Fall Party Photo Diary

Mother Goose Time 

Pin the Patch on the Scarecrow

Sensory Stations throughout the yard: Kinetic Sand

Flour and corn kernels

Sensory bags filled with objects, water, gel, pumpkin seeds.

Crunchy paper with Halloween shapes bin

Pumpkin Spice Salt dough

 Banana Ghost and Pumpkin Tangerine snack

Crunchy paper parachute toss

Oats, noodles and crab apples to scoop and pour

Crunchy paper toss

Surprised Bunnies

We started the morning with blocks. Mr Z had dragged them out of the toy room. Mr A helped Mr Z make this house. Then they lined up the school bus counters from MGT in and around the house they built.

Our new focus letter for the month is P. So, I threw some magnetic letters in a bin with popcorn kernels. The boys dug around for letters for quite some time and Mr A found the letter P. He flipped it around and noticed that it could also be the lowercase letter B.
He is getting better at his letter identification and the sounds they make. I'll be honest it was stressing me out that he has no interest in Language Arts and learning the phonetics of the alphabet. But, then I decided that he has plenty of time! He'll learn it eventually and it doesn't need to be forced upon him at this point. I'm okay with letting him have more fun playing, doing crafts and working with numbers. Interest in letters will come... in the meantime, I ask simple questions like "What letter is that?" or "What sound does it make?" Now his curiosity comes naturally. He sounds words out to pick out the first letter he hears. Its becoming more frequent although, he still prefers other subjects. He wonders and questions on his own, especially while driving in the car. (That's where he has the most time to think about things because there's nothing else to really do. There and in the bathroom... If your child likes company that is. I've learned so much about Mr A from just having conversations with him in the car and the bathroom. Take time to listen when they really want to know something or just talk to you.)
Anway, I've decided to let him take the lead on the Language Arts subject. If I force this subject, he will not enjoy it... ever.

The tractor helped dig out the letters and deliver them to the sight word cards from MGT.

Mr A made his Clown Shaker craft in the evening. He says his favorite part was just putting the beans inside of the plates and stapling it together. That made me laugh. He got lots of glue stuck on his fingers this time around. I showed him what I used to do all the time at school and at home when I was a kid... put a thin layer of glue on my finger tips and let it dry then peel it off. I made a perfect glue fingerprint. Mr A thought it was fantastic and made his own. It was nice to have him sitting in silence waiting for his glue to dry. Then he sat in silent concentration while peeling it all off. I added that it did feel a little funny pulling the glue off. I imagined it would feel something like a reptile shedding its skin. Mr A agreed.

Nailed it. I love his super huge clown mouth. I guess its a clown with a lion mane.

So, the one activity we did from Mother Goose Time that I didn't get any pictures of, was a dramatic play game. I was actually busy participating and playing with the boys. This was one activity I wish I had gotten some kind of picture or video, but I'm glad that I didn't because we were having so much fun together.
We were given two different cubes from MGT. One with the picture and word of different animals and the other had pictures and words of feelings. We rolled both at the same time. Mr A rolled 'mad' and 'cat' first. He didn't really know what to do at first. So I made the noise of what I think a mad cat sounds like while making a scratching motion with my hands. The boys mimicked what I had done. They thought it was hilarious. So we kept rolling the Dramatic Cube Dice for different combinations: sleepy snake, mad dog, scared fish. My favorite was the 'surprised bunny'. We crouched down low like a bunny, then sprang into the air and hopped to the other side of the room. The boys hopped all around the house. Animals can have different emotions too and sometimes. What fun!

Making Bubbles Float

What can you find floating in the sky? Clouds, dandelion seeds, bubbles. One of the activities to investigate things floating in the air was to make our own bubbles. I used approximately 2 tablespoons of dish soap in about 1/4 cup of water. The boys took turns mixing the bubble mixture with the hand mixer. Mr Z thought the feeling of the mixing was funny. He said it tickled his hands, probably the vibration. Then Mr A got a turn for a few seconds.

 Mr Z tried blowing them around for a little while, but it mostly just ended up in his face.

 He had a great time playing in the bubbles.

His favorite was smearing it all over his body.

Since the bubble mixture didn't really float when we tried to blow it around, I pulled out real bubbles. Mr A blew those around for awhile.

 Mr Z kept smearing bubbles all over his body.

Then a few bubbles landed on Mr Z and stuck. Mr A was fascinated that they were sticking to Mr Z's hands and body. Mr A experimented with other things to make the bubbles stick to. He asked why the bubbles wouldn't stick to his hands, but would only stick to Mr Z. I reversed the question to have him think about it. Because he has soap on his hands and I don't. So then Mr A got his hands soapy and blew bubbles on them.

 Mr A noticed the bubbles would only stay where there was soap.

We had so much fun until Mr Z kept smearing dish soap bubbles in his eyes. He cried for about 30 minutes from the sting and wouldn't let me put Visine in.

Our craft for the day was to make a small Hot Air Balloon. All of the materials were provided by Mother Goose Time. 4 colors of a balloon shape were printed on cardstock and we were able to punch out the shapes. One side of one color was glued to the next to make a 3d balloon. Mr A strung his yarn through the holes and we taped the ends to a mini paper cup after he had colored it with marker.

 Mr Z liked gluing his balloon pieces together. I provided a hand to help hold.

The boys threw there balloons around for a few minutes when they were done making them, then Mr Z took his outside and dunked it in the bubble mixture we left out from earlier.

Mr A showed Daddy his hot air balloon craft provided by Mother Goose Time. Daddy, you know Mommy told me something. The hot air makes the balloon go up and down.

Galaxy Glop Writing

Today one of our activities with Mother Goose Time was to write in some glop. Mr A made his bag himself. He scooped 4 spoonfuls of hair gel into the bag and added his favorite colors of liquid watercolor: blue and red. Gold and red glitter made his perfect. Then he squished it around and made some neat galaxies. We picked some letters to write in the gel, but that wasn't interesting enough. Mr A squashed his til it burst... and then it got thrown away before it made too much of a mess.

Mr A had more fun slapping it around, squishing the bag and looking through it. We looked through it for quite some time. I imagined myself looking through some crazy alien goggles.

Mr A is having a hard time with this subject. Outer space isn't relatable enough to him, I guess. He enjoyed week one: stars, sun, moon, clouds, astronomer and then Earth from week 2. But when we got into the other planets, he didn't care too much. So, we've just been doing the activities to stay busy, not necessarily for the educational aspect. When I've tried to do lessons or add in some facts about the planet of the day, he flips his switch off and loses interest. It's been a little odd. Hopefully next week, we'll perk up a bit... we get into astronauts, observatories, rockets. Things he may find easier to grasp.

The boys have been in their own world lately. I am still working on my Rally & Regroup mantra. It helps me personally and now I need to figure out how to help the boys and get our homeschooling back on track.

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