SLANT and People Crayons

So someone came to our front door today, which we hardly ever open unless it is for pizza or someone who doesn't normally come over, and my SLANT box had arrived! Pam from Moments to Teach has sent me a great box full of wonderful tools to help me get started with my anchor charts adventure.

Look at all these awesome goodies! Thanks, Pam! I cannot wait to use it! 

Also, since it was 102F before noon today, my sweet 3 year old and I had a craft day. We made people crayons. We have made these before, but we made disk shapes. Here is what we used. 

You don't have to use crayola, but they work much better than other brands, especially if you mix colors. 

So we took the paper off all the crayons and broke them into pieces. Each person had 2 crayons worth of wax. 

Then we cooked them for 16 minutes at 250F. We let them cool for 30 minutes before I popped them out and an hour before we used them. 

Both my 3 year old and my 1 year old enjoyed using them, and they could grip them really well in a people shape. We had so much fun we had to make more, so we searched the house for two more packs of crayons and made mixed people. 

We just broke them all into little pieces in a bowl and filled all the people. We still used 48 crayons to make 24 people. 

We had fun, and it was so easy! Who won't like coloring with multicolored people?

Kiwi Crate Love!

So one of my teacher friends was looking for something to do for her sweet grandkids while they visited over the summer. She found this website, Kiwi Crate, that sends you a box once a month of activities to do for kids 3-8ish. I thought, why not? My daughter (3 years) loves crafts, and most of these are science based.

We are only 2 crates in, and we are having a blast!

The crate comes with just about everything you need inside for 2-3 activities. This month was Wonders of Water.

Each activity book has instructions on how to do the activity, plus ways to extend the craft you made, and links to more crafts you can do in the same category or with that activity you just did. This time, we get to make a sailboat (learning about force and wind power), make water colored animals (learning about mixing colors, and 2 science experiments, drops on a penny (surface tension) and clay boats (buoyancy). Each activity book has links to Kiwi's website for more on that topic.

We do these one activity at a time. Day one is one activity book's basic craft. Then we extend it after we make  it. Then stop. The next time we do something we go online and check out the extras for that activity book. When we finish those, we do another book. Each activity book can last us a week or more with the creating and extending. My daughter gets so excited about the science part (my little scientist!) that she has all sorts of questions and "esperiments" she wants to do for each one.

Have more than one kid? They have add on packs of supplies for siblings. You get the crate, but it has double the consumables so each kid has plenty. Check out the crate at Kiwi Crate!

I am just so happy we found something already put together for us to do that is fun and educational. As soon as we get through this crate, I will post about our experience with water! I try and make most things we do an educational experience from learning our alphabet while placing sugar decorations on a cake to turning our giant TV box into a rocket ship and blasting to the moon. Just so you know, almost half the nerdy things we do are my daughter's idea :)

The Rainbow Conundrum. Help!

My daughter (who turned 3 in February) needed some motivation to sleep in her own bed at night and not on the floor of our room. She said her room was scary, and I showed her all the pretty things her aunt and I painted on her walls and decorated. It is covered in owls and birds, pinks and greens, her name on wooden pieces and other things.

The quote was left from when it was her nursery, and I couldn't get myself to take it down, so we designed her big girl room around those colors. We found a matching wall hanging set that we bought, and then she got to earn it after eating meat at dinner. Each meal she ate some meat, she got another clip to hang her art on. Now she gets to change out her work when she eats what she is supposed to.

She has her name above her bed. We spell it every night.

Before this big girl room, she was still sleeping in her crib (she was 22 months old when we moved her out of it). Now that she had a twin bed, she was scared to be alone. We painted handprints on the wall next to her bed to remind her she is never "alone." If she got scared, just touch our hands. This was cute, and worked for a bit.

Then she couldn't sleep in her own bed because it wasn't "good for girls my age." So we painted lucky mushrooms by her closet door to help make it better. Evidently pink and green polka-dot mushrooms ARE good for girls her age.

We had also painted a large tree on the wall and I cut out owls and birds that matched her bed set and mounted them in simple frames to make them sit int he tree. I attached them with the 3M wall sticky stuff. Well, when one owl fell down in the middle of the night, that made the tree scary. I could put it back up, but she told me it would just fall down again. See where it took the paint out with it? 

Then she was doing alright in her room after I fixed the owl, but then she saw Monsters, Inc. We didn't think anything of it. She saw the new one at the theater with her grandma, so we watched to first one at home. She enjoyed the second one, but she couldn't sleep in her room with a closet door because monsters might come out and scare her. So her aunt spent the night in her room and scared all the monsters away. She left a note for proof :)

 Now we are at the rainbow. After the note, we laid in her bed and looked around at all the things in her room. I asked her to point out anything that seemed scary, then I explained what it actually was. She said she needed rainbows and sparkles to make her room not so scary. So I told her if she slept in her own bed from bedtime to sunlight for 5 days in a row, I would paint a rainbow and sparkles (the red, green, violet and clouds have glitter on them) on her door.

Well, today is day 6. She will probably sleep in her own bed, since she has been, but what can I do if she needs even MORE motivation? Am I bribing her too much or is it incentive? Is she playing me to get more things on her wall? Should I just make her sleep in her own bed without a reward? I am running out of room to paint things on her walls!

