 I think I’m on a journey. I want to see changes in my life, and I want those changes to help others. I’m not going to stop blogging, though I’m not very good at it 😅
Who knows what I’m doing really, just a lot of navel gazing possibly, definitely some self-reflection, a bit of actual learning, and a handful of helping.
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 This week we are looking at the letter R, actually we a listening to the ‘r’ sound that this letter can make. Slight difference there but I focus on the phoneme - the sound - rather then the letter name.  I have set up next the TV a small toast rack that I bought in an second hand shop. It holds the sandpaper letter R, that I bought from Wood Puzzles here in Queensland. It also displays ‘My “r” Book’ by Jane Belk Moncure and ‘Sleepy Cheetah’ by Mwnye Hadithj.  First we practised writing the letter by tracing over the sandpaper as we made the R sound.  I then read ‘My “r” book’ aloud, really pointing out and emphasising that R sound. These books a super cute and Atlas really enjoys them, I have the vintage set which I bought off eBay.  We then read ‘Sleepy Cheetah’ which has many R sounds. The illustrations are beautiful and soft, and I love the similes used through out the story. I pointing out the lower case letter R every now and then as well.
We will read ‘Sleepy Cheetah’ through out the week and work on related and fun activities... I just haven’t planned out what they are yet 😂  This weekend, our town hosted the Way Out West Fest. It’s three days of musicians at every food and drink venue in our town plus two nights of international and Australian artists. We love music, it is an important aspect of our life. So for us this is an amazing opportunity that we are so lucky to participate in. My husband is involved via his work so we’ve been lucky to get VIP and Crew passes.   What’s more important to us is that Atlas is able to attend some of the concerts and see live music.  He’s always shown an interest in music, playing his percussion instruments, blowing the recorder, putting on CDs, and singing made up and not quite right lyrics.  This weekend has really made an impression upon him, even though we went to last year’s festival because he’s older it’s definitely triggered something.  This afternoon after seeing Anu Grace performing, on the way home he decided to put on his own concert for us.  And it was super cute.  This really does prove to me that the environment we place our children in, really does become the third teacher.
I wish we had gotten to see more performers, but on Saturday we lost our oldest cat. Later in the week, when I’ll be a little less sad, I’ll write a post about it.  I was testing my box of permanent markers out today, and was left with this pretty cute looking peice of paper. I didn’t want it to go to waste so I set up a process art tray for Atlas. It also included scissors, glue, and a circle punch. When Atlas saw the tray he was pretty excited!  What is this thing? Where did this paper come from?  How do I do this?  Where did the circle go? Atlas found a little flap that held the circles after they were cut.  This one’s not a full circle! Problem solving why some circles weren’t full circles and how to fix was tricky.  A pretty pile of decorated circle!  He did end up glueing two circles to a small off cut of paper, but that wasn’t our focus. I love how this activity used so many different fine motor skills and co-ordination.
 Who says art has to be messy or that you need a tonne of art supplies?No one probably but anyway... Atlas was exploring simple materials with a focus on the process rather than the product that he was making. I love process art especially as this was all self directed. It helps that all of this was easily accessible to him. Materials: Cardboard Scissors Felt pens  Step 1 Cut up some cardboard, any shape you want. Atlas cut a long strip.  Add some colour using felt pens.  Fill the whole piece up with colour.  Chop your product up into small bits.  Sprinkle you pieces where someone can appreciate them. Atlas left it on the bed beside his sleeping his dad 😀
 School holidays means no school for me, and not a lot of day care for Atlas. We are travelling to Townsville this week. Have kid: Will travel.  Quintessential outback shot with the windmill. We stopped in at Charters Towers Maccas for lunch - our first Happy Meal since Christmas time. Although I’ve vowed not to have any while we are away, Atlas does live for the nuggets so we’ll indulge him while we are in the city 😅 While we are near the shops I’ve been we’ve been enjoying buying up art and craft materials. You can imagine the rainbows of colour 🌈 and glitter ✨ we’ve bought!  Atlas bought some new sticker books, well he snuck them into my basket as I was perusing paint 🎨 😂 I didn’t mind. He also chose an Avenger’s Crayola travel pack of crayons. Included in my shop was some cards and envelopes and some Crayola Silly Scent pens. Before we headed for dinner with friends I asked Atlas to make a card to give them.  We are staying in an AirBnB, a beautiful old Queenslander that has a lot of beautiful antiques so we needed to be extra careful when we worked. Yes... he is using a pizza box to protect the table cloth!  This is Atlas’s first attempt at drawing a human figure - he called it a scarecrow - before it was covered in rainbow 🌈 boy after my own heart.  Why pay for cards when you can whip up some art like this?   I bought this material on sale at the end of last year as on of A’s Christmas presents and then hid it away, and forgot about it.  I found it late January and got it out for A to play with.  He really enjoyed it, sorting the bolts and figuring out which way to turn the nuts.  To be honest, if I lived near to a hardware store I could have made this one myself but I don’t so... I really want to get the activity with the screw driver!
I think purchased this from A to Z Montessori from here.  Such an easy activity to prepare! Fill a jug (I added food colouring). Put out cups. Add a sponge. Let the magic happen.  Concentrating on trying to pour even levels. Opps! Time to clean up. Oh dear! Most of the water didn’t make it back into the jug.   That’s better!  Pour the water back into the jug... then clean up that mess 😂   Grandma’s garden has lots of flowers in it, so we’ve been enjoying picking and arranging flowers.  Pouring water into the little vase. We are using Grandma’s good crystal 😱  In goes a jacaranda blossom, he does like the blue and purple flowers. I don’t often include face shots of A but look at the joy!  Gently arranging the rest of the flowers.  Here’s one we prepared earlier.   I am so glad I packed the Hape wooden numbers for our holiday. I just knew that A’s interest in numbers would keep growing.  I was at a discount store and spotting packets of cats. They came in a pack of 6 so I grabbed three knowing I would have enough for A to use them as counters up to 5.  I introduced the toy cats to A just after we were playing with our real cats. ‘I love these! These are my favourite animals!’  I started with the number 1 and then we worked out way down the mat; going back to check if A had enough cats for each number.  After this I also added the zero and showed him how there were no cats beside zero because it means ‘none’ or ‘nothing’. Such a hard concept to understand!
I think I’ll go back and get some more packets of cats so he can keep counting up to 10. |
AuthorHi, I'm Pamela. A nail crazy lady with green hair. I live in outback Queensland with my toddler and my husband. I love books, writing and crafting. For more info about me go to my 'About' page. Archives
March 2018
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