Free play for toddler

It has been ages since I post anything here.

Sorry been lazy bit. LOL

Well I am going to talk about Free Play and the importance of it.

A lot of times we forgot how important free play it is to a child especially toddler;

they learn a lot from free play.

Imagination play an important role in free play

and many times creativity sneaks out from there.

There are many types of Sensory bins that we can think of for free play.

Here is one simple ones.

As you can see here, I use some flour, a spoon and a car;

I place all of it on a tray, there you go viola!

My LO play for it for about an hour....

well yes it is really messy in the end,

that is why if you can do it outdoor!

Skills learn include:

Fine motor skills in spooning and pouring.

Hands on play to feel the touch of powdery flour.

My toddler did try to blow the flour and see it fly all over.

I let him do it for fun as I am prepared for a messy play.

After all the scooping and pouring and flour fly all over;

time to clean up!

I pour all the flour on the floor for him to step on it!

This was really fun for him,

and yes you must restrict the area he can roam around!

Otherwise the whole house would be a mess!

Hope you can try this out with your little one!

Dress-up Party

Yes, we had a dress up party at home!

We all had dream about it when we were kids,

we try out our mum's clothes, wear mum's shoes,

wear mum's lipstick!

Come on, all little girls love dress-up!

I can tell you, they just love it and me too!

So, why wait.....

See what we did? I bet you love it too!

These 2 little girls just could not get enough of it!

And they just love to pose as well!

Halloween is not the only time you can dress up!

Oh, we had lots of different props as well, you see!

After the photo sessions, the girls get top browse through the photos as well.

How do you like my pose?

See, we can be serious too...... maybe LOL!

Last but not least, we just love a good laugh!

We hugs and giggles like all little kids do!

I hope you like what we did and try at home too!

Mommy has got the ideas for you...

Try it out!

 

All you need:

Old clothes that you cannot wear or want to throw away!

Hair pins

Bracelets / jewellery

Hats / scarfs / belts

Hair bands/ rubber bands

Other funny props....

A camera

 

There you go.... put all in a box let the children dig it out themselves!

It's more fun that way!

 

Hope you all have fun!

Monkeys had Fun! August- (ORG)

Hello everyone, We are back again with our monthly Reading Group!

This August, we started with Monkeys.

Here you can see we use 2 books.

Both books do talk about monkeys and what they do.

So I incorporated Actions words.

It was pretty fun as the children could act and play with the words.

After reading the book, we do some bouncing using the Bouncy ball.

All children take turns and had fun. So you can see they learn the word Bounce!

Next we did some craftwork. We let the children do cut and paste.

They were to make a monkey face!

Easy job for kids ages 3-5.

They cut it and paste it all by themselves.

Don't you just love our monkeys!

We are going to hang this in our bedroom!

Lastly before we end the session, we did a monkey dance!

 

Here you go,

First scratch your tummy, then lift up your chest,

then scratch your chin, after that lift your hands and reach up to the sky.

Do a silly walk, and pose!

Now wave goodbye and spread your wings up to the sky!

 

Hope you all have fun!

We just did!

CAP Cooking Class by Ms. Pearly (Nyonya Chef)

This is our second cooking class organised by CAP.

This time we had Ms.Pearly Kee who are

so kind to have us all mommies and children

around in her Home cook class.

Ms.Pearly is our own local Penang celebrity Nyonya chef.

We are going to cook some delicious Chicken Curry and Roti Jala.

Here are all our lovely mommies and their princesses.

The children age from the youngest 4-11.

All are junior master chef in the making..... lol.

 

We first started our class by touring the herb garden.

All the children get to see, smell and taste the different herb plants.

It is good that they get to see, smell, touch and taste at the same time.

One of our mommies, smelling the leaf... nice smell indeed!

Now here are some of the ingredients that we are using to cook our curry.

We introduce the ingredients to our children and they get to recognize the items.

We are using all our senses here!

 

Now the little one get started by peeling the potatoes!

See how concentrated she is on the skill that she is about to master.

All children get excited to cook, no matter how big or small the tasks is.

Here we have one of our mommy demonstrating

how to swirl the cup of batter on top of the pan.

This is how we cook the roti jala, or the kids call it spider pancake!

Looks like spider web they say, but yummy!

 

Here's our yummy looking chicken curry after cooking for an hour.

Looks delicious right, even our little ones try it and it is not that spicy!

Well you can add more chilli if you want to.

Here's all our mommies and children enjoying

our food after all the hard work.

Some of us even forgot to take off our apron!

The kids got so hungry after all the

cooking they just could not wait to get started!

Oh we had some homemade rosella drink as well.

Here is our group photo session.

We all had real fun, and learn a lot too!

The children had a blast!

 

 

Xmas Party - December (ORG)

Ho Ho Ho, It's Christmas again!

We are so excited this time

as we have lots to do!

First we read a story about Santa having a New Jet!

