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This Reading Mama

12 Common Household Items You Can Re-Purpose and Re-Use

By thisreadingmama 12 Comments

Teaching young children requires stuff. 🙂 As kids learn, they need to be able to touch it, manipulate it, and experience it for themselves to make it meaningful to them. A nicely packaged workbook just doesn’t cut it, in my opinion. But let’s face it. Stuff can get expensive.

One money saving tip I’ve learned over the years is to re-purpose and re-use the containers and items I already have and use them for teaching. Today, I’d like to share my top 12 favorite common household items you can totally re-use and re-purpose when teaching young children, giving you some free learning materials!

12 Common Household Items You Can Reuse for Learning - This Reading Mama

*Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. Always supervise young children when they play with toys that contain choking hazards. Wash out and inspect food containers thoroughly before using with children.

1. Parmesan Cheese Containers

We use our parmesan cheese containers A LOT! The holes on top make a perfect place to slip in straws, uncooked spaghetti noodles, pom-poms or pony beads. Open up the other side and drop in dice, counting bears, or pennies.

parmesan cheese container

2. Coffee Creamer Containers

I like re-using the coffee creamer containers that are clear so my younger ones can see what’s inside. We use them in quite the same fashion as our parmesan containers. Here NSis is dropping in old golf tees (still in good condition), that were going to be thrown away by a family member.

coffee creamer and golf tees

3. Peanut Butter Jars/ Mayonnaise Jars

We use peanut butter jars and mayonnaise jars for SO much. Sorting, dumping, transferring, containing dice when rolling for a game, storing markers, scissors…you name it! I love that they have lids that contain the mess at times. I also like that they are clear and I can easily see what’s inside them. This goes for many containers we use. My kids have been drawn to the clear ones the most.

4. Coffee Canisters

I love coffee canisters of any size. We use them for so many purposes. Our two most favorite are to keep markers and puzzle pieces.

coffee canisters

5. Scoops from Powered Drinks

If you buy powered lemonade or sports drinks, I’m sure you noticed the scoop included in the package. When you’re all done with it, use it for play! Kids can scoop water, oatmeal, letter lacing beads, dirt, coffee beans, you name it!

6. Smaller m & m Containers

I buy these every year for my kids’ Christmas stockings just so I can re-use them for fine motor play! Again, we use small manipulatives, such as our counting bears to count or drop inside.

m&m container

7. Bubble Wands

Bubble wands make the perfect pointers when reading with young children (they can also be used as a magic wand or anything else your child can imagine). Plus, they come in so many colors. Hammer in a nail on your wall and easily hang them for storage.

bubble wand

 

8. Plastic Bottle Caps

We have collected all kinds of bottle caps. Most of my bottle caps have letters or numbers written on them with permanent marker. We have used them with some of the activities from my free ABC Review Pack as well as Bottle Cap mats. (If you’re looking for more bottle cap mats for spelling, I also have some in the first few levels of my free BOB Book printables and the word family lessons from Reading the Alphabet.) Not only do we use them for spelling, I also keep larger ones, like milk tops, that are safer for my youngest one, who will still sometimes put things in her mouth. She likes to dump them, scoop them, or transfer them from one container to another.

9. Food Containers

applesauce containers

Our washed out applesauce containers are used quite a bit as well. They make the perfect place for paint, glue, or smaller lacing beads. We also re-use the plastic trays from under the packages of mushrooms (the blue container in this post) or Chinese take out.

reusing almond container

One of my kids’ absolute favorites is the container that I bought almonds in. I cut a slit in the lid and we use it to drop in coins or plastic colored chips. They love the clinking sound at the bottom!

 

10. Trays (with compartments)

We have old ice trays that we sometimes re-use, but we also re-use food trays with compartments (frozen food packages often have these). These work perfect for sorting, making patterns, or fine motor work. And they can come in all sizes and shapes, making it fun to use different kinds.

trays with compartments

11. Containers from Other Educational Supplies

Many educational supplies that you buy come with containers. In some cases, I empty the contents, place them in individual zip up bags and store them all together in a bin. The containers are then used for other purposes, such as transferring, dumping or sorting.

