Screen Time Alternative!

If you have a child in your home between the ages of 2 to 6 years old, I can not recommend enough, for you to have a box of Mother Goose Time preschool curriculum.  Even if they go to preschool, daycare or Kindergarten.  It's a great, and easy, alternative to screen time.

I am a Mother Goose Time Blog Ambassador and I do receive this curriculum for free in exchange for writing about our use of the curriculum.  That being said, I get no commission or reward when people who read my blog buy a box of MGT.  My reason for sharing is simple, this curriculum, has had a huge positive impact on my family.  As a new Mother, I had no idea what my children were capable of, but Mother Goose Time did!  They gave us countless "Mother Goose Moments" that I am SO thankful for, even more so now that my oldest is 9, and my middle son is 7! 

I have had a box of January's Dinosaur Dig sitting on our dining room floor for months now.  This morning, Adam (age 4) and I had some one on one time as his older brothers and Dad were on an outing.  I have always wanted to make my time with the kids count, even before going back to work, but even more so now.  Our time together in the evenings and weekends is so important.  Of course, I still have all the house work and chores to do and less time to do them in, so I can't give them my full attention, all the time.  Please don't let this make you feel guilty.  My kids spend plenty of time watching cartoons, playing video games or playing on their own while I get stuff done.

But when I do have an opportunity, like this morning, I will quickly run out of ideas, especially out of ideas that don't cost money.  Because of course going out to eat or shopping is a lot of fun, but it adds up! Just when I am about to say "okay Adam, let's put some cartoons on" (because Mommy is out of ideas and wants to get chores done) I remember that box of Mother Goose Time. 

But it's not just a screen time alternative in this situation alone.  The MGT activities can easily be set out in an investigation station style and your child can discover the activity and play independently.  Often it will launch their imaginations into a new direction and keep them engaged and entertained for a nice stretch of time.

Today we lengthened our one on one time and got out day 12 to learn about Dinosaur Heads.  I set up the calendar for June and we sang the days of the week and months of the year song as he worked hard at cutting out his dinosaur teeth.

These calendar pieces work just as well for June as they do for January!  Instead of attaching the calendar pieces permanently, I use something that can stick and re-stick.

Then he glued the teeth on.  Carefully placing the tooth where he wanted and then lifting it back up, putting the glue down and sticking it on.

When the dino headband was fully constructed he put it on and turned into a dinosaur, it was SO scary!

After filming this little video I realized he had not eaten breakfast yet.  I was trying to feed him cereal but he said he couldn't eat it because he only ate meat.  Oh my!  But if you notice, with in that role playing is a lot of knowledge.  He knows that dinos with sharp teeth eat meat, that's something!

After he ate some cereal, I did finally convince him, we did some graphing!  Yep, graphing.  It was math, but he didn't know that!

He rolled the dino die, looked to see what kind of dino he rolled, then placed a penny on the chart.

As the pennies added up on the chart we talked about which one had the most rolls, which ones were the same which one had the least.  These words are all math terms.

I didn't even get pictures of the pattern he made using the dinosaur manipulatives.  But as you can see, we had a lot of fun, playing and learning and avoiding screen time! 

Please, please, trust me when I say, they grow up fast and life can change in a blink of the eye.  Don't take for granted these precious and silly toddler/preschool years.  Squeeze as many moments like these in as you can!

The Soccer Man

I asked Adam what he wanted to do for his 4th birthday party and he said he wanted a "soccer and chocolate party".  He had been starting to play soccer at his daycare and I guess he really likes it.  I was able to find a Puma soccer ball and a matching shirt at Ross Dress for Less. 

I was able to take his birthday off so that I could spend the day with him.  He will only turn 4 once and soon he will be in school.  We spent some time playing soccer in the front yard.  We can't play in the backyard because our chihuahua goes  bonkers over balls, even giant ones she can't fetch.  I was enjoying every second of our day together and just had to get some pictures.

Such a cool "soccer man".

 And when he was all done with me taking his picture, this is what I got. 

When it got just a bit too cold out, we came back in and played with his new Greek ship from Playmobil. This thing is awesome.

 Our new doggie Mia kept wanting to get into the photo.  Since I don't have a good photo of her yet I changed my target. 

 She wasn't sure if she in fact wanted to be photographed. 

 The eyebrows on this dog are just spectacular. 

 We are so blessed to have her.  I mean, look at that face!

Unfortunately, in the middle of the night with 30 minutes left of Adam's birthday, my little soccer man threw up.  Not a great way to end the day.  I am home another day with him and it has allowed me to document our day.  So I will try to see it as a blessing in disguise.

