Giant Sight Word Stomp Board

(4 Years)

Little Miss likes learning activities that are quiet, Wild One always lights up when I make our learning into a physical game (specifically jumping, running, swatting).  It seems a lifetime ago when we were learning our letter sounds.  I remember Little Miss liked pointing to magnetic letters, whereas Wild One was learning letter sounds by playing swat the letter.

Two years later, we are learning our sight words and Little Miss now likes (sometimes, when she's in the mood) to jump and dance and twirl.  I created a gigantic sight word board in the driveway (with each word written twice, so that the three of us could play simutaneously).  Little Miss said that she was going to be the teacher and tell us (Wild One and me) which word to jump on.   I have a feeling that as she grows-up , I'm going to be hearing a lot of Little Miss trying to take the lead and tell us all what to do!

The inspiration for this giant sight word stomp board was from the below hopscotch board.  You see, early last week, we played a game of hopscotch using -at words.  Little Miss was not at all interested.  She wanted to draw with chalk, Grandma and Grandpa bought them a huge box of vibrant sidewalk chalk.  She was all ready to draw, however she asked me not to take any pictures until she finished - and of course it rained. Meanwhile, Wild One kept asking, "are you done yet?  Can I play?".  I didn't think I'd ever finish the hopscotch board, he kept trying to jump on the board as I was creating it.

Oh, those red stains on the collar of Wild One's shirt is strawberry juice.  He ate almost 1/2 of a pound of strawberries!  

Yay! We Love Soccer!

(42 Months)

We just had our first soccer practice and game.  It is so much fun!  Our team ranges with kids that are newly turned threes to four and a halves.  I read on a blog that signing kids of this age up for sports is a waste of time and money.  She went on to say that they just run around and no "real" skills are developed in this form of organized recreational play.  We only had our one practice and game so far, but I can already see that there are real skills being learned and reinforced:

• waiting your turn (patience)
• lining up when called and working on drills (following directions and listening skills)
• tracking the ball with your eyes while running after it (gross motor skills)
• compassion (we saw a little one help up a teammate that fell)
• teamspirit (clapping when a goal was scored)
• communication skills

We signed Little Miss and Wild One up with the anticipation that Wild One would LOVE the physicality of it, whereas we knew that there was a good chance Little Miss wouldn't even step onto the field (she is so painfully shy sometimes, even with family that she sees at least twice a month she shies away).  Boy, were we wrong about her!  From the moment she stepped onto the field, she was eager and ready to play.  Little Miss shed her shyness and went to talk to the other two girls on her team.  During one of the lineups, the boy next to her was dancing, and Little Miss started dancing with him!  My shy little girl, went onto the field and had a great time.  She did come over three times during the game.  Once she asked to have "a short one", she needed to have a moment another time, and the last time was for a drink break.  We realized that we forgot to explain to the kids, that during a game and practices they aren't supposed to leave the field unless the coach tells them to.  

Wild One loved running after the ball!  He even started acting like the coach, directing everyone (as if he was putting on one of his shows that he does for us at home).  He was even fascinated with how well his shin guards worked, "Mommy!  I got kicked and it didn't even hurt!" This is his element: sports, running, performing.  He loved it.  We knew he would.  He loves sports, he loves being active.  

The hour went by very fast, especially for the grown-ups.  We were all laughing so hard, watching as our kids looked around aimlessly for the ball, only to discover it was right by their feet.  Or as two little kids were holding hands and skipping through the field.  Or when they would just run around in circles trying to figure out which way to go.  Or when they would line up on the wrong side (that was our two- it happened twice).  

So verdict?  I think you can tell.  For our two kids, organized recreational sports is a fun way of learning and making new friends.

"I love school" Thank You Calendar Time

(31 Months)

My cheeks hurt from grinning like the Cheshire Cat.  We had our first Calendar Time this morning and the kidabunks loved it.  They even sat on their mats, listened to directions and followed instructions.  I'm telling you this school board is magical - WILD ONE sat still (well, for a little while).

We began by inviting them over to sit on their mats with a special friend.  Little Miss chose one of her tiny teddy bears and Wild One choose his blue nosed puppy.  So far, so good.  Next, I introduced them to the school board and let them just look it over.  We began at the top, I told them today's date.  Then we clapped to ten.

We sang the Days of the Week song.  I tried to explain the concepts of Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.   They took turns placing each of the place holders in their respective days.  We looked out the window and saw that it was sunny and beautiful, then we looked at each of the symbols and put on the correct sunny card on Monday.  We talked about Summer and how the weather is really warm, and all of the fun things that we do in summer.

Next we looked at what we'll be working on this week.  We sang the Leap Frog song, "the E says eh, the E says eh.  Every letter makes a sound, the E says eh."  I pointed to the word pink and then asked the kiddos that on the count of three to try and find two things that are pink.  Little Miss quickly ran and grabbed a big and small Abby Cadaby and Wild One found a big and small pig.  

