Homemade Play dough

We couldn't finish our day without a craft, so we make some homemade play dough. I tweak the recipe because I didn't make the colors for lack of time and energy LOL, so instead I use Kool Aid !!! Cool ha?

What you need :

½ cup of flour
½ cup of dyed water
¼ cup of salt
½ tbsp cream of tartare
½ tbsp cooking oil

Kool Aid (assorted colors)

Mix all your ingredients in medium heat and stir, stir, stir, stir some more, maybe a little bit more, until you notice the dough is thick and no longer stick to the pot ( about 5 minutes).

I got this recipe from http://www.minieco.co.uk/natural-dye-for-homemade-playdough/

This is what you need

Not quiet pretty as the one we saw at Mini Eco, but...... we got some free play dough for the rest of the week.

Walk on a Circle

As you notice we are doing circles this week, what a proper way to practice our gross motor skills walking on a circle !, carrying a tray maybe or just an object, this will help and prepare the child to carrying things carefully and fully aware of their surroundings and also will help to take care of things around the house !

Parts of a Hand (Nomenclature Cards)

Today we learn about the parts of a hand, using Nomenclature Cards or 3 Part Cards. You can also design this cards using clip art in WORD, but you have to laminate them to make them last longer, because little hands can get get rough sometimes. Make sure you specify on the cards the parts of a hand: palm, fingertips, wrist,thumb, fore finger, middle finger, third finger, little finger.

We also talk about the importance of having a thumb finger, we can not grasp without him, or maybe we can ?. We try to pick up objects with the thumbs tucked in the palms, very interesting, uncomfortable and hard.......thank God we got thumbs ! THUMBS UP FOR THAT!

We talk about things we do with our hands, like: touch, feel, shake hands, comb our hair, grab the silverware (properly), caress mommy face, play ball, paint, etc......

I remember a song I used to sing a lot when I was in Kinder, one of the first I learn : " Where is Thumbkin", we sing that song.

I Hope they remember all the parts of a hand !!!!

Painting Wet on Wet: Waldorf Watercolors for Children

Last week I make my first order through Bella Luna Toys www.bellalunatoys.com and I'm very pleased with my order, not only for the high quality of  the products, but for the natural satisfaction I saw reflected on my children faces. I feel so grateful for being able to provide this high quality materials to my little ones, watching them...stroke after stroke...

This is what you need:

Stockmar watercolor Paint -  20 m.l (Carmine Red, Ultramarine Blue and Lemon Yellow.) http://www.bellalunatoys.com/waldorf-art-supplies/painting/stockmar-watercolor-paint-20-ml.html,

Waldorf Watercolor Paint Brush  http://www.bellalunatoys.com/waldorf-art-supplies/painting/waldorf-watercolor-paint-brush.html

 Heavy weight watercolor (140 lb weight, tape-bound pad, cold press) http://www.bellalunatoys.com/waldorf-art-supplies/painting/watercolor-paper.html

 

Then I told them a color story like this one :

 

“One morning, Tippy Brush woke up and looked outside his bedroom window. It was a crisp autumn morning. As he looked outside his window, he saw bright red leaves falling from the maple tree and blowing in the wind, filling the sky with their color. ‘Oh, I want to play with red today!’ he thought.

So Tippy jumped out of bed, but before he went outside, he had a nice foot bath…

[Here I would demonstrate rinsing the bristles clean in the jar of water]

…and dried his feet clean with his towel [the rag]. Then Tippy ran outside and cried, “Good morning, Red! I’ve come to play with you!”

[At this point Tippy (my brush) dips his “toes” (the bristles) in the red paint.]

The red leaves were happy to have a playmate, and Tippy joyfully danced among the falling red leaves, until there were piles of bright red leaves all around.”

 If you want to add other colors just change the color on the story.....

"Sewing" cards (circle shape) with no needle (for your piece of mind)

Last week we did a lot of activities that include circle shapes, we learn a little bit about the circles and straight lines, their differences, etc. "The circle is a line that curves around a central point", I illustrated with a crayon on a string ( like a compass), draw around the circle with your finger and show that a circle has no beginning and no end. (Sorry for not having pictures to show).