Dinosaur Fossils with Mother Goose Time - a reflection.

The last time we were able to squeeze in any Mother Goose Time was January 8th.  Before I went back to work.  I have to tell you, adjusting to working full time with three children is HARD.  I do hope to write about that more in another post.  And hopefully you won't mind if I am frank with my thoughts.  I am not sure if many people talk about all the little hard things, and how much it really sucks. 

But back to these precious memories.  We got out the day on fossils where we dumped a bag of sand in a tray.  The letter we are working on is L, which is great because it's brother's letter.  I put the Ls in the sand and he used the paint brush to write L along side the hands-on letters.

So proud of his accomplishment.  He really just started getting great at writing over night!

Next he tried his own letter, A is for Adam. 

We had a little friend that I happened to be babysitting on this day and I gave her all the dinos and two containers to move the dinos from one to the other.  She also opened and closed the lids and was happy for quite a long time.

By now I had the paper dino bones all cut out and I buried them in the sand on the tray.  We talked about how paleontologists use brushes to uncover bones because the bones are fragile.  Talk about some great vocabulary.

 Piece by piece he found and slowly uncovered the bones. 

 Taking each one and placing it on the paper next to him. 

Then he covered the paper in glue and we put the bones together like a puzzle.  Next I had him pinch some of the sand from the tray and sprinkle it over the exposed glue on the paper. 

 He learned so many wonderful things on this day.  Some great vocabulary.  Practiced some spacial awareness by putting the puzzle of bones together and did some awesome writing practice.  All while having a ton of fun! 

Now that we have settled a little bit more into our routine, I really should, at the very least, pull out some Mother Goose Time every Saturday, just to spend some amazing one on one time with my little man. 

Day One of Our Rainforest Adventures

*This post may contain affiliate links.

Day 1 was all about Jaguars.  I set the J is for Jaguar Make & Play craft up at the table for Adam.  But later that day we had a whole bunch of kids over and it started to get kind of loud, so I asked if anyone wanted to make a Jaguar.  Even though they were older kids, they were super excited and soon, it got a lot quieter in my house as they happily worked on their Jaguars.

I also got out the I Can Read book so that Adam and I can read through it all month long.  He often hears me tell his brothers they have to do their reading and he LOVES having his own reading assignment.

Every new theme with Mother Goose Time means they get a new name tag and every month on the first day we write our names.  I write Adam's name with a yellow marker and he traces over it. He was quick to finish his name this month so he decided to flip it over and try his hand at some free hand As.

The older boys were at the other end of the table doing an old fashioned spelling test.  I put a divider up between them, dictated words for them to spell and then we graded it together after.  They were both upset that they didn't get them all correct because that's what we are used to with homeschooling.  I quickly explained to them that getting only one or two wrong is really good!! Mommy used to miss a lot more.  This brought them a lot of relief.

The next lesson was called Circle Spots and the idea was to cover a large paper in circle's like the spots on a Jaguar.  They recommend we cover a tables surface in large pieces of paper and then provide cups and other circle objects to trace. I grabbed what I had handy and used that old printer paper that's all attached in one long sheet.  My husbands previous employer found a case of it in an old office storage area.  Jackpot!

I was very nervous to present this activity to Adam.  I knew he would like it and want to do it but I thought he might get really frustrated by the items sliding as he was tracing.

But here's the thing.  He surprised me again and he was successfully able to hold the items in place as he traced.  If he did have a little hiccup, he didn't get angry, just fixed it and kept going.

These are huge signs of development for Adam.  The social and emotional development to shrug off frustration, and the physical ability to hold an item in place while tracing.

Observing Adam as he works through a project is called Authentic Assessment. I have observed Adam enough times doing various activities using a variety of skills that when he "surprises me", I am actually observing and assessing a leap in his skills and abilities.  As a homeschool Mother in a state where no documentation of work is required for a preschooler I can do this assessing very informally.  But if I were in a state that required documentation, Mother Goose Time would make it so easy!!

In fact, I could look at the developmental continuum under Self Concept and see that under 1.3 Identifies and manages feelings Adam would be right at Benchmark D "Recognizes personal feelings.  Controls impulses with reminders."   Although, this time, he didn't need a reminder and was able to control those emotions on his own.  So maybe he's on his way to Benchmark E!!

Over the last few years I have been taping Adam's name tags to the back of our Circle Time display board.  This is another fun way of assessing Adam's growth.  And not to worry, if you don't know where to start with collecting work samples, Mother Goose Time will take you step by step through that as well.

