Showing posts with label Brothers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Brothers. Show all posts

Saturday, December 17, 2016

Deer Day Part 2

Deer day part 1 started with the name tags and I wrote all about that in my last post about emergent writing.  Part of the name tag activity had us talking about the tracks a deer would leave behind and it encouraged us to get a tray of flour out for the children to write in.  I went a different route because we have a bunch of figures from Schleich.  These figures have accurate feet and therefore leave accurate foot prints.  So a horse will leave a horse shoe print and dog a dog foot print, etc.  When we were in Michigan a few years ago we bought three Schleich deer.

So I set up Adam with Play-doh and a Schleich deer to make foot prints with.  Then I added a few of our other animals for added fun and discovery.
 He tried out every animal at least once.

Mother Goose Time also tied the color white into this lesson on deer.  We discussed how some deer are called white tail deer and talked about what those deer do with their white tails when they are scared.  We flicked our white ribbon that we got with this months theme like a deer would flick it's tail to warn the others.

The last activity we did was to make the deer head bands.  This is one of the Make & Play crafts.  After you make the craft, you play with it, pretty self explanatory.  But of course Mother Goose Time gives you ideas on how to play.

First the make part.  We were given a brown piece of paper to trace our hands on, we then cut those out and used them as the antlers.  Adam really wanted to cut his hand prints like the big boys so I traced his hands twice.  One set for him to cut and one for me to cut.  He is only two and a half so he does not quite have the cutting skills to follow his hand print.  But he happily cut his paper to pieces.
 The other two very carefully did all their own cutting.



We assembled the headbands next and then moved onto the Play part!

Deer are great jumpers and leapers, so with our headbands on, we were to jump from a line and mark how far we were able to go.  This is where I had a lot of fun with my new fast camera.  I cranked up the ISO and the shutter speed so I could capture them mid air.

Here they go!!!!!!!
Leaping Lachlan.
Adam mid-air.
No feet on the ground for Peter.
 They were just too cute not to get a picture of all together.  Lachlan is a pretty tough deer.
I counted to three and had them jump all together.  Adam was a bit behind on the jump, but you can see him getting ready to go.
I took many photos but tried to pair them down a bit for the sake of this blog post.  Here is a slideshow with more of the action shots.
My happy deer.



To recap on this one day of lessons from Mother Goose Time, we learned a new color and talked about it in a context that really grabs a kids attention, like the white tail of the deer.  While we were on this topic we talked about emotions like fear and added a bit of science by talking about why a deer might be scared. Add in more science by talking about animal tracks.  We used our big muscles while jumping like a deer and we used our little muscles by cutting out our hand prints and assembling our headband.  Oh and of course, all the great emergent writing practice we had while making our name tags.  

Don't be fooled by all the fun, we learned a lot too!

Wednesday, September 7, 2016

Toddler Time with Mother Goose Time and Owl Art (Kind of)

This year I am now teaching 3 kids.  My oldest is in 2nd grade and my middle son is in Kindergarten, but will be joining my oldest on most of his 1st and 2nd grade curriculum.  Adam, my youngest, is 2.5 year old.  Oh how important that .5 is.  They grow so much in those 6 months.  He has a new word or 10 everyday.  His understanding of things surprise me daily. 

It wasn't so long ago that Peter was tiny and understanding way more than I anticipated.  Because he was so far ahead I didn't really do any intentional learning with him.  But then I was convicted. 

Friday, May 6, 2016

Butterfly vs. Moth

Do you know the difference between a butterfly and a moth?  I always thought it had something to do with the color, as most butterflies are colorful and moths are usually a neutral color.  But it turns out that a moth changes from a caterpillar to a moth in a cocoon, which is a soft silky wrapping and a butterfly changes inside of a chrysalis, which is a hard shell.  Who knew!

I love the fact that even I learn something new with Mother Goose Time.   On Butterfly day we learned about symmetry.  I wasn't getting much enthusiasm from the boys about the idea of making a symmetrical butterfly pattern, so I did it first myself and set it in front of Lachlan.  He was suddenly interested!
He got right to work making his own pattern.
We actually started butterfly the day before these pictures were taken.  I started them on the butterfly life cycle craft.  Lachlan got a bit frustrated with trying to draw stripes on the wet beans for the caterpillar part of the wheel.  So we picked up the project again the next day.  Again, he wasn't interested at all in finishing it, so I got started on it by finishing the caterpillar and then he decided to do the rest on his own.
 Finishing touches.
While Lachlan was working on his Butterfly Life Cycle wheel, Peter was working on illustrating his bilingual book.  I love these little bilingual books, but I really like this one.  This one gave them the opportunity to finish the pictures on each page, not just color them.  The first page said there was one (una) bee, the second had two (dos) caterpillars and the third page three (tres) butterflies.  Well that's what the words said but the page just had a flower and you had to add the rest.  I wrote the number over the number word to help them out. 
Once he had it illustrated and colored he put the pages in order and stapled it together all by himself.  This is where a lot of book knowledge comes into play.  He has to know that the pages are numbered and that they go in order, he also has to know which edge to staple and to know that he has to know which way a book opens. 
Peter started using Mother Goose Time three years ago when he was just 2 years old.  When he was two I would let him scribble on the page and then put it together myself and read the book to him.  Now, he is 5 and can do it ALL by himself.  What a cool progression of skills!

To keep things going I moved onto this butterfly word family game.  We had caterpillars with the full word on it and a butterfly with just the "ug" part and then little square cards to put down on the butterfly to build the word.  
 I had Peter put a letter down and then find the matching caterpillar card. 
These were perfect 3 letter words to practice segmenting on.  This is a skill we are working on in our 1st grade spelling curriculum All About Spelling.  He used the 3 BINGO chips and slid one down for each sound.  /r/ slide one down, /u/ slide the next one down, /g/ slide the last one down.  It helps him to break down the words into the sounds that make it up.

