"Elaborate special systems of education … seem to me to be built upon the supposition that every child is a kind of idiot who must be taught to think" Anne Sullivan
For family who follows this blog, here are some of the amusing tidbits we had this week!
Eliana has learned to climb up on the table — Becca had to join her for the picture!
“mommy I want more fruit!!!” (Well, her words were “aahhh! aaaahhhh!” )
And the joy of empty boxes – Eliana couldn’t be left out of Becca’s fun! (Becca is focusing on the drawing she is creating inside the box, Eliana is looking at the drawing that Becca finished in her box)
Today Becca started learning how to write her name. I taught her a story to go with the letter R:
The rain comes down, out of the clouds, and the rainbow comes out from under the clouds after the rain.
She understood the concept, I think:
"Mommy put me in the picture too!"
After practicing the rest of the letters, we wrote them all:
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In honor of Herb Day we went for a walk around our backyard to see what kind of plants we could find. We had fun taking pictures of plants and collecting Buttercups and Dandelions.
We used our dandelions to make a fairy crown: cut a slit in the stem with your fingernail to slide the next flower through until you have enough, then tie the first and last stem together and there you go!
Hopefully the one lesson that will stick is the Plantain:
The leaves can be rolled between fingers to release the oils and pressed upon a bee sting, spider bite, insect bite, scratch, etc. They’re about as prolific as Dandelions, so they’re always around when you need them.
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Tags: garden
Filed under: Outside Activities
Today we harvested some wild strawberries in our backyard! Becca wasn’t thrilled with the ants on some of them, but otherwise they were pretty good (if small) and Eliana seemed to love them!
Both were asking for more when the bowl was empty!
Tags: garden
Filed under: Outside Activities
Last night I attended a webinar by Aviva Romm, herbalist, mom of 4, and new grandmom! that discussed herbal remedies for kids specifically focusing on summertime. It included things like how to treat scrapes, bruises, cuts, sun burns, insect bites, stings, poison ivy, etc. She explained everything that should be in your first aid kit (and how to use everything) and she gave a few great ideas for things to do with your kids (we’ve gotta make dandelion pancakes!!!)
They’re offering a link to the replay of the webinar until Saturday (5/5/12) at midnight so if you want to see it yourself, (it’s about 90 minutes) you have a chance! This is an awesome resource to learn some basic ways to use nature to help heal yourself and your kids – many things are easily obtainable and some may even be prolific in your own yard!
Highly recommended!
http://www.onlinemeetingnow.com/seminar/?id=a3c4fdaabf
Filed under: Outside Activities
Today we did a quick and easy painting project – the four seasons. Note the pink in the winter tree? That’s what happens when you don’t clean your fingers well enough before you switch colors! She opted to do the fall tree with the corks, but the rest were all fingerprint leaves.
Sometimes I need something to shake myself up – when the TV is just too easy to just start another show and I’m just tired. So I finally got down to the “brain breaks” on my to-do list. I took the time to print them, but they could have just as easily been hand written.
Basically I put 10 quick activities into a jar and whenever I feel the need to wake up I call brain break and Becca gets to pick one paper from the jar. First one she picked was “20 jumping jacks”
Here are the 10 things I put in our jar:
20 jumping jacks
Pat head and rub tummy
Ants go Marching (sing song)
Ball/bean bag toss (or juggling)
Jump, Skip, Spin, repeat
head rolls
Toilet paper streamers
Who can yawn bigger?
Dance party (using the preset songs on the piano)
Make silly faces (happy, sad, confused, hide faces and if you match, you win)
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Tags: brain breaks
Filed under: parenting, Play, Preschool
We have this Melissa and Doug puzzle:
When we got it (thanks Great-Granny!) my hope was that the pattern pictures would be jumping off point – a way to show how shapes can be used together to make various pictures. I had bought this puzzle probably a year ago:
and while we liked it (it’s great for teaching beginning puzzle skills), it didn’t promote the type of out of the box thinking I was hoping for, probably because the puzzle boards were structured. Without the structure on the pictures themselves (there are no “walls” for the pieces to fit into), I finally am starting to see some spontaneous out of the box play:
She told me she was building a drive way.
Oh, and then there was this:
Meet “Mr. Snowman”
So in an effort to find appropriate table activities for Eliana, I discovered that she actually likes coloring! Well, most of the time, I still have to keep an eye out for the crayon in the mouth, but she likes making marks with the crayons on paper. She does have problems getting the paper to stay still though, so I had started putting a cup on the far corners to keep the paper in place… well, she discovered a new fun activity last night:
Crayons in, crayons out… sorry Daddy, you’ll have to get a clean cup to have a drink out of because yours might have a little extra color in it now!
Tags: toddler activities
Filed under: Table activities
Daddy took a personal day to take us all downtown DC for a little bit of history in the making: The Shuttle took a couple passes over Washington DC on its way to the National Air and Space Museum and we got there in time to see it!
It was quite a popular event, although most of the Mall was torn up for lawn restoration (You would think that would involve green grass, but no, it was mostly involving large mounds of dusty dirt).
The Capitol Building
After this fun, we rode the metro over to the Zoo and had a bit of birthday fun – Eliana loved it!
She would get so excited when looking at the animals that she would stamp her feet like she was running and clap her hands. She also started yelling at the gorilla’s and wanted to climb into the Prairie Dog’s home.
All the excitement did take their toll, though…
It’s so hard being one! Happy (one day early) Birthday Eliana!
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