Crafty numbers

 

Another simple idea to teach number recognition as well as counting. I cut out the numbers from sugar paper. I then made a few piles of arts and crafts pieces. In this case: feathers, star stickers, lolly pop sticks, pom poms and pink squares.

Daughter covered the whole number in pritt stick glue. And I asked her what number it was. After this, I told her she needs to put the right number from each pile of crafts on to the number. So 1 pom pom on number 1, 1 feather on number 1, 1 star sticker on number 1, 3 pom poms on number 3, 3 pink squares on number 3 etc.

What was interesting about this was that I noticed that she really took extra care to count how many things she put on each number. She told me: ‘Ummi, I have to count them first’ and ‘Oh! I’ve got four pink squares – that’s wrong. I need 3 for number 3′. So it really showed that she understood the concept I was teaching her. Alhamdulillah.

Sand Numbers

 

I know you can buy montessori sand paper numbers…but we made our own and it isn’t with sand paper. All you need is card, glue and sand and a paintbrush.

Daughter painted the numbers I cut out with glue and a paintbrush. She then spread sand all over them. We shook off the excess and let it dry.

Why would I waste my time doing this looong option? I could have easily just cut out sand paper and stuck it on card! I do believe that children learn better when they really get their hands stuck in and it is also messy and fun. Our children need to enjoy learning, getting messy and really getting dirty. If the early ages are not the times to do this, then I think we have failed as homeschooling mothers. There will come a time when our children will be too ‘old’ to want to do things like this. Let them enjoy it whilst they deem it to be fun. They grow so fast…

Just can’t get enough of chocolate…Presenting: ‘Science and chocolate’

As if numbers and chocolate wasn’t enough, we did a very late science lesson at 7pm on Monday evening. My excuse is that I am almost 8 months pregnant – so bring on the lessons involving anything ’sweet’ that is edible…of course!

So, what did we do? We made chocolate swirls. Yummy! Daughter and I cut some baking sheet paper and placed it in a baking tray and then emptied two packets of white and milk chocolate chips into two separate containers.

 

I boiled some water in a pan and explained what ‘boiling’ was. I then placed each container into the pan and daughter mixed the chocolate chips until they melted. We then had a very interesting lesson on solids and liquids and melting! Once both sets of chocolate chips had melted, we spooned 6 of each onto the baking sheet paper  and then swirled the opposite colour into each one. The tray was then placed in the fridge so that they would harden. After 45 minutes, we took them out, peeled them off the baking sheet paper and my daughter was fascinated that they were hard – which of course led us onto ‘freezing, and liquids to solids’. She was so excited! When her father walked in from the masjid, she exclaimed: ‘Abi – we made chocolates that were soft, but they’re hard now!’ So, alhamdulillah she understood what I was trying to teach her.

The best part of the whole experience was ‘licking the bowl’. It was actually our first ‘licking the bowl’ moment together as mother and daughter! *sigh*