Then we discussed the rectangle and we went around the room grabbing objects that are rectangular (books, lids, sheets of paper, a shoe box, picture frames, the cookie trays...).  We practiced saying "at" and I said we'll come back to that one later.  

We sang the Months of the Year song, while pointing out each month on the board.  Wild One decided that he wanted to point out the names of the months while we were singing.

We read the poster All About Number 2, and then we went off finding pairs of objects.  We made a huge mess, my fault- I should have said just find one pair of objects.  I was brought animals, trains, pillows, coffee/tea cups, books...  I'll try and remember tomorrow to just let them show and tell two sets each.

We played point to the shape on the Shape poster.  We didn't spend much time on it, I noticed that I started losing their attention.

Then we moved onto the _at blocks.  I was so surprised at how quickly Wild One picked it up.  He loved playing school and kept wanting to say the word over and over again.  I'm so proud of my little man.  Little Miss decided it was time for her baby to eat breakfast, so she began cooking for her in their kitchen.  I noticed that she was watching her brother while cooking.

These were so easy to put together.  I didn't write on the blocks themselves.  I placed tape on the blocks and then wrote on the tape (that way we can use the blocks for other word families).

After we finished with the blocks, Little Miss came over and wanted to play.  I asked Wild One to show his sister what he was working on.  He lit up and said "I do school!"  He told his sister that a-t is at.  Look at my little teacher!  I'm so proud.

We played again with our Pinkalicious play-doh.  We made sandwiches, pancakes, faces, poked holes with pretend carrots, made textured patterns with pretend corn, and then it was time for lunch.  What a fun morning!

Calendar Time

(31 Months)

I've been wanting to making this board for several weeks now.  Calendar time offers so much learning in one confined space.  For the past few weeks, after the kidabunks were asleep in bed for the night I searched blog after blog, Pinterest board after board, looking for ideas.  The process seemed to be too time-consuming to tackle during a once-a-day, hour long nap.  Then, one wonderful day last week they took a two-hour nap (two glorious uninterrupted hours).  It was the jump start I needed to get this project underway.  Once I started, it actually came together pretty quickly (although not as fast as homemade play-doh).  

I had certain goals that I wanted to accomplish in using this board, which determined the material that I placed on the board.  My goals over the next year+ are to practice learning:

• the days of the week (in order)
• the months of the year (in order)
• the concept of yesterday, today and tomorrow
• what the weather is outside (cloudy, sunny, rainy)
• the names of the seasons and our current season
• learning about each number 
• learning numbers in sequence, through a real-world number line
• begin learning about word families
• understand that there are several ways to draw a basic shape
• practice in forming letters (out of shaving cream, play doh, blocks, sticks, pom poms) 
• -this one is for me, I wanted a board that requires little time to update, and that will grow with the kidabunks for the next two plus years.

The board is finally finished!  The ideas and inspiration came from my Pinterest board and Today's Weather is a free printable from Homeschool Creations (thank you, to all of you incredible mommies out there for posting your terrific ideas).  We're going to start using the board tomorrow and I have a lot of fun activities planned for us that I'm so excited to share with the kidabunks.

We sing the Days of the Week song to the tune of "Oh My Darlin'"-
There are seven days,
there are seven days, 
there are seven days in a week.
There are seven days,
there are seven days,
there are seven days in a week.
Sunday, Monday
Tuesday, Wednesday
Thursday, Friday
Saturday.

Sunday, Monday

Tuesday, Wednesday

Thursday, Friday

Saturday.

We sing the Months of the Year song to the tune of "Ten Little Indians" - 

January, February, March and April

May, June, July and August

September, October, November, December

Those are the months of the year

(repeat two or three more times)

I'm so excited for tomorrow!

Letter B Week (Day Two)

(29 Months)

I love my itty bitties!  When they saw their table this morning filled with "b" books, I received "wow!" and "thank you very much Momma". They sat down to their table and began to "read" their books.

After that we partially colored the letter "b".  This full-page letter b is from Erica at Confessions of a Homeschooler.  Thank you Erica.

We carefully placed beans on the b outline.  Do you notice what Wild One is about to do?  That's right, he almost got the bean in his mouth before I stopped him (he's so fast).

Next, we had fun stamping butterflies and bunnies on the "b" paper, on the easel paper, on the tops of Mommy's feet, on our legs, arms, bellies, backs (you get the picture).

Then, we threaded light blue and royal blue pony beads onto blue pipe cleaners.  Wild One threaded seven beads and then got up to start jumping around the room.  Little Miss placed five on her pipe cleaner and then began taking them off one by one to use in her tea pot (maybe it was supposed to be herbal tea?.

Lastly, we used our bottle cap letters to spell out our names.  We tried using clothes pins last week, but they were too challenging to clip onto the paper (we need to develop those pincer muscles).  In all fairness, I had to give a significant squeeze to open the clothes pin as well.
<<picture>>

Little Miss wanted to end with counting three bananas, and then asking to eat three bananas.

