Music and Movement: Fruit and Vegetable Toss (Gross Motor Skills, Color Recognition, Nutrition)

 My little monkeys love their play food.  I think their "grocery store" is one of the most played with toys in our house. They also love physical activity, and since we are stuck inside a lot right now I am always looking for fun indoor activities that work on gross motor skills but also teaches some kind of lesson.

What better way to help teach kids the difference between fruits and vegetables (or food groups depending on what your focus is) than with a fun game that also helps to improve their coordination. Plus it is easy and requires little to no preparation...and with my two little monkeys that is always a great thing.

What you will need:

• At least three baskets/buckets (more if you are doing all food groups)
• Play fruits and vegetables (you can add bread, meats, etc. to focus on food groups)
• Painters tape (optional, but helpful to keep excited little monkeys from running up to the baskets)

I chose different color baskets to represent fruits and vegetables to reinforce color recognition (more for my toddler but a good refresher for my preschooler), but you could also put a picture of fruits and vegetables or the words on the basket depending on what works for your child.

There are few rules, basically the child has to sit or stand behind the line.  They choose food items out of the basket next to them.  Then they toss the food items into the right baskets.

You can use any play food you have.  The play food we love is the New Sprouts brand from Learning Resources.  It is toddler friendly and tougher than most play foods that I have bought. Always check the manufacturer recommendation for minimum age requirements, some play food isn't that safe for toddlers (especially if they put everything that they can in their mouths like my littlest monkey).

The baskets are woven and I found them at Target.  We have gone through multiple play food baskets trying to find something that the little monkeys couldn't destroy (my kids love imagination play and they like to wear them as hats, etc., so the extra expense was well worth it).  These are awesome and have survived longer than anything else. 

Since I love games that teach multiple lessons, we also played a game where we sorted the fruits and vegetables by color. 

Overall, the fruit and vegetable toss is a fun and easy way to get the kids moving and practicing their coordination skills while learning.  The great thing is that they don't even realize that it's an educational activity.