Activities for the Olympics

My son came home from school yesterday all full of excitement about the Olympics. Little did he know that I had been planning a few things for us to do at home to prepare for the big event.  Here are a few of the things we have to done in anticipation of the big day.

Olympic Torch

We made our own torches and after they were complete, we headed out of our apartment, torch in hand and made the rounds to a few of our favorite nearby spots. We got tons of smiles from people as we walked by and the few shop owners we visited, loved not only the torch, but my son’s enthusiastic chant, “Olympic Torch! Olympic Torch!

Materials

gold poster board from a craft or paper shop
red cellophane (tissue paper would work too)
a popsicle stick, old pencil or broken chopstick
tape
hot glue gun

Directions:

Heat up your hot glue gun.
Roll the gold posterboard the long way until you have the shape you like. Hot glue it together.
Insert a circular piece of paper with a hole in the middle inside the top of the tube. Adhere it with hot glue. This will hold the flame in place.
Cut two large squares from the cellophane or tissue.  Lay them flat at different angles.

Gather the large squares around the popsicle stick and tape the bottom so the cellophane stays in place around the stick.
Insert the “flame” into the hole in the circular paper inside the tube.  Secure with hot glue if desired.

Olympic Rings (8 Different Ways)

We were simply going to paint the Olympic rings with brushes and paint, but once we started creating a whole bunch of other ideas came to mind!, And, before we knew it we had created the Olympic Rings 8 different ways!

For the first 3 ideas, you will need a palate of paint with the colors red, blue, yellow, black and green.

One: Dixie Cup Rings

Dip the rims of 5 dixie cups in the paint and press them onto the paper to create the Olympic Rings.

Two: Plastic Bowl Rings

Follow the same directions as above, but use a plastic bowl with a wide rim to make  the rings. The texture on the bowls gives the rings a different sort of look than the cups.

Three: Coloring Page Rings

My son really wanted to paint a “stencil” of the rings, so I printed one out and he painted it. My youngest did it as well.  You can see the difference yourself. 🙂

Olympic Rings coloring page from Activity Village

m&m Rings

We glued the m&ms down to create the Olympic Rings…and we ate all the orange ones. 🙂

Reinforcement Sticker Rings

Lego Rings

Olympic Event Cards

I found these images on the web (for free). I messed with them a bit, made them all the same size, printed them out and made them into 2 sets of cards. Click the image to download.

FREE DOWNLOAD

Winter Olympics

Summer Olympics

                                                

Here are some ideas for using the cards:

See how many of the sports we can name

Play Olympic sports Memory and Go Fish

Do a variety of sorts–like/don’t like, tried/haven’t tried, water/land, with equipment/without, ball sport/no ball sport, outdoor/indoor and more!

Choose 4 favorites that we will be sure to seek out and watch

Gold Medal Tally

FREE DOWNLOAD

We will be using this gold medal chart to tally how many gold medals US athletes win.  You can download these charts by clicking on the image. There is one for the US and one that can be colored in for the country of your choice!

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