Step-by-step tutorial
Step 1
Gather all materials. I used our scented markers in addition to a fine-tipped marker to write on the dot stickers. My kids love using the scented markers whenever they can!
Step 2
My 7-year-old helped create toilet rolls for my 2 and 3-year-olds by drawing colored circles on the roll in the same colors as our dot stickers. For us, this included red, yellow, green, and blue.
Step 3
For my 5-year-old, I drew lower case letters on the toilet roll, and then I wrote out the capital letters on the dot stickers. He is getting ready to go into Kindergarten so we are doing lots of activities to reinforce the lower case letters and practicing the letter sounds. I chose to put the lower case letters on the toilet roll so there was less chance of him getting confused by turning the letters upside down.
Step 4
For my 7-year-old, I wrote addition facts on his dot stickers and then wrote the answers on the toilet roll. This activity could easily be adapted to any age by using addition, subtraction, multiplication, or division. You could also make the problems more difficult by doing 2-digit addition and subtraction and having them work out their answers on a scratch sheet of paper. You could even include calculator skills for the younger kids and let them help out! My kids love to use the calculator.
Step 5
Once all the toilet paper rolls are created, you could put them into brown paper bags with the dot stickers for busy bags. These come in handy when you're in the car or running errands. My kids were too excited and couldn't wait to get started matching their dot stickers to their toilet rolls. My 3-year-old had a great time matching her colors.
Step 6
My 5-year-old took his time matching his letters. At first, he wanted to do them in order, but he quickly realized that it was easier to do all the ones he could find quickly first and then go back to find the others. This is an important trick for kids to learn as they head off to school.
Step 7
My 7-year-old loved this activity. While we have done a lot of reading this Summer, we haven't done as many math activities as I would have liked. This activity was great because he could work out the problems and if he got one wrong, the dots were easy to lift off and move around.
Final result!
Once all the kids were finished, they lined their toilet paper rolls on the counter to show their Dad when he got home. They were so proud of the "schoolwork" they had accomplished.
