Week 13 Chores and Goals

This week we are talking about goal setting -- because it's New Years and all. So this week we will be setting goals for the new year. Some objectives: set quantifiable goals, talk about responsibility, begin doing chores.
 Here are my 4 year-old's goals:

• Learn to crochet.  We've already picked a beginners project
• Become and independent reader
• Being learning the piano. Daddy is her instructor
• Begin Kindergarden

We spent the week talking about doing chores and starting a chore chart.  My wonderful sister-in-law shared a great idea about rewards.  "What children really want is time with their parents.  So rather than make video games a reward, why not make time with you a reward?  You could go get a treat, have one-on-one time, play a board game, etc."  I love this idea for a chore chart. I've read plenty of lists about chores appropriate for a 4 year-old, but here are ones I'm okay with her being in charge of:

1. Feeding the cat
2. Setting the table for dinner
3. Putting her clothes in the hamper, she could also put them away after I fold them
4. Clearing her dishes from the table
5. Putting her shoes away
6. Cleaning up toys

We read Loudmouth George Earns His Allowance, this gave my daughter some ideas about doing chores, but I loved that this book addressed trying to get out of chores. She has really taken to chores and the rewards.  Then we talked about goals using The Little Red Hen.  The Little Red Hen shows us how to break goals down into manageable parts for success. It also teaches that if you don't participate in the work, you don't have any claim on the rewards.  When my daughter complains about helping at dinner time I ask her, "Are you a part of this family?  Do you want to eat dinner? Then you need to help me set the table."

Here she is enjoying her Christmas toys.

Week 12 Jesus and Christmas

We are Santa truthers.

We don't teach about Santa.  Instead we talk about the birth of our Savior and the gifts he gives us.  Then we spend the month doing our best to give to others.  The closest we get is discussing St. Nicholas. I might write another blog post about it later.  But for now let's focus on Jesus.

This week (really this whole month) we've been talking about the birth of Jesus.  We started by teaching the story of Jesus' birth.

On Monday we gathered at my husband's uncle's house for a wonderful dinner and a Christmas pageant.  My oldest was pretty resistant about the pageant when she found out she couldn't be Mary.  She refused to participate.  The closest we got to participation was her agreeing to be a Mary shepherd.  So I sewed her a simple shepherd outfit.  But, when we began to dress for the pageant she decided she would rather be an angel with the really big kids. Moments like this made me grateful for my toddler, who was completely chill about the whole thing (until I squished her finger in the pantry door and ended up cuddling her through the whole pageant).  My youngest was happy to be whatever, she was just happy to be part of it all.


Here is my angel and my shepherd.



On Christmas Eve, Tuesday, we dressed up like shepherds and held a shepherds dinner (which turned out really nicely).  We sat on the ground and ate from the same two plates of olives, cheeses, breads, fruits, and lamb.  Then we did a reenactment of the Nativity using the fisher price nativity we bought this year.

As an aside, fisher price toys are cheaper if you buy them directly from the fisher price website.  You can also get free shipping if you make a large enough purchase.  We were very happy with our experience.

On Christmas morning we opened presents and visited with our wonderful neighbors.  It was a wonderful day!

And on Friday, when everything had settled down, I invited my daughter to tell me the Nativity.  She was really impressive in the telling.  Not missing any of the details.  She made her mom proud.

I'm grateful for moments like these that make me happy with our parenting choices.

Week 11 My Five Senses - Part 2

My Five Senses - Part 1

Part 2
When I was planning the schedule I gave the five senses two weeks because the five senses allow for a lot of exploration.  This week it snowed again, yay! So we used the snow in our sensory play. We played outside in the snow.

Then we brought snow inside.

After they had played in the snow for a little while, noticing how cold is was, I gave my older daughter a bowl of warm water to explore the sense of touch.  How does the cold feel?  How does the warm feel?  How does it feel when you mix them together?  What happens to the snow in the water? In the picture she's holding two little cups of snow which she's about to drop into the water.

After we explored hot and cold for a while, I added colors to the snow.  We chose to add blue and yellow to explore colors.  My oldest mixed and my toddler mixed and we ended up with green snow.  Then she added cups of green snow into the water and made green water.

Exploring with our senses was a lot of fun.  However, I barely scratched the surface of possibilities!  We should have done more exploration with our ears -- a blindfolded Marco Polo game would have allowed this. We should have explored more with our tastes -- sweet v. salty.  And we should have explored more with our noses -- lotion or spice smelling would have worked well for this.

Week 10 My Five Senses - Part 1

Objective:

• Identify each of the five senses
• Explore the world through each of the senses

This week we began our exploration of the five senses.  We started by naming and discussing what each of the five senses are.  I found a cute image of all five senses, this really helped my daughter visualize the senses and how they are used. Afterwards we did sensory play.

This is cornstarch and water.  You can see there's also some color added.  My daughter's favorite color is purple, so of course everything becomes purple.  This was a messy activity.  I find myself saying no more than yes to similar activities, but sometimes I just have to get over the fact that it will make a mess.  I accept it will make a mess and I accept I will have to clean it up.  Realizing these two things helps me allow similar sensory activities to be common in my house.

Then we made graham cracker houses.  This was an exploration of taste, sight, and touch.  We tasted each of the candies before and after making the houses.  We used our eyes to make color patterns on the roofs of the houses as well as where to place our gummy bear people.  Lastly, we used our hands to build and manipulate the materials we had available.  It was a lot of fun and our decorative houses sat on the counter for a week or so.

My Five Senses - Part 2