 

12. Easter Egg Dye Cups

One of my new favorites is the little cups we used to recently dye our Easter eggs this year. They made the perfect color sorting cups for our family counters. (The white container you see being used is from Chinese take out!)

color sorting cups

 

Storage of Free Learning Materials

storage bin for containers

How do we store all our containers and items? In one simple bin (similar to these). It sits in our schoolroom. The best part is that many of these re-usable containers can nest inside one another. My kids enjoy the freedom of being able to use the containers or items they want or need with freedom (as long as it gets cleaned back up when they are done!)

 

Follow This Reading Mama’s board Recycle, Re-Use, and Re-Purpose for Learning on Pinterest.

 

What are some free learning materials you’ve re-purposed and re-used in your home? I’d love to hear your ideas!

 

12 Common Household Items You Can Reuse for Learning by This Reading Mama

 

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 ~Becky

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Filed Under: Parenting

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Comments

  1. Jena says

    April 22, 2014 at 7:37 am

    Such great ideas! We already do this too. I love to reuse egg cartons and lids from jars for dishing out small amounts of paint, and yogurt containers are used for water to rinse the paint brushes. I love the idea that everything be clear so you can instantly see what is inside. Thanks for giving us more ideas!

    Reply
    • thisreadingmama says

      April 22, 2014 at 8:39 am

      Love these ideas!

      Reply
  2. Amy says

    April 22, 2014 at 8:37 am

    these are fantastic ideas—wish I had thought of some of these when my boys were little!

    Reply
    • thisreadingmama says

      April 22, 2014 at 3:10 pm

      Thank you, Amy. Thank you also for the tweet! 🙂

      Reply
  3. Jodie @ Growing Book by Book says

    April 22, 2014 at 3:01 pm

    Love the idea of the bubble wand to use as a pointer! We created a whole writing center area with recycled materials: http://growingbookbybook.com/2013/04/29/the-wartville-wizard-poppins-book-nook/

    Reply
    • thisreadingmama says

      April 22, 2014 at 3:10 pm

      I love that post!

      Reply
  4. Carey says

    April 23, 2014 at 10:20 am

    I absolutely love this post! I am taking so many notes, I am a new homeschooler and it is so great to know that so many items we have can be re-used for educational purposes! I love all these ideas, thank you so much for sharing them all!

    Reply
  5. Tracy says

    April 29, 2014 at 9:35 am

    This is such a great post! Another idea that I’ve been using is empty baby wipes containers. We have collected a stockpile of Smart Links from the Wendy’s kid’s meals, that they do every so often.
    (Not that we eat out very often, but with 6 kids!) And I keep them in one of these containers in our vehicle for an easy thing to pull out during waiting times. It’s great for many ages, since older ones can build and create, and younger ones can sort or dump and then slide them back in by the opening on the top. I’m sure this could be used for many other types of things as well!
    Thanks again!~
    Lord Bless

    Reply
    • thisreadingmama says

      April 29, 2014 at 3:38 pm

      Love it!

      Reply

Trackbacks

  1. HUGE List of FREE Homeschool Curriculum & Resources - Money Saving Mom® says:
    April 25, 2014 at 3:46 pm

    […] This Reading Mama has compiled an excellent list of 12 Common Household Items You Can Re-Purpose and Re-Use: Free Learning Resources. […]

    Reply
  2. 20 {No-Prep} Fine Motor Skills Activities - Kids Activities Blog says:
    April 28, 2014 at 7:01 pm

    […] empty containers and let kids drop things through the lids. So easy and so cool! via This Reading […]

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  3. 25 Quick and Easy Activities for Toddlers says:
    May 6, 2015 at 3:10 pm

    […] into an Egg Carton by Moms have Questions Too 19.  Pick up Blocks by Hands on as We Grow 20.  Empty Containers by This Reading Mama 21. Cereal Towers by Mess for Less 22. Build a Fort by Love Play Learn 23. […]

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Hi! I’m Becky, a homeschooling mama with 4 blessings who keep me on my toes {and knees}. Before homeschooling, I was a classroom teacher (M.Ed.) and reading tutor. Read more about me here.

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