Animal Puzzle Magnets

I've been wanting to make some games for Jaden for a long time. Before our last trip (to Albuquerque) I get a few of these done for playing in the car.

Mommy didn't have ANY fun with them in the car because Jaden kept throwing the pieces, and after so much work, I didn't feel like losing them!

But, since getting home, he's had a LOT of fun with them!

Here are some of the printables that I used. You can find them here.

First the cutting
Then in half. I found that straight lines worked better than puzzle style pieces because of the overlap on laminating.
All the pieces laminated. I would definitely laminate these pieces because toddlers are rough on toys and the paper would bend so easily. Take advantage of all of the work you put into these and make them reusable for a long time! I recommend finding a teacher supply store or office store near you that can do the laminating the most cost effective way. In pricing it, it was way cheaper than buying the self-laminating sheets.
I put magnets cut from self-adhesive magnet sheets onto the back of each piece. Jaden tried putting the pieces together without them but got frustrated really fast because one piece would move while he tried to put the other piece up to it. This way he really got them together and had a lot of fun.

We started simple placing two or three animals on a small magnetic white board (about $10 at Target or Walmart)

After he got used to the animals and how they fit together I threw all of them up on the refrigerator to see how he would do.

He surprised me by getting all of them. The rabbit, cat and mouse gave him the most trouble. I guess because they are all the same grey color and similar shapes. Because he played with them so much individually first he knew which tail went with which head but, he wouldn't always catch his mistakes right away. Sometimes he would match the rabbit head with the mouse tail and wouldn't realize it until later when he found the rabbit tail. Then he would correct it and keep on going.

I really wasn't sure if he would be able to do this activity yet or not but, he's like a pro already! I'm already looking for some new ideas for Christmas and maybe some 3-piece puzzles!

Here's a little video for you

Make a Smilebox slideshow