I haven’t had a lot of time to browse the sites that have participated in the Ultimate Blog Party, but I’m so glad I took the time to visit The Preschool Mama. She’s a former Montessori teacher, and she has some wonderful tips and ideas on her site.

She’s currently doing a series on money-saving tips, and today we used one of her ideas for an “educational toy that costs next to nothing.”

Attach a picture of a rabbit to a bunch of paper bags, and write a number on each of them. Cut out pieces of orange tag or paper, to look like little carrots. Make small dots on each carrot. Ask your child to count the number of dots on the carrot, and place it in the rabbit bag with that number.

We modified it a bit. I drew a rabbit face on one plain brown paper bag and cut a hole in the bag for the bunny’s mouth. Then I cut some “carrots” out of orange construction paper. Then I took it to Poppy’s room, where we played Feed the Hungry Bunny for about 20 minutes. Preschool Mama’s suggestion is a little more elaborate, but this simplified version took about 3 minutes to pull together, and Pi loved it.

Go check out The Preschool Mama. Her suggestions Work for Me!