I enjoy using morning tubs in my classroom. If you have questions about how I set up my morning tubs, then you might want to check out my original morning tub post. 

It is the second quarter and time to change out my morning tubs. I felt like 9 weeks was a sufficient time to keep the activities in the tub. I have 12 tubs and my kindergarten students saw each tub twice a month. They had favorites and some that were just “okay”. I wanted to take the favorites away so they wouldn’t become bored with them. I may introduce the favorites again later in the school year.

Let’s jump right into the pictures!

I shared this idea on Bonnie Kathryn Teaching Facebook page. This is a “greater than and less than” game.  The little frogs came from the Dollar Tree. The kids hop the frogs down the cube train number line. They record which frog hopped further as the “greater than number” and the other frog as the “less than number”. I laminated the recording sheet so it can be used over and over again with a dry erase marker. Click the link at the bottom of the post to download this recording sheet.

Did you know you could buy Jenga blocks at the Dollar Tree?!?! They are smaller in size, but the dollar price tag lets me use the blocks in multiple ways. I wrote our sight words that we are covering in Kindergarten on the blocks. I am going to let the kindergarten students play the game of Jenga (good for fine motor) with these blocks. They will get to keep the block for a point if they can read the sight word. However, I don’t plan on setting “rules” for this morning tub. If the kindergarten students decide to make a “new” game out of these blocks, I feel that is totally okay. They are working with the sight words and building with tiny blocks which will build fine motor skills.

I am positive this box will become a fast favorite. These blocks connect together to the base block with a wheel. The students have to figure out how to connect the wheels to make them turn and spin. Engineering here we come! They are super cheap. I have two sets in the tub and it is more than enough for students to use for building creations! You can find them on Amazon here. (affiliate link)

I found these blue magnets at the dollar tree. By now you should know that store is my friend. Have the kids use the blue magnet to guide it over a maze. I have several papers that I just drew squigly lines. On a couple of papers I have the alphabet and numbers. They will guide the magnet over the numbers and alphabet in order. You need card stock paper. Thinner paper will make the magnets too strong and you won’t be able to guide the magnet.

Have some geoboards stuffed in the back of your closet? GET THEM OUT! You can download the number freebie from Make Learning Fun.

Top Picture: Race to fill the cup. Roll the dice and fill the cup with that number of cubes. Partner rolls and does the same. Whoever fills the cup first wins.

Middle Picture: This is my cutting tub. I placed straws and different types of paper for the kids to practice cutting. I also placed a few markers for them to draw designs to cut out. No rules. Just cutting! You can read more about my cutting tub here.

Bottom Picture: Dollar Tree for the win again! These are simple matching games. They are thick cardboard which means they will be durable. I placed the cards inside a snack container from Walmart. Dollar tree had several different kinds of matching games. I bought all of them and placed them in the tub. The kids are using them to play alone right now. However, I will encourage them to partner up after a couple of weeks. Great memory game!

I made these quick CVC puzzles for my kids to practice segmenting and blending CVC words. My kids love puzzles and this one is no exception. Out of all the tubs I had out this morning, I kept hearing “I did it Ms. H! I did it! I made a match!” I divided each vowel set of CVC puzzles into different pencil pouches. Each puzzle piece has a number on the bottom corner that matches the bag number. This helps them put the puzzle pieces back into the correct bag.

This next tub is probably my favorite…

I found these gumball machines from…wait for it… THE DOLLAR TREE.  I almost hollered when I found them. #excusemysouthernslang

I filled the gumball machines with marbles from the Dollar Tree. The kids draw out a number gumball from the bag. They get that many gumballs out of the machine by turning the knob. They put the gumballs in the ice cube tray ten-frame. They use the work mat to color in gumballs in the ten-frame and write the number on the gumball machine. Let me just say…the kids LOVE THIS ONE!

Okay! I mentioned a couple of work-mats in this post. Want them? You can download them free here. 

Share some of your ideas in the comments. I would love to share them on the blog for the next quarter.