Quote Originally Posted by Chatterbox Childcare View Post
Whereabouts are you?

I am looking for outside toys

Playmobil

Anything for the garden, display, learning letters etc

Wooden/natural resources
If you're like me and have a wooden shed in your garden, I had the idea of sticking shiny plastic door numbers to each panel, thus numbering the panels 1 to 10 horizontally, then drawing dots in big chalks under each door number in different colours; so 1 had one dot, 2 has two dots, etc. Then I got some cup hooks and put 5 pairs of used Crocs on them (5 pairs, hung two at a time at the narrow side, one pair above the other arranged from the biggest down to the smallest pair beside the door, all in different colours). The children love this, and we can also take the crocs off and use them for throwing into a big trug type bucket from the pound shop, which I put in the middle of the garden as part of a counting game. We have hours of fun doing this. We can also use the crocs to try to water the plants. It doesn't work, but the children love dipping them into a bucket of water, as they think they will hold water, then they laugh when it pours out everywhere and makes crazy patterns. (A lovely summer activity that costs very little - plus it helps us do counting to 10, colour matching, matching pairs, talking about the different sizes etc. They can also help me by trying to put each pair back in the right places. I haven't labelled their positions with labels with the colour's name written on it, nor have I yet written the word that corresponds to each door number, but now I think about it, that might be a nice touch!)

It's just a daft idea, but I like cobbling together resources out of nothing as I was brought up in the 70s when most of the families around were unemployed, skint, and my Dad's favourite mantra when I asked for a toy that I'd seen on TV was: "All children need is fresh air and a good imagination. You've got loads of those, so go and play!" Those were the days!