But if you look closely, the name tags at the top have his name, written by me, and then scribbles all over the place.  As they get towards the bottom you begin to see mostly his name with very few scribbles because he has started to trace directly over the lines. Except of course on the rainforest one.  He seemed to have some fun drawing a few extra lines on that one, maybe they are vines in the jungle.

I hope you enjoyed a glimpse into a "day" with Mother Goose Time.  We have incorporated it in so many avenues of our life.  Whether it be neighbors coming over to play or serious Preschool learning and work for my little guy so he can be like his big brothers.

I love to use this blog to document Adam's learning adventures.  I feel so blessed to have a record of all that he has done.  But it's also fun to sit down and reflect.  It was in this reflection that I realized these moments when Adam "surprises me" aren't surprises at all, but assessments in disguise.  The only reason I am surprised is because it's a skill or ability Adam was not capable of before, but now he is!  They are in fact observations of skills gained and growth made!

How to Set a Toddler Trap

Before you get worried, this type of trap won't hurt anyone but it will expand their mind and abilities!

**This post may contain affiliate links.

Sometimes it's hard to do an official "day" of Mother Goose Time lessons and activities.  When that is the case I have a lot of fun setting up "toddler traps".  I actually call mine "Adam Traps" because that is my intended target around here.  He is my 3.5 almost 4 year old little man.  So maybe, I should officially call him a preschooler, but I still struggle with not calling him baby Adam, so one step at a time please.

There are many names for what I call "Adam traps".  Some call them Investigation Stations or Invitations to Play.  It's a pretty simple concept, you set up an activity in a special location for the child to find and investigate on their own.  This is good for my Adam who has always been very independent.  When he happens upon an activity and he chooses to investigate it further you can just see him beaming with pride and he has a lot more commitment to the task when it was his decision.

Here is what you do.  First you set out an activity at one of their spots or you set it up on the floor or somewhere that will catch their eye.  Here is the first "trap" I set.  I put out this Mother Goose Time math activity.  We had done this once before so I knew he would know what to do.  The objective is to have them roll the pocket cube and then put that many "clouds" (cotton balls) in the sky on the paper.

The second trap I set was at the table.  I put his My Little Journal on the table with his name written in yellow.  We have done this a few times now, so again, I knew that he would know what to do.  I set the green marker next to the journal and he knows to trace his name.  I also included colored pencils so he could draw a picture on the cover if he wanted to.  You can also see his chocolate milk is sitting there and his favorite Wii controller.  I figured he might just climb up to the table to look for those items and discover his journal and I would catch him in my trap.

It didn't take long until the first trap was successful. Caught him!  I didn't want to scare away the toddler so I just took a quick picture from behind.  

Here is a side by side.

A little while later I was able to get him to participate in the second trap.  But I had to make it more enticing.  I sat down at his spot and asked him to tell me his favorite weather.  This was the journal prompt for the cover from Mother Goose Time.  He said the sun and I asked him what he liked to do in the sun and I started to draw a stick figure drawing of Adam flying a toy airplane outside in the sun.  He of course wanted to join in and then took it from there.

He wrote his name first.

Then he added his own touch to the cover photo.

The key is, I did not ask him if he wanted to participate because it's too easy for a toddler to say no.  I just got him intrigued and because it was his decision he was totally invested.  He did page after page in his journal.  He wrote beautifully!

 Big Cs and little Cs.

He did perfect #4s.

I love how these My Little Journals have the letter and then shapes or lines that, if practiced, will help in the formation of the letter.

On this page Adam drew his "heart beat" because we were at the hospital the weekend before because of a severe case of croup.  They had him on a monitor and we watched his heart beat.

On the very last page Adam was determined to write his very own A, with out tracing.  I gave him some step by step guidance through writing the letter on his own. "Line up, then down, then frog jump, and draw a line across."  He did a few that looked more like a triangle and then nailed his very own and very first A!!

You can find your own "Toddler Traps" on Pinterest, there are thousands of ideas.  Look for keywords of Invitation to Play, Investigation Stations, or Toddler Tray Play.  Of course, you can make it super simple on yourself and order a box of Mother Goose Time where all the Pinterest ideas are brought to life with stellar graphics, great printing, and delivered right to your door.  Not to mention the fact that they are guaranteed to be educational and easily adaptable to your child.  It's up to you of course and your budget, but I promise you won't regret it if you do decide to buy a box.  Either way, set a Toddler Trap for your little one, and see what happens!