Letter Box

Remember the Mailbox I had made for Sophie some time ago? Well, I still have no time to make the letterbox with letters on them. However, Sophie simply enjoys "mailing" the envelopes with letters on them, then "digging" from underneath to get them all out again. It was even better that she tried to name the letters before she put them into the mailbox.



For the moment, I shall just let her play with it. I doubt I would make those letter boxes yet.

Play Playdough

Our plate of beans in Playdough has been sitting in the kitchen cupboard for more than a week so I decided to do something about it. I mixed more Playdough into it and let Sophie use it as a sensory sort of Playdough. It definitely felt different and she was very curious about the beans inside.




It is interesting to see Sophie pretending to feed the caterpillar some of the mixture using a spoon. I must say it did look almost edible.




When she had enough of the mixture, I gave her some brown Playdough and cutter tools. I was happy to see that she could understand more and more of my instructions. She was able to turn the cutter over when I told her to.




This was the fun part. Sophie was fascinated with the egg. It was her first contact with an egg so she kept comparing it with her Playdough ”egg”.




I needed the egg shells for Open-ended Art tomorrow so I cracked two eggs into a bowl and showed the contents to her. She was so eager to touch it but I did not let her. After all, it was our dinner!




In order to distract her from the raw eggs, I made Sophie a “spoon” and a “cup” with her black Playdough. The ultimate aim was to mix the brown and black together so that it would be a nice dark brown “egg” for tomorrow’s Open-ended Art.




Once again, Sophie showed me that she learns best by playing and enjoying herself. For as long as I could remember, she ignored me whenever I tried to teach her how to “roll” the Playdough into a ball by hand. Today, she just simply did it.

I find "M" and "m" quite challenging to make with Jumping Clay. I am sure Sophie would very soon "destroy" them... hahahaha... and I would ahve to repair again.

Jingle Boxes

Ever wonder what to do with boxes like these? They are too sturdy to throw away or recycle so I would keep them for craft. However, there are just too many of them lying around... Fortunately, I found a way to deal with them - make them into Jingle Boxes.

It is pretty easy really. Just cut them into halves and tape all the sides to form cubes. But just before you seal them, put jingly stuff like bells, beans, beads etc inside. If you want them to look more appealing, you can wrap them up like presents. I like to keep them simple.

I made the Jingle Boxes on Monday but we were using them like blocks. Sophie was so tickled when I blew at the stack and toppled them one by one.

Today, Sophie was playing with them again. She somehow knows they function like shakers. I could have assessed her ability to discriminate the sounds made by different materials but I thought I ought to give her a break. Perhaps I am giving myself a break too. Just have fun.

Choo-Choo Hi-5 Train

We never bought Sophie a pull-along toy because they are either too expensive or too ugly. So I was very eager to make her a pull-along toy train when I came across the instructions in a book. Of course, I modified it and added some of Sophie's favourite characters. It is actually quite easy to make and I like that it is made from recycled items.

This paper roll "steam engineer" was inspired by "Chugga-Chugga Choo-Choo" by Kevin Lewis and Daniel Kirk. Sophie loves this guy so I intend to make more paper roll characters for her.

I used another paper roll for the engine so that it looks more like a train. The boxcars were made of mini cereal boxes and lots of tape. And recognise the characters in the boxcar? I cut them from the cardboard cover of Sophie's DVD.

Initially, Sophie had a bit of difficulty pulling it along. It kept overturning. She learnt to pull gently and even push from behind. I thought that was an unexpected bonus to the "toy" - probelm-solving.

Raise The Alarm

This was probably one of the best games we have ever played indoors. We played so many rounds that by the time we stopped, we were hot, tired, sweaty and quite happy to just sit at our sofa doing nothing but rest. And all you need is an alarm clock.



Initially I wanted to see if Sophie could locate the alarm clock by listening to the alarm. However, she liked it so much that we kept on hiding and seeking until I ran out of places to hide the alarm clock. And frankly, it was not as easy as it seemed. She would not have found it without any clues.



I like the way she put her hand to her ear and said, “sound” and then put her palms up to ask, “where?” as she ran around in search of the alarm clock. She also looked for it at places where it was hidden before. I took the opportunity to introduce the concept of “loud” and “soft” and it worked on her well. I definitely must think of new ways to play with her to help her learn.



Towards the end, Sophie realised that I would usually point my video camera at the location of the alarm clock. Thus, she conveniently came to me, looked through my screen and “found” it on the chair. That little “cheat”!

Sound Discrimination

I wanted to test Sophie's ability to tell the instruments apart by listening to their sounds. It was an activity that required a lot of preparation work so I roped Papa in to help. He was happy to play the instruments, record their sounds on his recorder and converted them into MP3 format. Then we took pictures of each instrument and created PowerPoint slidesshow of them with their corresponding sounds.