Our Top Ten App List (Mostly Free)

(29 Months)

I was so surprised when I first got my iPhone to see how many wonderful, and user friendly, educational apps there were for my little ones (the under three group).  I spent hours downloading free apps and then trying them to see which ones we liked, and which ones would be deleted.

As of the past two months, these are our Top 10 (out of the 25 that we kept).  They are all free except for Letter Quiz and Dora's Skywriting Adventure (my incredible cousin Catie, gave us a free app code for this app).

1. Letter Quiz (we first tried out the free lite version, but then purchased this version)- this app has four games: flash cards, match the upper to the lowercase letter, touch the "A", letter tracing (their absolute favorite- it has bumpers on the letters to help keep the lines on the letters)
2. Count-a-licious- there are three fun games on this app: number show that tells and shows the number, a counting game and a number tracing game
3. Bob Magic Lite- from the makers of BOB books, this app has levels of difficulty for placing letters in order (mostly cvc words)
4. Magic Piano- teaches the child timing and finger coordination along with beautiful music
5. Teach Me Toddler- quizes and provides a score cards for numbers, letters, shapes, colors, phonics and counting.  Offers sticker rewards after the players gets three answers right in a row
6. First Words Sampler- shows a picture (of a cat) then has three tile letters for the player to place in order, it has a safety net that will not allow the player to misplace a letter
7. Tozzle Light- a shape puzzle that reinforces sounds and names of animals
8. Dora's Skywriting Adventure- similar to the Letter Quiz
9. Little Writer- another tracing game, this one is for capital and lowercase letters, numbers, shapes and words
10. MeMe Tales- reads aloud wonderful online stories

Grocery Shopping = Following Directions

(29 Months)

As you can see, we are on a following directions kick right now (probably because we're not so good at it yet).  We first practiced with Music = Following Directions and now, we are going grocery shopping to practice following directions.

We love grocery shopping.  We're still at an age where it's fun for them, and therefore fun for us too.  Our neighborhood grocery store, Publix, has the most incredible employees.  They are so sweet to the kids.  One morning we were pointing out different types of produce, "let's see how many different colors of apples we can find?" an employee overheard me, and suggested that if I have time, after I show them the apples she'd like to take us to the berry section to show the kids the different colors and shapes of berries.  Really?  Anyway, it's experiences like those that make the kidabunks really like going to Publix (plus they have those really awesome double grocery carts in the shape of a race car).

It's been raining here pretty hard, so the kids haven't been able to go with us to the grocery store (my incredible hubby has been taking care of that for us).  They were really sad that they couldn't go with their Daddy to the store, so we decided to create a mini, teeny, tiny grocery store for them in their playroom.  I removed everything off two of their shelves, and then grouped the play groceries as you would find them in the grocery store, handed them a shopping basket and a grocery cart and voila we had a little shopping extravaganza.  Somewhere during our shopping trip, Wild One decided to swap out the grocery cart for his Daddy's old briefcase.

Instead of letting them go nuts just grabbing everything off the shelves like they were in a Supermarket Sweep, I told them for this "game" we're going to look for certain objects.  Who can find and bring back the milk?  Who can name a yellow fruit?  After we played through all of the food items, they asked (demanded with tears) to play again.  Since we're in the "I do" independent stage, I'm going to make little signs for each of the food categories  (bananas, watermelon, carrots...) and label some trays and baskets that we have lying around the house.  That way they can put them back in the baskets themselves and play again.

This can also turn into a wonderful sorting game- all dairy products in one bin, all fruit in another...  It can also be sorted by color.  Don't you just love easy to set up games that require no out-of-pocket expense?

Red Rover, Red Rover Let the LETTER A Come Over

(28 Months)

We've been integrating some old school games into our play over the past few days.  One of our favorites is Red Rover.  Do you remember this one, "Red Rover, Red Rover let Suzie come over" and then Suzie runs to the speaker?  In the beginning I needed to remind them to wait and be patient until it was their turn.  That quickly switched to anticipation, especially when I'm hesitating and using my "I'm thinking" sign. While they were giggling and running and laughing to the point of hiccups, I had a wonderful idea.  Let's integrate some I SPY with letters.

Red Rover, Red Rover let the letter T come over.  Then the kidabunks would scramble around their table looking for the letter T.  It was so cute to watch.  Plus it was simple to set up.  I chose ten letters to pull from (I didn't want them to have to search through 52 letters to find the letter that I was calling out) and then grabbed our magnetic letters and Leap Frog letters.  Placed them on their table.  Rolled a work mat for the kids to jump over (they love jumping) on their way to me, and we were all set.  Easy, peasy.

I would have loved to share pictures of the kidabunks playing, but every single picture was blurry- they move too fast.

This game was so much fun, for both them and me!  Plus, think of all the adaptions that could be made: by asking for one of the below to "come over":

• letter sounds 
• names of specific animals
• objects that begin with a certain letter
• objects of a certain color
• shapes
• numbers

This game is excellent for following directions, listening skills, identifying upper and lowercase letters, gross motor skills and patience.  Most importantly, they really like this game.  We played it three times today!