It was interesting as this book does relate

to our modern world, in my opinion it is

suitable to both gender; although we have

an all girls reading group here!

Santa's New Jet by David Biedrzycki.

After the story-telling session,

we continue with our Christmas Cooking activity.

Oh don't forget to wash hands first!

Here, showing the children some

ingredients and let them taste and smell some of it.

We are making Christmas Squares! Easy and neat.

We are doing it all by ourselves.

Some make it round too, using the moulds.

I know all mommies been waiting patiently for the recipe...

I hope you all can try it at home with your child too.

It is easy and most of all, no mess at all.

Best of all it is yummy!

 

Christmas Squares

1/2 cup oats

1 tbsp. sesame seeds

2 tbsp. mini marshmallows

2 tbsp. cranberries

4 tbsp. Honey

2 tbsp. Sunflower oil

Tiny bit of vanilla essence

 

Preheat Oven to 160 degrees.

Line baking sheet with baking paper.

Mix dry ingredients all together.

Then add honey, oil, vanilla essence.

Use spoon pour on the baking sheet and tap it thin and flat.

Bake for about 20 minutes, and let it cool for 10 minutes.

When it is cool, it should be able to break it into small pieces;

and keep it in an air tight container.

Viola!

Here are the examples of the round shape Christmas squares!

Ok I forgot to take pictures of the

other squares as they were quickly

being eaten or put into the container. LOL.

Next, we have the kids do lots of things for this

mini picture that they can hang on their wall.

Stencilling, tracing, drawing, colouring, cutting and paste!

Last but not least, this time, they have to write the

Merry Christmas wording and put down their names!

After all the activity, exchanging presents time!

The stockings were full now with little presents and sweets.

Here are the children hugging each other for the

photo with the Christmas tree!

 

Thanks again to all that participate,

the children really have fun!

The Joy of Mandala.

It's November! We are going to learn about Mandala!

 Yes, you heard me right, mandala.

It's for the kids to learn something about

inner peace and shapes and symmetry.

According to Wikipedia, In common use, mandala has become

a generic term for any plan, chart or geometric pattern

that represents the cosmos metaphysically or

symbolically; a microcosm of the universe.

 

Here we have the kids drawing circles and shapes,

I want them to choose their own colour and draw them carefully

and use the shapes that they like.

After drawing all the shapes they have to paint the whole picture.

This does shows the character of the child and what they prefer and

how patience they are too.

Next the children did a Family Mandala.

They get to think about what each family member like

and prefer. What colour that they

choose for their individual member in the family.

It's interesting to see how they

think and draw things that represent each family member.

Finally, We are making it big!

The children get to cooperate and create a big mandala

using recycle items. Each of the kids get to carefully place

the individual items carefully around in a circle.

I am quite amaze that they already know the concept of mandala;

before I explain, they already know what to do!

Lastly, they are proud of their creation!

It was fun and interesting for them to

play this big mandala game!

 

Thank you all for that participate, we all had fun!

Wording dice game for kids.

Here is something that I have created for my Screen-Free mission!

My 4 year old has started to do some reading and writing,

so I intended to do some revision with her.

This is what I come out with after spotting an

interesting Art dice game! (Which you may want to try too!)

Well nevertheless, this is what I did. 

First I got some black wooden square blocks and

painted them in some pastel colours.

I have 6 different colours for each side.

I asked my 4 year old to help, and she did only the pink!

I did the rest..... lol.

After that I use different colour sharpies to write on the cubes.

I have asked my child simple questions like:

1. How do you feel?

2. What animal do you like?

3. What body parts can you name?

4. What kind of action words you can think of?

5. Name the colour.

6. What kind of pattern you can think of?

7. Name different type of skin for the animals.

8. Describe the sizes.

Well, you can come out with many different descriptions too! 

I also did ask my girl to try to spell simple words.

Of course, she must able to understand all the words written too.

Now, we start playing by rolling

the dice and stacked it up accordingly.

I would help her on the arrangement

of words; which one come first and all.

She just love stacking it up, using

some of the motor skills here too!

After that, I would ask her to copy the sentence on

an exercise book; draw it and colour it!

Also I ask her to read each word accordingly.

She totally enjoyed this and wanted to play again!

So this is the second sentence that she come out with!

I use a lot of descriptions here, but you can try it differently.

Also I might add in some sight words for her to learn as well.

 

I hope this gives you some inspirations!

Thanks for stopping by.

If you try this differently don't mind sharing it here too!

Texture Sensory Bin for Baby

It's sensory bins again!

Well, I need to let my 13m old try something new.

So I call this Texture sensory bin.

Things you need:

Paper

Foil

Tissues

Cotton wool

Bubble wrap

Plastic wrap

 

Throw everything in a bin then

scrunch, squeeze and tear 

all different materials in front of baby.

I did try to let baby feel every single material on his skin!

 

Have fun!