My friend Melissa recently recommended a great book on learning activities to with your kids called Mommy Teach Me. I began reading it and my love for teaching started to emerge again. I had already been doing little things with Ava but after reading this book and then coming across this blog, thanks Cassie, I quickly went out to Dollar Tree and bought a few items to start incorporating "Learning Time" into our day.
We by no means do this every day but whenever we have some free time I will sit down with Ava and teach her something new or just let her explore new objects and let the teaching go from there. Our conversations have been amazing and she is already learning so many new things! I have been wanting to do things like this with her for some time because a) I want and need to spend more one on one time with her with no other distractions b) I want her to develop a love for learning and c) it makes our day a little more fun and productive.
One of the first things I did with her was let her play with all my buttons. I tell ya, they were and still are a HIT!! (In fact we have had our fair share of crying fits when we have to put them away) As she was playing with them we would talk about concepts such as big and small, same and different, shiny and dull, and also learn new colors like gold and silver. I tried to get her to sort them in this white muffin tin but she wasn't really interested in that just yet. Baby steps mom! I can't expect my 2 year old to do things that I did with my 1st graders!
I had these tongs out too to help her work on her fine motor skills but she could care less about those.
Here she is comparing two of the buttons. It is so cute and makes me proud to hear her say "Look Momma, same" :)Last week our learning time was playing in some water tubs that I put together. At Dollar Tree I bought some sponges, some test tube shot glasses for pouring (ha!), and a baster for squirting. She loved playing with them and pouring or squirting the water (fine motor skills) from one container to the next. The Noah's Ark crew joined in the water fun too.
Looks kind of lame but she enjoyed it!
Macy also got a sponge bath!
And she figured out a very clever way to water our new flowers.
Midway through we had a popsicle break
Another idea I got from the Little Hands Big Work blog was I froze some buttons and army men in a muffin tin and then let her play with them in the water tub.
We talked about how the water was frozen and the toys were stuck inside the ice.
Until.....
the ice began to melt and turn back into water
and then they were completely out and we could touch them! (and is my dog "draggin butt" in the grass in the background???!!! Busted Macy!)
I have a feeling someone is going to love preschool!
