A recycling project: The homemade iSpy book.

My boys love to play ispy. It's the only game that successfully diffuses tantrums almost instantly. Like if they are having a meltdown in public, all I have to do is say "ispy a red pair of shoes" and they would stop their crying/screaming/yelling immediately and start searching for the red pair of shoes.

In fact, ispy is such a brilliant tactic to keep children occupied when we are out or even at home because it is hassle free, with no extra baggage at all, and expense free too which makes it all the more brilliant! Apart from off the head ispy fun, I do from time to time buy those ispy books you can get at the local bookstore too, and the boys love them! 

Recently, I had an idea to create an ispy book from magazines that were left untouched at home. We always get those school newsletters, pioneer magazines, neighborhood newsletters and they always just go to waste after a minute of browsing. So I had an idea, and that was to create our own ispy booklets from cutouts of these wasted materials!

It's amazing how simple pictures can end up being different interpretations of the alphabets! Of course, certain letters are not easy to find at all (like Q, R, G) but with luck, and plenty of time spent analyzing pictures, I managed to find all 26 letters of the alphabet in one sitting, and browsing through 8 magazines. This cost me close to nothing, except for the album I bought from daiso for two buck. And I am pretty sure it's going to do a good job at keeping the children entertained, especially when we are out. Best part? We can always replace the pictures when the children finds it not challenging anymore!

Part 1:Organizing the Children's Learn n' Play Room

Part of my new year's resolution if I actually had one was to clear up my children's playroom. It is also the room where they do most of their learn and play and spend most of their time in. Unfortunately, as a result of my excessive shopping habits and procrastinating nature, that room was pretty much left in a mess the whole of last year. New loots were simply stacked, until it reached almost ceiling high. Truth be told, I could not even remember some stuffs I had bought and kept until I brought them all out to organize early this year.

So this is part of my organizing the playroom in a homeschool house series, where things are organized in a manner that is kept low budget, and simple. Part One of this series includes a reorganization of all the things we owned and classifying them into different categories. This would help me (a homeschool mom) know where to get my materials, and the children (the homeschooling kids) understand the category or subject that they are learning or playing with.

This Laiva shelving unit was kept at a budget, and was bought from Ikea for only $29.90. It is just nice for keeping things that are not too heavy and I had chosen all our resources that came in light boxes to shelf nicely and neatly on this unit. Children could also see quite clearly from the box spines what each individual item is all about, and could pull out to play easily when left on their own. 

Everything was then classified under "Games/IQ Games/Family Games", "Language and Literacy", "Math and Numeracy", and "Science Concepts". That way, I could easily find something I am looking for when I intend to cover something in each category with the children. And my children could also identify the items that teach them math, or English, or science for example.

It is always brilliant to have things organized so that I do not look or sound like a cluttered mother, which honestly I have been since my children came into the picture. I blame it on time, or the lack of it, hah! Stay tuned for part two of my organizing the playroom series, I promise you it gets more exciting and cheaper too!

Oh the things you could do with just a bucketful of geometric shapes!

I have a confession. I used to ace my elementary mathematics as well as additional mathematics, and I can be considered a natural at math. Since becoming a mother, I find myself unconsciously shopping for all things math-related for my children, even though I am a strong advocate of learning through play. Of course, learning math does not necessarily mean simply knowing the numbers. When working with preschoolers at a young and tender age, understanding math is all about rote counting, and one to one correspondence. There are plenty of ways to actually teach these, and I prefer to teach it with play.

We have plenty of math manipulatives at home, but one of my favorites is the bucketful of geometric shapes. With just one bucket of colorful shapes, there's just so much that can be done. Like sorting, patterning, counting the sides of the shapes apart from identifying the shapes and colors they come in, or even making pictures with these geometric shapes. The use of it is endless, especially when you leave it to the creativity of a child.

Adult-initiated activity: One to one correspondence
We started off with an adult-initiated activity. I laid out the numbers 1-5 and let him identify the numbers and colors they were in. And then, I left it all up to him to choose the shapes to correspond to the numbers that were laid out. I was secretly rooting for him to match not just the correct amount but the same color of the shape to the number. And like mother and son thinking alike, he did just that.

Child-initiated activity: Free Expression
I always believe that learning must consist of a good balance of both adult and child-led activities to have a consistent and happy process. Children already have a vivid imagination, and this is truly where we can take their lead. By observing them and seeing where their interest lie and where they're spending most of their time and energy, you will be able to see what they are trying to teach themselves. After he had achieved my goal of learning to count and correspond, I left it all up to him the kind of things he wished to do with the bucketful of geometric shapes. I could see he was raring to go with a million and one ideas and I too, was excited to see the kind of creativity he would unleash. With nothing else but just different shapes, he created a "fox" and a "dog" and pointed out the different parts of them that he made with the shapes. I was captivated with the kind of language that was spurting out with each description of his work. I was happy that we were achieving language and interaction through what started as a math activity. That is like killing two birds with one stone!

Oh the things you could do with just a bucket full of geometric shapes!

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We found a caterpillar. It wiggled long, it wiggled short, it wiggled right at me!

There was a caterpillar. It wiggled up a tree. 
It wiggled long, it wiggled short, it wiggled right at me! 
I put him in a little box, don't go away I said. 
But when I opened up the box, he was a butterfly! 
I could never make one, even if I tried. 
Cause only God in Heaven can make a butterfly!

We stumbled upon a fuzzy caterpillar today, and used it in accordance to reading our favorite Eric Carle story, The very hungry caterpillar and singing to the fuzzy caterpillar song. If like us, you love this story too, do sing along to this song that will probably get your child loving caterpillars even more!

And now, we are anxiously awaiting our caterpillar to build a cocoon and turn into a wondrous butterfly!

Color Splashin' Fun with chalk paint.

Some of the bare essentials in my pantry would include extra packs of flour, salt, macaroni bits, and food coloring. There are limitless possibilities of fun to do with these stuff, and it does not cost much at all! With just a pack of flour, water, starch and food coloring, you can make sidewalk chalk paint, colored dough, and even gooey slime!

The simplest recipe we had fun with was:
1/4 cup of corn flour
1/2 cup water
and a few drops of coloring

The end product included a whole sidewalk of neon colors which were so pretty, the children could not resist splashing the entire corridor with. We drew rainbows and smiley faces and splashed each other with endless colors of chalk paint whilst running to and fro which ended up looking like a Color Run. For an extended activity, do allow the children to scrap off the dried up chalk effect because that's tons of fun too!

Try it if you haven't. Try it if you needed a perk in the day's events. Best of all, try it because the kids would love it. And I shall not deny that it makes a kid out of you as well!

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