Playing with a Magnet

Today was a bit of a lazy day so we did a really easy to set up activity. I bought this magnet months ago but had forgotten about it. I found it while doing some organizing of my activity supplies and I knew Monkey would love it. 

Supplies: magnet, various magnetic and non-magnetic objects 

For the most part, I filled out bin with objects that Monkey would be familiar with. This was easy to do for items that would not be magnetic but a lot trickier for items that would be! So I had to throw in some things that he hasn't had much experience with. 

I set Monkey up with the magnet and the bin of objects. I asked him if he knew what the magnet was and he did, which surprised me because I'm not sure where he learned that! Regardless, I'm glad he knew, and we talked about what a magnet does in very simple terms. 

Then he got started with all the items. 

If an object was magnetic, or "stuck" to the magnet, he would put it in one pile, and if it wasn't magnetic, he would put it in a different pile. 

Here are the two piles of magnetic / non-magnetic objects. We didn't talk about why certain things are magnetic and other not, because I don't think he's quite ready for that. I kept this activity simple for his introduction to magnets. 

After examining all the items I had chosen for him, Monkey still wanted to play with the magnet. I told him to walk around the house and see what he could find that was magnetic. 

He found magnetic and non-magnetic things. 

We kept the bin and the magnet out on the counter for him all weekend and he's used it a lot, sorting through the objects again as well as walking around the house testing out different materials. 

This was a hit! 

Mar