Cutie Pie and Sweet Pea received a F.A.O. Schwartz soft bowling set when they were too little to really use it as intended. After a while they weren’t interested and it got set aside. We pulled it back out the other day when Sweet Pea was switching from one activity to the next faster than I could say “STOP” (for my own sanity)! Sweet Pea had so much fun with it! He still switched from one thing to the next quickly, but every activity was centered on the bowling!
Have you ever thought about all the things you can do with a soft bowling set? After talking about how they felt (heavy on one end, funny texture, soft, like one of Daddy’s gloves) these are a few of the things we did with it:
Sweet Pea and I used two pins as drum sticks. We banged on our thighs, the floor, a toy drum, the wall. We talked about how the sound was different each time we (gently) banged on something different.
We got out different sized balls and different weights of balls, aimed and rolled to knock the pins down. Some questions that were answered: Do some balls knock more over? Are some balls harder to roll? Do some balls go where you want them to better than others?
We practiced counting. What to count? Count the number of pins in the set. Count the number of pins knocked over. Count how many pins didn’t get knocked over. Count how many balls you can find to play bowling with.
Sweet Pea practiced coordination. Holding onto a small ball is a lot of work for small hands! It also takes a lot of coordination to roll a ball smoothly, let alone aim it and knock a pin over!
So much fun and so much learning going on at the same time! Love it!
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