A blog I love:

http://www.notimeforflashcards.com/

Shape Box

I made a shape box. What is a shape box? Well, in this particular scenario a shape box is a box (betcha wouldn't have guessed that!) that has various shape materials in it. It contains wooden shape puzzle pieces (that have long ago had the puzzle board itself broken and tossed), index cards with a traced shape on them, the name of each shape is written on the back, and two of each shape cut from felt. After some time, there will also be household items that are examples of each shape, but I'm still in the process of collecting those items and will probably add them as we learn each shape. I'd like to do a box for each color too, but at this point I'm thinking that may have to wait until after "four" arrives. Ideally, it would be done before...as we are currently working on colors and shapes, but alas, life gets in it's own way. I'll keep you posted if I get to those color boxes. :-)

Blogger Neglect

Most of you found this blog via the homepreschool yahoogroup, or a birth board that I am a member of and therefore are probably aware that I am currently expecting baby #4. This has caused a great deal of blogger neglect. However, I'm going to try to get several projects completed in the next 2 months and hopefully will get them all posted to this and my other blog.

Today's Activities

This morning my son said his first color name! Now, I cannot say that he actually knew which one it was in the box, but it was the name of a color nonetheless! Expanding vocabulary is a big thing in our house right now. I KNOW (in the logical side of my brain) that he is well within the range of normal for vocabulary and he understands FAR more than he is capable of verbalizing....but you know there is that non-logical side of my brain that says but his sisters were talking in complete (and for my oldest, elaborate) sentences by this age. My oldest knew the ABC song, and several shapes and colors....so there is this small part of my brain that says "Hmmmm." So him saying "Blue" while pointing at the box of markers was a BIG moment. Like I said, I don't know that he really meant he wanted the blue one, but I did give him the blue one again (he had already had it).

After he colored for a good long while, the longest amount of time he's ever been interested in coloring (I give credit to the use of markers here....usually I give him those boring old crayons..pffft who wants those things) his hands were covered in marker so I set up a hand washing station (He LOVES this activity.). He washed his hands and then I gave him fresh water and he played in the water with cups, spoons, bottles, and funnels. He also poured from one bowl to the other.

A couple new works

I can't take credit for this first one, as it hadn't occurred to me. I was at a birthday party on Saturday night, and was talking with the hostess and a mutual friend about trying to entertain the toddlers while schooling the big kids. I mentioned the spooning, and jar lids. And our mutual friend (someone whom I adore BTW, she's just full of fantastic ideas) suggested letting them put things into an empty wipe container. You know the kind with the pop up lid, with the slot to pull one wipe through at a time. She said she remembered doing pom-poms. It was an AHH HAAA moment. Not that long ago, someone on our birth board mentioned that their child loved putting coins in her piggy bank...this is a VERY similar activity, but yet I hadn't thought of it.




This morning I did this activity with Ben. I asked him if he wanted something to do, and he gleefully answered "UH huhhh" (he still doesn't say Yes or N0). So I sat him down at the table (a nice low table) and got out a bowl, the poms, and an empty wipe container (I KNEW there was a reason I had kept that....HA to my husband, my junk DOES have purpose!). I gave the demonstration and them let him get to work. He repeated it with all the poms I had given him 3 times! He would bring it to me and say "more", I'd empty the poms back into the bowl and he'd repeat the activity.





Here's a pic:

I can think of a couple variations for this: poker chips (I have these), and LARGE beans or buttons.

After he tired of this activity, I broke out the pegboard. I didn't snap any pictures of that work but this is the board we have: http://www.drtoy.com/1999_c/dtpeg.htm He likes to fill all the holes and he likes to see how tall he can stack them before they fall over.

More of Toddler Lessons

So, I'm sharing some more of our "school" time. My DS loves to help unload the dishwasher. He brings things and says "Thank You." as he hands it to you, because that's what we always say to him as he gives it to us. It's too cute. The problem with this? Oh, yes there is a problem. When I'm trying to LOAD the dishwasher, he comes running saying "Thank You! Thank You!" Because he wants to UNload the dishwasher. It's a minor problem, and worth the life lessons involved in helping out the family.

Some things he knows where they go and can put away himself after he retrieves them from the dishwasher.

Most important of all, imaginative play with the farm (we are learning the signs for farm, and the animals).

And there was just something so very wicked witch of the west about this that I couldn't help but share it.

Transferring Activity

We didn't get to do beans the other afternoon, I realized I only had small beans. While my DS isn't big on putting things in his mouth anymore, it still presented too much of a choking hazard for me to let him play with them..on the off chance he might put them in his mouth. Now, if I had been planning on sitting there with him, that would have been a different story. But, one of my goals is to get him to do more things independently, so I didn't want to sit there. Well, this morning he got out our transferring bowls again, and I was searching for something around the house that he could transfer without me worrying about him. I then found the container of buttons! I knew these would be a HIT as he is ALWAYS asking to play with them, and I've never allowed it before (mostly because they would just be scattered everywhere, and I didn't want to deal with that).

You need two bowls (Montessori methods prefer glass or wood....but I don't have any of those yet, so mine are plastic). A large spoon. And, whatever objects (buttons, large beans, pom poms, dried wagon wheel noodles, or anything else you come up with) you are going to transfer. It's also best to have a workmat, you see that I'm using a placemat as our workmat. It keeps the bowls from sliding around.

Here is the setup:

And then I did the presentation, I unscrewed the lid of the jar. I said "Don't touch, watch mama." I poured some of the buttons into the first bowl. I picked up the spoon, I scooped a few buttons up and dumped them into the second bowl. I repeated it three times. Then I asked if he'd like to try. "Uh huh!" (He never says yes or no, uh huh and uh uh.) I handed over the spoon, and he was able to do it successfully. Another 30 minutes!