Before we even started with the activity, Sophie grabbed the pictures and started matching them to the real instruments on display. It was not a big deal to match them correctly but I was surprised at the spontaneity she showed. Fortunately, my camera was in the room so I could capture it.



I showed Sophie the slideshow (tutorial) once and started testing her. She was quite good actually. She could pick the correct pictures to match the sounds almost all the time. She only got confused with the bells and tambourine. However, it was really hard to keep her at one spot. She ran around, grabbing the real instrument instead of the pictures at times and stopped to play the instruments for a while... But she could match them and that was good enough for me.

Letter Of The Week - "m" For maracas / music

I ran out of ideas so "m" is for maracas and music notes. I was not sure if Sophie could tell they were maracas, so I let her fiddle around with them before we started. Fortunately, she could. And the notes were not unfamiliar as well since she had seen them in her previous MIM class.

I do not understand her obsession with glitter glue but I would allow her to "waste" it so long as she enjoyed the session. However, I had a hard time stopping her from drawing on the letter while the glue was still wet.

I let her off easy today. She just drew a few strokes on each of her maracas with her markers and called it a day.

The end product was not so nice but at least she learnt the letter and two "m" words. Our next letter would be better.

End Product - "m" For maracas / music

My Sleeping Child

Letter Of The Week - "M" For Monkey

Sophie loves monkeys. Something about them makes her laugh... Although she could not really say "monkey", she could imitate their actions and their cry quite well. Naturally, we had to make "M" for monkey.

I made a tree branch from a piece of pipecleaner and some leaves to go with it. Then I cut out a swinging monkey with a long tail. Before we started on the craft, I let Sophie play with the materials a bit. She was clearly intrigued that the letter could be either a "M" or a "W" depending how she looked at it.

Sometimes people would ask me why I take so many video clips of Sophie working. I know that nobody (except Papa and Mama) would watch ALL the clips, but they are important. They help me to keep track of Sophie's learning and development. From this clip, I know she could tell yellow from green and I could decipher her self talk. I also know she could tell that the barking sound came from a dog and not any other animal. If I had not recorded all that, I probably would have forgotten our interaction.

Papa was going to work so Sophie tried to tell him what she was working on. I thought it was wonderful to see that. It shows that she actually knows what she is doing. I was always afraid that she might be just doing what I directed her to do.

I finished up the "monkey" with some white dabs here and there. After I pasted the letter on a piece of construction paper, I noticed Sophie staring at the glitter glue quietly. I knew she wanted it so I let her add some on the letter.

I think it is really true that if Sophie actually knows what she is making, she is less likely to get bored, especially when she likes it as well.

End Product - "M" For Monkey

Cool Blue Under The Hot Sun

I wanted to take Sophie out for a "nature" walk around our apartment. We brought along her shades, magnifying glass and binoculars. Sophie could not resist the temptation to relax and bask in the sun...

Sophie's Got Balls

Both Papa and Mama have exhausted our list of activities to do with Sophie and she was still energetic. Thus, we closed all our bedroom doors and started kicking her balls in our corridor. She was thrilled to kick and throw all sorts of balls everywhere. But it was not long before she grew tired and “collapsed” onto the floor (nice and cool).

Open-ended Art: Mosaic (Playdoh Tiles & Cereal Cubes)

It has not been a wonderful week since Sophie is sick, sleep deprived and cranky always and Mama is super tired as a result. However, we still tried to complete the mosaic art with Playdoh tiles as proposed at Growing and Learning by Leaps and Bounds ... on a much smaller scale though.



I thought that Sophie might appreciate some time with her Playdoh since we did not get to carry out our usual Playdoh Time yesterday. We did the Letter Of The Week “y” instead to make up for lost time (Tuesday). So I quickly rolled out the Playdoh and made little rectangular tiles with a cookie cutter while she was busy entertaining herself.

I used plastic tray as a base since the end product would not be a permanent piece. She was not too excited about the task but she complied anyway because it seemed novel especially after I put the “duck” in the centre.

Unfortunately, that was about the only successful piece of work done. When I tried to introduce more “tiles” of different colours, Sophie lost interest and started throwing everything on the floor. She had more fun driving me insane with the mess than creating another mosaic. Sometimes I think she was trying to get my attention by doing what I did not want her to do. How frustrating!

I thought that was quite enough for the moment so I shooed her off and cleaned up before making her the letters "Y" and "y" with her Jumping Clay.

Feeling down and defeated, I tried to engage her again during snack time. I put a plate of strawberry syrup and a bowl of cereal cubes in front of her in hope that she would put most of the cubes in there before figuring out how delicious they tasted.