Lachlan was across the table FINALLY working on illustrating his bilingual book.  I say finally because I had been asking him if he wanted to do it for days.  He loves to draw, loves it!  So when I saw he had the opportunity to illustrate a book, I thought, this is perfect!  My enthusiasm was quickly squashed. 
 It had to be his idea I guess.  But he did do a beautiful job and enjoyed it very much.

Back across the table Peter continues to work through all of the words.  First building them on the butterfly and then using the BINGO chips to segment the sounds. 
The next day was Moth day and that is when we learned the difference between a moth and butterfly. 

On moth day we were given our monthly dose of vocabulary cards.  These cards have a graphic and the corresponding word.  We were given a super cool sticky butterfly and they got to swing the butterfly, stick it to a card and then read the card.
Adam's turn.  He can't read, he's only 2, so I read it to him and we repeated the word a couple of times.  But mostly he had a lot of fun with the sticky butterfly and was surprisingly accurate.

Next we talked about moth balls and how people use these smelly balls to keep moths away because moths eat holes through peoples clothes.  Mother Goose Time had us put a smelly oil on cotton balls and have the kids try to toss them in a bowl.  I put two different oils on 6 cotton balls, 3 cotton balls with each sent.  I used citronella on 3 and lavender on 3.
 Then I asked them to sort them by smell.  It was actually quite challenging because I think some of the scent blended when they were in the bowl together during the tossing portion of the game. 
While they were sniffing, Adam stole my camera and took tons of photos.  Then he wanted me to take a photo of him.  Not a hard task. 
It's pretty fun to see them all gathered around working on something together.  I would totally do this again but I would not let the cotton balls be next to each other for too long before they tried to sort them. 
I have missed all this fun.  We have been pretty good about getting all the basic 1st grade curriculum done each day but have not been doing as much of the fun Mother Goose Time learning.  Bees & Butterflies has really captured our attention and we have learned so much.  We should be moving on to Bubbles, Boats & Floats, but we just can't miss out on any of the Bees & Butterfly fun.  So we are finishing every last day before we move on. 

Sunday, September 13, 2015

First Day of School - Using MGT for Pre-K and 1st Grade

We did things a little backwards on our first day of school.  We did school first and then went out front to take the first day pictures.  I guess that's what you can do when you don't have to go anywhere for school.

Our first day of Mother Goose Time's Friends and Feelings study was about Saying Hello.  I love how each year Mother Goose Time starts with a topic that explores the student and their families and communities.  Last years September topic was Me and My Family.  I believe, at the core of the learning environment, is the feeling of safety and belonging.  So beginning the year by establishing the child in their self concept and teaching them how to care for and respond to others, you are setting a great foundation.

What I love about Mother Goose Time and what makes it so easy to use for the whole family

Monday, September 22, 2014

Adam, 6 months and sitting up.

 I put this basket of toys in front of it and he tips it towards him to grab a toy out.  He plays with it for a while and then drops it.  When all of the toys are out of the basket and on the floor I gather them back up and put them back in the basket so he can do it all over again. 


I love these two together.  Lachlan is so in love with this little guy. 

Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Grandma Norma's Birthday Cake

It's always fun to celebrate someone special in our lives by baking them a cake.  Grandma Norma's birthday is today and we are celebrating tonight at dinner.  So yesterday Lachlan and I made the cake and today all 4 of us, decorated the cake. Lachlan, Peter, myself and even Adam joined in the fun.  Well he was there and watching at least.
 First Lachlan poured in all the ingredients.
 Then he got to turn on the mixer.  He obviously thought that was a lot of fun.
As it's mixing Lachlan is sending a little love to Grandma using his sign language to say, I love you.  Just as a side note, when I put this Yankees jersey on Lachlan he laughed, he thought the word yankees was pretty funny.  Never really thought about it, but it's true. 
Then Peter got started on frosting.  Don't worry Grandma, I didn't let him lick the spatula until we were done.
Jeff bought the sprinkles in bulk.  They were a better deal after all.  So I put the sprinkles in a Parmesan type shaker.  Otherwise I figured we would have a whole lot of sprinkles piled in one area and not spread out amongst the whole cake.
 It worked great.
Here you can see Adam joining in on the fun.
Lachlan's turn.
Quite messy of course.  Looks like he is growing a mustache.
And then Adam ate some carrots.  He was very happy about it.

Happy Birthday Grandma Norma!  Can't wait to celebrate you tonight.

Tuesday, July 8, 2014

Adam Pride 4 months old

 Some play time on his 4 month birthday.  His hands are really starting to cooperate and grab things he wants them to grab.
 He has a dimple of sorts when he smiles big.  It's a little crease under his right eye.  You can kind of see it here.

I am so big.
This guy will probably have a lot of pictures with his hands in his mouth.  He brings them up there when he gets happy.
I sing the song "I'm forever blowing bubbles . . . " to him a lot.  He drools and blows bubbles more than my other two did.

He loves this crinkle toy from Amber.

He was starting to get cranky, but he found his thumb, and all was okay for a second.
Birds eye view.
Some jammy time first thing in the morning with brothers, the day after his 4 month birthday.
Yep, that's how we roll.  Fingers in mouths and noses.  Peter was just doing it to be funny.
 This one has got to be my favorite.


What is happening to me?

 Looking up and a big yawn.  So cute to see his little neck all stretched out.

What is that thing they call brother?