The Learning Backpack!

If you're like us, you don't have a huge house with a spare room for all the cool things that you want to do (wish I did though lol).  I have a hard time organizing all of the arts and crafts items that we have and Little Mans learning activities.

 I have a closet in the laundry room that has a baby changing table with all of the arts and crafts stuff that we do and its great for keeping it out of the way but it was all getting mixed up with Little Mans stuff (things like his matching games, letters, dry erase book).

 

 

So I decided to put all of Little Mans educational activities into a box or bag that would be easy for him to get into. So I scoured the house searching for something to put all of this stuff in. My house is such a mess, we moved recently and still haven't found places for everything yet :(

 

Finally I had an idea, why not use Little Man's backpack from last year? It worked perfectly because his big binder and dry erase board fit inside, and the little things like his 3d shark cards (from a Wendy's kid meal...they have the best kids meal toys imo... always educational). I hang it on a hook inside of the craft closet so that it is out of the way.

 

Little Man loved it! It made all of our old activities fun again and he spent about an hour and a half playing with everything. Even his older sisters got into the fun! And its so easy to just throw everything back into the backpack when you are done!!

The Mouse and the Motorcycle

 

NEW BOOK!!!
 

Our new book is The Mouse and the Motorcycle by Beverly Cleary. Little Man likes to watch this movie on Netflix so I figured it would be a nice book for us to enjoy together.

 

 The Mouse and the Motorcycle is about a mouse named Ralph who lives in a hotel in California with his family. Then Keith and his family arrive, he has many fun toys but most importantly he has a motorcycle, beautiful shiny and red. He even teaches him how to ride his motorcycle and lets Ralph ride around in it at night. The story then tells how Ralph saves the day and they have a great friendship.

 

The Boxcar Children

 

NEW BOOK!!! YAY!!!

 

After finishing the Bone book Little Man and I picked The Boxcar children by Gertrude Chandler Warner. (I really pushed for this book lol... it's great)

 

 

 

This is the story of four little children who lost their parents and are trying to survive on their own. They find an abandoned boxcar and decide to make it their home.

 

I loved this book when I read it in elementary school. This book has a reading level of Grade 3-5. However, Little Man is four years old and he is able to keep up with the story. So far we are on chapter 5.

 

We read one chapter a night and they are very short and at the beginning of each chapter is cute black and white picture of what happens in the chapter to come.

 



 

This is a great book for a child of any age. The small adventures are sure to keep them entertained!


UPDATE::: We have finished the boxcar children!! Yay! Our first "chapter" book read! Little man was very exciting during most of the reading. However, he did get a little bored with the little details.... he likes the action, stormy nights, finding pets, building a swimming pool. While reading this book held his attention, there were times when he was a little bored. Overall, this book was pretty good!

Out From Boneville

Before its time to start getting ready for bed me and Little Man have snuggle reading. We call it that for obvious reasons, we snuggle up somewhere and read.

I think it's important to introduce chapter books to children at a young age so they don't get overwhelmed by them when they are older. We read normal little kid books during the day and sometimes at night if we had gone to the library that day but normally we read chapter books.

Right now we are reading Bone Vol. 1 Out from Boneville, by Jeff SMith. I saw this book at Meijer and thought it looked cute so I got it for Little Man.

The story is about three cousins (who are made from bones) that get lost and separated from each other. They each end up in a forest with all these strange creatures. They spend most of the book looking for each other.

The pictures and the story are very cute and Little Man loves it!

 

 

There is even a game that goes along with the story line of the book that you can play online. It's free to try but if you want the full version you have to pay to register ($19.95)

 

Here is the link: Out FromBoneville

 

After we finish the book we may try the game out, I will post about it if we do!!


 

UPDATE:::   Well the Bone Book has come to an end :(  It was a cute graphic novel, but I feel like a lot of the humor was over Little Mans head most of the time. He enjoyed the pictures and the Rat Creatures. It is the first of a series but I'm not sure if we will get the rest of the series or not, I might just wait and see if Little Man asks what happens next because this book has one mighty cliff hanger!

DIY Memory Game

Memory games are fun for kids of all ages, the only downside it that they are all themed to certain things. You can get, Thomas, Toy Story, My Little Pony, Cars, but I wanted something with a little more variety so I decided to make my own memory game with a few of Little Mans favorites!

But first I had to brainstorm, I thought about making cards and laminating them but that just didn't sound too fun. I saw something on pinterest where people made magnet pictures out coke bottle tops and I thought it was pretty creative. The only problem, the pictures wouldn't be very big. So I had an idea to use Gatorade lids. They are the perfect size for little hands to grab at and the pictures would look nice as well.

I picked out a few pictures on Google images and resized them to fit into the lids. You need to print out two of every picture you choose and then cut them out into a circle that will fit into the lid. Use glue to get them to stay inside.

I chose to use Barney, Pooh Bear, a Smurf, Sid the Science Kid, and a Pirate picture.

 

You play just like you play any memory game. Lay all the pieces face down and flip over two at a time to see if you have a match, if you do set it to the side. The player with the most matches wins.

