How to host an activity bag swap

So have my postings on activity bags caught your interest? Why not host a swap. Sherri MacLean, co-founder of Activity Bags LLC, offers the following advice on hosting your first swap.

We found that holding a swap is a really fun way to accumulate a variety of preschool activities without having to assemble every one by ourselves. Basically, you get a few friends together. We found twenty to be a great number for a swap, but it also works well with fewer. Each person receives instructions for assembling one activity. They will put that activity together twenty (or whatever the number of participant) times. Then, you swap, and each person gets one activity from every other person! It is great fun! When the swap is over, each participant will walk away with many completely different preschool activities. You can certainly do all the activities by yourself; you do not have to do a swap. The activity instruction sheets are very clear for assembling one, ten, fifteen, or twenty activity bags.Coordinating an activity bag swap is not only easy, but very fun! Below are some tips to give you an idea of how simple it is to coordinate a swap. More detailed instructions are contained in each book.
Set Important Dates. Before you start calling all your friends to participate in your swap, you need to do a few things first:- Decide on the dates for assembling your activities.- Determine the date for the actual swap.- Select the activities you want to assemble. Having all this information at the ready will help you when you make your calls or send emails to the potential swap participants.
Find Your Participants.Now that you have all your important dates and activities picked out, you need to find some participants to be in the swap. Once you have an idea of potential participants, you can either send them an e-mail or call them. All of our books include a Participant Information Form to help gather all your information on each swap participant. Below are some suggestions of where to find participants for your swap:- Preschool play group- Church- Moms in your neighborhood- Friends and family- Homeschool Support Group- Moms you meet at the park- Basically, any mom, grandmother and or teacher with preschoolers
Assign the Activities.Every book includes a Preschool Activity Supply List to help you find an activity based on what supplies your participants may have on hand. When you talk to your potential participants, ask them what supplies they have on hand at home and try to match an activity to what they already have. Every bag is designed to cost $1 or less to assemble. But, the more items you have at home on hand, the less each bag will cost.
Communicate and Stay Organized.It is important to communicate with your swap participants in case they have questions regarding buying supplies, assembling the bags, etc. You can send an email out about 2 weeks before the swap date just to check in and see how things are going. About a week before the swap date, send one more email to check in and remind the participants regarding the swap date and time. Each includes sample emails and letters to help you communicate.
Learn from Other Coordinators."The best tool for me was communication. After I made the first contact with my participants via phone using the script in the book, I followed up with an email using the example in the book. Everybody knew what was going on and if anyone had questions regarding their activity, I caught it early. Also, the Activity Instructions are VERY clear. The majority of the questions I received were regarding the best places to buy supplies and substituting items.""Try to find people you think are truly willing and committed to following through with assembly etc. That was my biggest challenge. Take the time to do a lot of follow up calls, reminders and make yourself more available to pinpoint potential problems before the swap.""Do not be afraid to work with the number of participants you have. If you do not have 20, do not worry. If you have less than 20, you can just make that number of activities or everyone can do 2 activities and double the number of activity bags you will receive. If you have more than 20, you can split into 2 groups. Be creative"

Thanks again Sherri!
Wendy

An Interview with Activities In A Bag's Co-creator

I posted a few weeks ago that I was going to participate in a preschool activity bag swap. I went to the swap and it went great. I recieved 24 different activity bags for Emily. I have given her about 7 of them so far and she loves every one. I am so impressed with the variety of activities and what she is learning from playing with them.
Sherri MacLean, one of the co-creators of Activity Bags LLC, agreed to answer some questions for me. She gave me so much wonderful info, it will be in two posts. In this post, we'll talk about Activity Bags and in the next post, Sherri will share how you can host a activity bag swap of your own. (Don't miss the free gift offer from Sherri at the bottom of this post!)

CF: Welcome Sherri! You and Paula spent 2 years field testing your first Preschool Activities in a Bag book. In your experience, what makes a good self-directed activity for preschoolers?

SM:What makes a great preschool activity for us is one that 1) cost $1 or less to assemble, 2) it needs to fun, educational, and require little to no help from Mom to do the activity and 3) it needs to have skill sets that help prepare the preschooler for Kindergarten.

CL: Having created so many different activity bags, surely you have a lot of bags around your house. How do you organize your children’s activity bags?
SM: We keep them organized in file folder boxes. We label them on the outside and stack them near our school area. You can fit 20 Preschool Activities in one file box quite nicely. How do your children use them? We take one activity out at a time and set the timer for 15 minutes. When the timer goes off they may open another activity ONLY when the first one has been put away, zipped up and put back in the box. And, if you ask our seven, eight, nine and ten year olds, they will tell you YES! They STILL play with the activities and ask to do them after school is over. One of the favorites involves stacking cups, plates, and bowls. They also love the matching activities and bead activities. Basically, they love them all and will tell you they are not just for preschoolers!
CF:Do you strategically bring out different bags at different times?
SM: Not really, unless we are working on how to hold a pencil, or small motor skills. We try to rotate them but they always have a favorite they could use over and over. Also, the great thing about the activities is that they can be used over and over again as well as passed down from child to child. Some of the activities do contain consumable items such as paper, which can be replaced easily to keep the activity going and going.
CF: According to your website, you have quite a few new books underway. Can you share with us what your Science Experiments in a bag, Craft Kits in a Bag and Math games in a bag will look like? What ages are they geared toward? When will they be available for purchase?
SM: Most people think we only have activities for preschoolers, but we have more books on the way that have been tested and are being prepared for print. Including: Preschool Activities in a Bag - Book #3, filled with 34 brand new preschool activities, three volumes of Science Experiments in a Bag (Ages 3 - 12), three volumes of Craft Kits in a Bag (Ages 5-12) , and Math Games in a Bag - Book #1 (ages 5-12). All of our books are in the same format, allowing participants to hold a swap with other friends. Each experiment, craft kit, and math game has been tested by over eighty different moms, and they love them! So, Activity Bags, LLC is not just for preschoolers.Between the two of us, Paula and I have 11 children and writing books in the mix, along with homeschooling, can be challenging. So, it is hard to say when all the books will be finished - but know we are working on them. :)
CF:A large portion of my readers are in the Denver area. Is there a way that moms can participate in testing activities for the new books?
SM:Yes, we keep a data base of moms who are interested in testing our new kits. All you need to do is send an email to www.ActivityBags.com and let me know you want to be on our mailing list for testing. I will add any Mom who is interested in testing to our main data base. Next time we hold a test swap, you will receive an email invitation with all the details to join the swap(s). It is really that easy. So far we have held to date over 30 groups of 20 moms. That is a total of 600 participants and 12,000 kits being assembled!
As a gift to all your Moms reading this, we would like to offer you a complimentary copy of our Ebook Sampler that includes:7 Preschool Activities in a Bag assembly instructions3 Science Experiments in a Bag assembly instructionsA 30 Day Challenge Devotionalhttp://www.activitybags.com/Sampler.pdfPlease feel free to write to us anytime with questions - we would love to hear from you!

Thank you Sherri!