Teaching with Play Dough

My daughter was talking to her daddy today about learning. He was explaining that one day she would get to go to school and learn all sorts of things (because my sister, Emily's best friend, is away at college). She started to cry, and when he asked her what was wrong, she said she wanted to go to school with mommy and be in her class.  I was so moved I almost cried :) My little girl loves to learn. We do all sorts of fun activities to help her learn her basic and not so basic skills.

Yesterday we worked on her fine motor skills with some mazes and some play dough fun. She would go through a maze, and trace back and forth the way to go. With the play dough, I would make something, then she would replicate it. Then she would make something and I would replicate it. We did that for an hour! We started with our own homemade play dough. She loves to bake and cook things. Here is a great recipe for homemade play dough, so if she loses some on the floor, its okay if her brother accidentally eats it before I get to clean it up!

1 cup flour
1 cup warm water
2 tbsp salt
2 tbsp cream of tartar
2 tbsp cooking oil
1 small pack of jello (use different flavors to make different colors)

Mix everything in a small pan until most lumps are gone. Heat on the stove over medium heat stirring the whole time until it makes a nice ball. Remove from the pan and place on a floured surface and wait for it to cool (about 20-30 minutes). While it cools, we make a few more colors. Knead it in flour until it doesn't stick. The website suggested adding glitter, so you know we did! Now play!

When you are done, keep it in a tupperware or plastic baggie in the fridge until next time, no more than a few weeks. Have fun!

July Goals

I am linking up with I Heart Recess for a July Goals linky.

Here are my July Goals:

Personal: I LOVE coconut. I am constantly making things out of coconut, and I like making my own recipes. My last concoction was a coconut berry trifle with coconut cake layered with coconut cream filling and strawberries and blackberries. Delicious! I would like to try something that is not a dessert. Maybe a crusted chicken or something...mmmm...the wheels are turning...

Family: I have a 1 year old son and a 3 year old daughter. They love the outdoors, playing together and, of course, science! We were planning to go to Sea World in August, but my husband, who is a police officer, got a schedule change and we had to cancel it. Now our only chance to go do anything is a slim picking of 48 hour slots this month. What to do? We would love to go on a vacation, but it may be a stay-cation. Maybe the Dallas World Aquarium or something.

Health: At the store, we were picking up more vitamins for my daughter when she asked, "What about your vitamins, Mommy?" That is a great question. What ABOUT my vitamins? They don't exist! So we got me some vitamins and a weekly pill box (I feel like I am 70) to help me remember. We put my vitamins and hers in the box so we can remember together :)

School: As the head of the science department, a new school schedule and structure, and 2 brand new teachers, we have a lot to get ready for this school year. I am super excited, and I want to help my department be ready, but I don't want to freak them out with my enthusiasm and organization. I already made them a planning calendar with all the important known dates and our scope and sequence on it. Too much?

Blog/TpT: We are starting Think Tanks next year, and I have so many ideas for them. I posted a few that I made on TpT, but I have son many more I made that are not posted. I would love to get the chance to get more of those out there. They are fun to create, and the possibilities are endless!

Outside the Box: My kids are both table food eaters. My 24 pound 1 year old can out-eat my 30 pound 3 year old, but who is counting? They eat all day. Breakfast is whole wheat toast/toddler cereal/homemade pancakes/eggs (the / means or not and!), lunch is a whole wheat sandwich/pasta salad(to sneak in new veggies)/chicken, and dinner is all the food groups; protein, veggies, bread. The baby gets whole milk all day with a water and usually no juice. My daughter gets one chocolate milk with breakfast with Carnation Instant Breakfast (she is a picky eater some days), and one juice at some time during the day. The rest of the day is milk and water. In between every meal and after meals is snack time. My son would be happy with snack time all day long! Carrots, apples, broccoli with cheese, puffs (for both!), a slice of bread, homemade tortillas, pretzels and peanut butter, and craisins are usually on our snack menu. They eat pretty well. Now mommy: pizza for breakfast, pudding for lunch, and a few bites of dinner between getting theirs, refilling milk, picking sippie cups off the floor, and cutting pieces even smaller. Usually I wrap up the day with something quick, like Nilla Wafers after they are both to bed. I am too exhausted to make or reheat anything by then! I need to eat as well as I make them eat. Maybe the vitamins really are a good idea!

Well, hopefully that all tells you a little about me. Share your July goals with us in this linky!

Science at the Zoo

We went to the zoo today, and the children's zoo has this really cool nature exchange where kids bring in rocks, plants, and shells they found and exchange them for other items in the store. My sweet daughter, only 3 and so observant, went in with her homemade nature collection box with 6 things: a blade of grass, a yellow flower, a rock, a stick, a green leaf, and a brown leaf a buggy chomped (all her descriptions). These were just things she found on our land. Well, she has to explain to the nature exchange guy where they came from and what she knew about them to get store points to swap for other nature. Her items were not that impressive, but the answers she gave to his questions impressed him enough to give her 200 points, way more than I thought she would get!

She used her points to get 8 rocks and 2 shells that matched so they could go together. What a great idea! She was so into touching everything and choosing the perfect items for her rock collection at home. Her favorite was a rock that looked like a heart. We loved this interactive part of the zoo. She even counted all 10 pieces as she placed them in her bag. I am such a proud momma of my smart little girl and so happy there are places like this that recognize children's curiosity in nature.