Sewing Cards:   

A quick and easy activity, was creating a circle sewing card. I used a circle inset, trace it over red construction paper, laminate it, punch wholes and Ta Da..... That's it...... It was nice to found red yarn laying around in some corner of my house. The kids really enjoy this activity, 25 minutes well spent "sewing" .

Preparation For Writing - Metal Insets

This is the first of the writing activities. Dr. Montessori analyzed the movements which are connected with writing and developed the Metal Insets to strengthen the three finger grip and coordinate the necessary wrist movements. One of the classic works in a Montessori classroom is the “metal insets”. The metal insets introduce a child to plane geometry: the child works with the rectangle, triangle, curvilinear triangle, circle, ellipse, qua trefoil, pentagon, square, trapezium and oval, to carefully outline the shape and then color it in, discovering that the triangle has three sides, a circle is round, a square has four even sides, and a pentagon has five. Work with the metal insets develops a child’s eye-hand coordination, strengthens and refines the child’s pencil grip, increase a child’s ability to concentrate, and stirs the child’s interest in design and beauty. The children can make works of art with these shapes, varying the shades, the selection of colors, the shape of the lines, even overlaying one shape upon another. It is both the process and the final product  that interest the child.

Bug tracing a   circle inset....

Bug tracing a ellipse inset..., she traced the ellipse frame first with color blue.....

Then she traced the ellipse inset on top of the one she traced previously... with color red...

Racoon did the same....

Weekend off .....We visit : The Capitol Park

Well , we all look forward to the weekend, to enjoy some family fun time and to share some bonding and togetherness. We can't wait to get out and explore with daddy some beautiful nature settings or anything that strike our fancy and moods.

At first glance, the remains of Alabama's fourth state capitol building look like the ruins of a small gothic cathedral somewhere in barbarian-ravaged Europe or Britain. The place seems impossibly small to have housed all the various functions of state government.

Alabama had state capitols in four other places before Montgomery, namely, St. Stephens, Cahawba, Huntsville and Tuscaloosa. Each was built and later abandoned due to floods, insects, disease, and/or political expediency. Every capitol site, including the present, is on or near a major river, as highways and railroads were scarce in the old days.

The facility at Tuscaloosa was quite ornate & elaborate, and served its purpose well from 1826 to 1845. The building was used as a girls' school after the capitol moved, and finally burned down some years later. Eventually all the remaining stone, bricks and marble were either stolen, moved to other building sites, or shoved into a ravine adjacent to the capitol grounds.

The "ruins" you see now are actually a clever, artistic, historically correct reproduction built on-site of salvaged and returned materials from the original building. Finely-crafted bronze plates on the grounds show the layout and history of the capitol edifice. Bring your camera, as these digs seem expressly designed for the artist and photographer.

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Language : What's Missing Game....?

What's Missing

The kids enjoy playing the game so much, I played with L for about 45 minutes, then Bug joined us, it was so fun!! This experiment is a variation of the previous experiment to test short term memory. Get your tray and items and cloth ready again. This time have you subjects view the items for 1 minute. Then cover the tray again. Without the subjects seeing, REMOVE 1 item from the tray. Show the tray and remaining items to your subjects again. Ask them, "What is missing?". Can they guess what you removed?

• Try it again giving the subjects more time to view all the items.
• Try it with less time.
• Try it with more objects on the tray.
• Try it with fewer objects, but have your subject identify the missing object feeling the remaining objects without seeing them.
• Try it again, but this time remove 3-4 objects.

Materials:

• Tray or plate
• 10-20 small items (sponge, bolts, cookie cutter, paint brush, etc....)
• Cloth or towel to cover the tray

Nuts and Bolts Activity

It encourages the children to remember to unscrew and separate the nuts from the bolts before returning the work to the shelf. This activity is naturally self-correcting as there is only one nut for each bolt and they can only go together one way.