 

We store it inside a nesquick strawberry mix container. It's not the prettiest but maybe one day I will cover it in a cute paper.

Number cards with dots

I made these a few years ago for little man so he could get familiar with numbers and how many each number represents. He still loves playing with these and now when he uses them he counts out the
numbers on his own.

 

I don't have pictures of the process to make these but they are pretty simple. I used cardstock so they would be a little more durable than regular paper. Then just grab a stencil, write out the word, then the number, and then draw that number of circles on your card.

There are a few ways you can use these. You can use them as flashcards, you can count out numbers of other objects.

We usually use bingo chips to place on top of the circles.

 

Just set them up and give your child a few options to play with them. Bingo chips, flat bottomed marbles, you can even invent a game where they need to find objects to match the card (ex. 3 little cat figurines for the number 3 card) Your child will show you how they want to learn and play, just follow along with them.

Feather Transferring

This is a simple activity to put together to get a little quiet time or for the little ones when you are cleaning or cooking dinner.

You will need two containers, you can use bowls, cups, plates, baskets, or anything you can think of. I used two little plastic bowls that you would use for leftovers.

You will also need something to transfer the feather with, tweezers, tongs, maybe even chopsticks. We used a big pair of tweezers.

Then add your feathers and go!! You might need to show your child how to use the utensil that you've chosen but other than that it is free play.

 

Enjoy the peace and quiet while your child plays or play with them and find new ways to transfer those silly feathers! You could even do feather sorting with different colored feathers.

Shade Matching

This is a little tricky for small children, there are some adults who can't do it so I think it's a great skill to learn at a young age. Shade matching is fun for little ones, but it doesn't seem to last too long in my house. Little Man usually plays for about a half hour with this activity.

I went to Walmart (you can go to any store that has paint samples) and grabbed two of each color shade that I wanted to do. I picked the basic colors, blue, red, green, and yellow. You will need some clothes pins (I didn't have enough to do every color but I will get more soon) cut out a rectangle shape of each shade and glue (I used a hot glue gun) it to a clothespin.

 Then give the clothes pins and the other paint sample piece to your child and explain how to match the shades. Once I explained it little man started doing it on his own and he has played with it many times since.

I didn't take pictures when I made them so I'm sorry I don't have step by step pictures. But this is the finished activity.

This activity also helps to strengthen finger muscles in little children, which will help with buttoning their own pants and holding pencils properly. Its a fun little activity that is cheap and doesn't take too much time to put together.

 

Enjoy!

Montessori-like Summer

Well it's summertime, so no more school. I like to keep Little man working and thinking so I set up activities that he can do during the day and when he wants to do them he can do it. It's a bit like Montessori school.

I went to a Montessori School and I loved the independence of it. It was always great that they didn't make me learn things on a schedule. I just got a list of things that needed to be done on that day and did them when I wanted to. I know it sounds like nothing would get done but amazingly everyone always did everything they were supposed to. Children will always do their favorite things first, but once those are done and out of the way they can concentrate on the harder task that they are more reluctant to do.

Little man is only four so the tasks that I had for him were all fun things. I got a piece of paper and drew little pictures of activities and wrote the name of the activity at the top so he could start to associate words with different activities the more that we do them. When he completes an activity he gets either a sticker or a stamp on that space. I just started this so my paper is just a quickly drawn list. Once we get into it more and do it everyday I will make a template and have pictures that I can stick on with Velcro. But for now this is what it looks like.

I have a variety of activities for today. They are:

Window Art       Little Man was given Crayola Crystal Effects Window Markers for Christmas. These things are so much fun! When you write it looks like regular marker but then as you look at it you will actually be able to watch the picture turn to crystal. Writing on windows and walls are good for strengthening little fingers to prepare them for writing.

Feather Transferring      This is an activity that doesn't take much preparation and you don't have to spend a lot of time explaining how to do it to your child. Just give them the materials, show how to use tweezers or tongs and let them play. This activity is also good for strengthening fingers and helps to develop fine motor skills.

Make a Fathers Day Card    Fathers Day is next weekend so I had Little Man work on his card for his Daddy.

Shade Matching     I mentioned this in my previous post on Shade Matching. It is a favorite that Little Man goes back to at least once a week.

Read    When he chooses to read he can either look at books alone or he can choose some books that he would like me to read to him. He is only four but I think it's good to introduce chapter books at a young age, Little Man can tell you what happened in stories that don't even have pictures to cue him on what has happened. He loves chapter books, we are currently reading Charlottes Web. It has a few pictures in it and he loves hearing about Charlotte.

Pouring Water and Wiping Spills   This is a practical life activity. Children love doing things that adults do. And they love it even more when you let them do it alone. These activities will also help develop skills later in life, getting a drink if your busy or even making their own breakfast (at least cereal, not talking about eggs and bacon here). Practical life is always a favorite with children and you can do it in many ways that seem like chores but to them, its playing.

In the days to come we will have science, math, letter recognition, phonics, and other great learning activities! So be sure to check back often!!