploration time with the sensory bin filler first. This bin provided hours of fun for my little guy while I prepped a few of the other activities for the unit.

Over the new few days, we worked on the uppercase and lowercase letter J/j, sorted numbers, and played with play dough.

Over the new few days, we worked on the uppercase and lowercase letter J/j, sorted numbers, and played with play dough.

Fine Motor Activities

One of our favorite fine motor activities in this unit was working with tweezers. I gave my son a large dish filled with plastic tweezers, jelly beans, and an empty water bottle. Using only the tweezers, he had to pinch the jelly beans and place in the empty bottle. He loved tried to fill the bin up as fast as he could.

We also enjoyed learning about the letter J/j by pinching glitter, squirting liquid glue, and using dot markers.

Art Activities

The sky really is the limit when it came to art activities for this unit! One of our favorites was dipping jelly beans in paint and rolling over white construction paper in a cardboard lid. I could see the critical thinking going on as my son tried to roll the jelly beans through certain areas.

We also really enjoyed finger painting this jelly bean with edible paint. I mean really, what is more fun than edible paint! After it dried, it was a slick and shiny design. My son added real jelly beans using liquid glue on top of his painting for an extra design element.

STEM Activities

I mean, is it ever too early to begin STEM activities? We sure don’t think so! For this activity, I gave my son a pile of jelly beans and some toothpicks. Then, I pre-punched holes in the jelly beans to make it easy for him to slide the toothpicks into the jelly beans. Then, we built our jelly bean creations together since this step was a little more difficult.

This unit is also filled with some great math activities that help teach children to count from 1-6. We used clip cards to identify the names of each number. When you are doing this with your child, make sure to point to each number and have your child say the name of the number with you. Then, count the number of jelly beans that appear on each card. Add the clip to the number that matches the number of jelly beans.

We also loved using counters to count from 1 to 6. Each time we counted a printed jelly bean, we placed a real jelly bean on top of it. Make sure to also point to the numbers and say their names. This will help your child with number identification.

Our final science experiment did require me to plan ahead. The day before you plan to teach this lesson, you will want to freeze some jelly beans inside water to make jelly bean ice cubes. Give your child an ice cube and ask your child to remove the jelly bean. If your child is anything like mine, then it won’t take long to realize the jelly beans are trapped! Show your child how to place the ice cube in sunlight to watch it melt. You can also hold the ice cube tight in your hand and watch the water drip off. My son tried throwing his ice cube on concrete and it broke. Then, he was able to work the jelly bean out of the ice cube a little faster.

I hope you enjoyed following our Toddler School journey this week! Click here if you want to download this Jelly Bean Toddler School Unit from my Teachers Pay Teachers store. It comes with 5 lesson plans and all the printable materials you will need to make teaching your toddler as easy as possible.

If you are looking for even more Toddler School fun for you and your little ones, then check out my Complete Toddler School Curriculum Bundle for all the plans and printables you need for an entire year of learning!

I hope you have a wonderful week playing and learning with your little ones! Feel free to send me a message on Instagram @theprimarybrain with any questions you have about how to teach your little ones!

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Written on February 5th, 2020 by Laurin Brainard