Pink Tower: Variation # 2 (blindfolded)

Exercise 1
The child builds the tower individually as was shown in the demonstration.

Exercise 2
Once the child has seemed to master the building of the tower, the directress will show him another way of building the Pink Tower. The directress will demonstrate in the same manner as above but instead of placing each cube in the center of the cube under it, she will line them up at a right angle will two sides adjacent. Once the entire tower has been built in this way, the directress will pinch the top cube with her thumb and index finger and place it on the ledge of the bottom cube. Starting at the far back, the directress will slide the smallest cube along the length of the entire ledge. This will be repeated for every ledge, by working you way up from one ledge to another. The child will then try. Once he is done, the child will replace the tower centered on the stand. 

Exercise 3 
Blindfolded (repeat exercise 1 and 2) 

Games
Grading from an extreme.
Grading from a midpoint.
Stereo Gnostic.

           

Language           
Large and Small
The positives, comparatives, and the superlatives

Purpose  

Direct Visual discrimination of dimensions. 

Indirect
- Refinement of voluntary movement by placing the cubes one on top of the other with one single movement of the hand.
While doing this movement, the child is refining visual-motor coordination and is called upon to concentrate.
- Preparation for mathematics.

Control of Error
- The control of error lies within the child being able to discriminate dimensions.
- Visual Harmony

Age
3 – 3 1/2 years (After the child has been introduced to a number of Practical Life Exercises.) 

Extension Cards variation.

Peruvian Locro Stew: Pumpkin and Squash Flavors Fit for the Season

I'm from Lima- Peru (South America Pacific Coast) ......Potatoes, Buttercup Squash, Autumn Cup Squash, Butternut Squash, Pumpkin – all these ingredients are ideal for Locro, a delicious Peruvian dish, perfect for fall. Locro, or “Quechua Ruqru” in the Inca language, is a thick, hearty stew originating in the Andes, but very popular in every region of Peru, specially in the coast of Lima (where I'm from), the variation in this area of the country is simply delicious, we serve it with camarones (crawfish) or shrimps.

My mother always made sure we had very nutritious meals at home and Locro definitely fits the bill. Its main components, squash or pumpkin, are great sources of potassium, niacin and iron as well as beta-carotene.

Locro is a simple, healthy and economical everyday dish and it’s great for vegetarians. You can serve it with rice but it also goes well with a piece of fried fish or just a simple salsa criolla (pickled onions in lime).

 

Recipe:

Ingredients:
½ cup canola oil
1 medium red onion, chopped
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 tsp ají amarillo paste (yellow chilly pepper)
½ tsp salt
½ tsp pepper
½ tsp cumin
1 lb buttercup squash, peeled and cubed
1 lb butternut squash, peeled and cubed (pumpkin can be substituted for this squash)
1 lb autumn squash, peeled and cubed
4 medium Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and cubed
½ cup fresh peas
½ cup corn kernels, removed from the cob
½ cup vegetable stock
½ cup fresh white cheese or mozzarella cheese, cubed
1/3 cup heavy cream or evaporated milk (optional)
1 tsp chopped cilantro
salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
In a round, shallow pot, heat the oil over a medium flame and sauté the chopped onion until translucent. Add the garlic, aji amarillo paste, salt, pepper and cumin and cook for about 5 minutes. Then add the buttercup squash, butternut squash, the autumn squash, potatoes, peas and corn. Pour in half the vegetable stock, cover and reduce the heat to low. Simmer for about 30 minutes, adding remaining stock as necessary.

Once all the ingredients are cooked, add the cheese and heavy cream and season to taste. Remove from the heat and sprinkle with chopped cilantro, serve with white rice. 

Enjoy!

Apple Units : Numeral Puzzle...

L and Bug love to do this activity : Bug paste numbers in order from 1 to 10 (continuously reinforcing numbers 1-10) and L from 10  to 20.

Preparation For Math : Sequence / Seriation - Bead After Bead...

{ This Moment }

Inspired by SouleMama .....

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

If you are inspired to do the same, leave a link to your "moment" in the comments for all to find and see...