Teddies and Toys
Resources
Software List
Textease
Compose World
Dazzle
2simple
My World
Writing With Symbols
Others to consider
Early Years Clipart, SEMERC
Roamer floor turtle, Valiant Technology (020 8673 2233, info@valiant-technology.com,
www.valiant-technology.com)
Pip floor turtle, Swallow Systems (01494 813471; www.swallow.co.uk)
Remote control toys (Inclusive Technology; 01457 819790; inclusive@inclusive.co.uk;
www.inclusive.co.uk)
First dictionary CD ROMS:
My First Incredible Amazing Dictionary, Dorling Kindersley
Oxford Word Box, Oxford
Word processor
Colour printer
Websites
Brilliant craft site
http://dltk-kids.com/
Victorian children: in the toy section sort toys into Victorian and modern categories
http://www.4learning.co.uk/qca/victorians/
Toys R Us
www.toysrus.co.uk
History of toys and games
http://www.historychannel.com/cgibin/frameit.cgi?p=http%3A//www.historychannel.com/exhibits/toys/
Links to toy websites
http://www.drtoy.com/
Paper dolls
http://www.ameritech.net/users/macler/paperdolls.html
Historical happenings: photographs of children examining Victorian toys
http://www.btinternet.com/~longvernal/photos/photos001.html
Victorian toys, cards and games
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Rhodes/7798/Victorian8.html
Pollocks toy museum and toyshop
http://www.tao2000.net/pollocks/
Antique toys
http://www.bargainjohn.com/antique%20toys.htm
Games and toys to make
http://www.kidsdomain.com/craft/_game.html
Free games to download
www.tukids.tucows.com
Children’s games from around the world
http://www.rice.edu/projects/topics/edition11/games-section.htm
Floor robots
Roamer: Valiant Technology
www.valiant-technology.com
Pip and Pixie: Swallow Systems
www.swallow.co.uk
The Pixie: introducing control at Key Stage 1
http://www.kented.org.uk/ngfl/ks1-ict/index.html
Objectives
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To incorporate the use of ICT to support a general topic about toys
To use ICT to support the early learning goals using toys as a theme
Activities
Language And Literacy
Teddy And Clown Diary
Use the photos from the PowerPoint or those taken around the school to produce a diary of
events for Teddy and friends.
Book out a Travel Ted
A very large bear with a backpack who can be photographed and written about
Teddy Bears Picnic
Compose world - sequencing of sound bites and pictures
D&T-Making Ginger Ted biscuits
Literacy-Drawing a sequence of pictures to tell the story/ retelling a well known story
Deciding upon and drawing foods for a picnic
Goldilocks And The Three Bears
Science [taste/ properties of materials]– food – too hot –too salty- too lumpy
How could we make the bed less hard? Why did the little bears chair break?
Literacy - Retelling a well-known story and drawing a sequence of pictures to tell the story.
Information on toys
There is a range of first dictionary CD ROMs that may well contain information about
different toys, e.g. doll, puppet, ball, jigsaw. Prepare a worksheet containing pictures of
different toys and their names and ask children to find them using the alphabetical search
facility within the CD ROM.
Talking books
There are some talking books which have a toy theme, e.g. Toy Story.
Word processing
Early typing skills, keyboard familiarity, phonics and alliteration could all be developed around
a series of screens with a toy theme. Prepare a page containing some toy images. Children
click next to each toy and type either the first letter or the whole toy name.
Prepare a word bank of toy names. Children can then use this to select the appropriate name
for each toy. This idea could be developed to include alliteration e.g. big ball, pretty puppet.
Paper-based worksheets
Use toy clip art and a primary font, e.g. Jotter, Sassoon, Comic Sans, to create worksheets
using a desktop publishing program.
Mathematics
Sorting toy sizes
Print a collection of toys, or use real ones. Use for sorting activities
Early logo
Floor turtles and remote control toys
Ask children to bring in any toys they have which can be controlled, e.g. remote control cars,
walking dogs, Inteli-Bots, robotic dogs etc. Allow children to demonstrate and describe how
these toys can be controlled. Move on to talk about everyday machines, e.g. washing machines,
videos etc. and how these can be controlled.
Children in small groups experiment and learn how to give the floor turtle instructions and to
estimate distance.
Prepare a series of activities for children to use with the floor turtle.
The Kent NGFL website has some very good support for using floor robots in the Foundation
stage.
The tale of the Sheppey Pigs; a Roamer big book:
http://www.kented.org.uk/ngfl/primary.html#ICT
Data handling
List favourite names for Teddies. Which is most popular?
Make a graph.
Get the children to bring in a teddy and use 2simple to produce a pictogram
Pictograms
Collect class data about children’s favourite toys. Brainstorm a list of favourite toys, e.g.
dolls, Lego, jigsaws etc. and ask children to select their favourite from the list. Use the data
collected to produce a graph on screen with the whole class.
Some potentially suitable pictogram software:
Use clip art to prepare a large pictogram as a wall display.
Use My World Maths and the Teddy Grids
History and Geography
2002 is the 100th birthday of the teddy bear- see PowerPoint discuss famous bears
Toys through time
Compare and contrast toys from the past with those played with today. Are there any
similarities? Are there still favourite toys that have stood the test of time?
Toys from different regions of the world
Do we all play with the same toys? Again use prints from websites to compare and contrast
different toys from around the world.
Lesson plan about games/toys that African children play with:
http://teacherlink.ed.usu.edu/TLresources/longterm/LessonPlans/africa/rutbin/
Children’s games from around the world
http://www.rice.edu/projects/topics/edition11/games-section.htm
Toys from different religions
Hanukaah: the Dreidel
Lesson plan on making a Dreidel: http://www.education-world.com/a_lesson/002/lp2251.shtml
Also:
http://www.torahtots.com/holidays/chanuka/chanstr.htm
http://www.billybear4kids.com/holidays/hanukkah/hanukkah.htm
Science
Forces; pushes and pulls
Sir Robert Hitcham’s Primary school website: http://www.hitchams.suffolk.sch.uk/index.html
has a section on toys in the teachers’ resources section on science. This looks at forces, in
particular toys that can be pushed, pulled or do both. Use this website as a discussion and
then ask children to make a collection of toys that can be moved from around the nursery.
Encourage them to sort the toys into push, pull or “push-me-pull you” categories.
Also see above for integrated ideas
Creative
The craft website: http://dltk-kids.com/ has many printable templates for preparing toys.
These can be printed in black and white or colour, cut out and used to cover toilet rolls, paper
plates and more!
The same website has a collection of finger puppets for printing.
More Websites
Eurotales
http://www.eurotales.eril.net/contents.htm
Toddlertales
http://www.toddlertales.com
Links to many traditional fairy story websites
http://www.cln.org/themes/fairytales.html
Children's stories, with audio
http://www.childrenstory.com/index.html
MAPE website: big books to download
www.mape.org.uk
Stories to grow by
http://www.storiestogrowby.com/
Rebus story
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Thebes/9673/rebusgld.htm
Eustace County Primary School: link to work on Goldilocks
http://www.addwebuk.freeserve.co.uk/eustace/1.htm
Goldilocks and the three bears teacher activity
http://www.aloha.net/~gkawa/goldilocksandthethreebearsteacher.html
... and associated quiz
http://www.aloha.net/~gkawa/goldilockssenses.html
Story with images drawn by Alex
http://www.charlton.demon.co.uk/alex/three-bears/index.html
Science and other curriculum links based around this fairy story
http://www.mcps.org/ces/ca/glocks/glindex.html
Bears theme plus websites and book list
http://www.pampetty.com/bears.htm