N is for Noodles

Last week I hosted the Sweet Bee’s preschool for her and five other three year olds. We had a great time discovering noodles for the letter N.

In preparation for our activities, the girls and I colored noodles a few days before. I followed the directions here (using a 1/4 cup of rubbing alcohol and a few drops of food coloring for one cup of noodles) and it was pretty simple. Because the noodles were slightly yellow-ish to start with, that set the tone for the colors, but I think they were quite pretty.

We explored the many varieties of noodles: macaroni, rigatoni, rotini, lasagna, corkscrew, spaghetti, bowtie… Each child got to hold a cup of noodles, and then we passed them around. It was a great touch and feel activity. Then we cooked up some spaghetti and made noodle art. I’ve done this before with my girls, and it was a hit both times. This time around the kids colored their letter N poster first, then laid out the cooked noodles on top to dry.  Although this picture is blurry (you try to get 6 three-year-olds to hold still!!), it gives you a good idea of how the activity went. There was a lot of tasting along with the crafting!

One of the finished projects.

Of course, snack time was noodles. I cooked up a pan of these alphabet noodles I found at the grocery store and served them with a little butter and parmesan cheese.

Our last activity was noodle necklaces. We used the previously dyed noodle to string up some lovely jewelry. It was interesting to see the different personalities of the children as they made their necklaces: one child laced 6 noodles and was done, another child laced every noodle she could until the string was full, and another child only used the green noodles. I had planned to do a little noodle counting and sorting by color, but we ran out of time. I’ve still got some leftover noodles for an activity another day with the Sweet Bee.

Most of my ideas came from this preschool lesson site. We had a lot of fun with our noodles!

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One thought to “N is for Noodles”

  1. I love this idea! I always thought a comparison activity where one had every type of orange whether it be a blood orange or the type we think of generally. I thought it would also be good to have tangerines too. One could compare and contrast the colors and the tastes. I thought it would be fun but it has not been tested on any children.—-I like the different ways the children expressed themselves with their necklaces.

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