Well, it did not take long for her to realise that she could actually eat those cubes. Of course, she still sought my approval (with her facial expression) before putting the first one in her mouth. She did not like the sticky feel of the syrup on her fingers and the taste (surprisingly). And so, she started feeding ME those cereal cubes that were stained with syrup. And I thought that was SWEET.

Sophie's New World

We finally made the trip in the morning to Ikea and bought the furniture we have eyeing for Sophie’s new space. Then we spent the rest of the day just fixing up the shelves and putting everything together. Although there is still room for improvement, I think we have reached our physical limit in terms of home furnishing. Now it is really up to Mama, Papa (facilitators) and Sophie (learner) to make the environment work for us. And that would be a challenge most definitely.

The Living Room

Before Sophie was born, our living room was not child-friendly or safe at all. The play-yard (6 panels) was the first area we set aside for Sophie in the living room. We had wanted to keep her safe without restricting her movement too much. We always called it the "playpen" so the first compound noun Sophie uttered was quite naturally also "playpen". In fact, she associates so many good experiences (fun and play) with her playpen that she says "playpen" whenever she wants to play in the living room. The panels have been removed long ago although the mat is still there. Now the area has been converted to an area for free play, with a mattress (from her cot bed), some plush toys, a dress-up box and her ride-on. And since it is behind the sofa, Sophie often climbs over the back and jumps onto the mattress. I also intend to do some creative movements and exercises with her in this area as well. As for the panels, we now used them as a barricade to prevent Sophie from helping herself to the television.

Just opposite of the "Free Play Area" is our "Language Station", with learning materials and activities for both direct and independent learning. Right now my collection of Chinese Language materials is pathetic but I reckon it should be better as we move along. Sophie cannot understand much Mandarin at the moment. We are doing much better with our English materials. I also included a magnetic blackboard for Sophie to play with letter tiles or any magnetic learning materials, and a table for hands-on activities and reading.

Sophie is crazy about ball games and balloons, especially soccer. We set up a "Ball Basket Station" for her to play her balls without knocking over or breaking anything. It is strategically located at the bent of the corridor of our bedrooms towards the living room. With the doors closed, she can kick the balls along the corridor as hard as she wants. We like to take turns as the goalkeeper and striker there. Sometimes we use the balls to distract her.

The Playroom

We have altogether four bedrooms, including a master bedroom with an attached bathroom. The bedroom with the best view has been converted into Sophie's playroom. We got inspired to do this after we visited Auntie Annie's place. The room is not big so we have to be mindful of the kind of furniture to get and the arrangement.

Near the door and beside the built-in wardrobe, we put Sophie's building blocks and Lego in clear plastic containers and called it the "Construction Station". She is, unfortunately, not too thrilled about blocks so she will only touch them if we are there to play with her. We use the wardrobe to store toys, teaching aids and art materials like bulky cardboard boxes, paper (in plastic containers) and craft sticks. I have tried many times to keep the space tidy but it seems quite impossible due to the nature of the contents or maybe I am just too disorganised.

On one side of the room, we have created an "Art Station" for painting, drawing and 2D work. We bought the easel at 50% discount some time ago and Sophie likes scribbling on it with whiteboard markers. We also put a shelf next to the easel to store her Playdoh, Jumping Clay and her magnetic writing board. It doubles up as a table for her art materials when she working at the easel.

If you take a peek inside the cupboard next to the easel, you will probably think that I am not a very neat person and you are right. I really dislike storing art materials "neatly" because it takes too much effort and time to put back everything I have taken out for a craft. In any case, the cupboard is used to store Sophie's art tools (upper) and Math/Science materials (lower).

Opposite the cupboard, there is an identical but open shelf. The top two levels are more for Mama than Sophie. I essentially put materials for ongoing projects, DVDs, VCDs, CDs, and anything else that I would not want Sophie to touch.

The lower three levels are for Sophie's books, hands-on activities (motor skills), toys and foam puzzles. I put the books on the lowest level because they are heavy so the shelf will be more stable. The second level is a good height for Sophie if she is standing so it is used for the hands-on activities and toys. And the foam puzzles are kept in boxes on the third level as they are light and pose no threat to her safety if they topple over. Yes, I am paranoid! We rotate the items on display to encourage Sophie to explore without getting bored. Most of the books here are too difficult for her because I bought them when I was still teaching or when they were on sales. The ones in her bedroom are more appropriate for her age and I generally read her those before bedtime.

Against the window is Sophie's "Math/Science Corner" (the best name I can come up with!). We put two shelves for hands-on activities, or any exploratory tasks (including sensory bottles). Again the items will be rotated (if I can think of new things to put there!). The shelves also help to prevent her from hitting the glass window or breaking it even. The messy stuff will be displayed and done in the kitchen though.

Last but not least in the playroom is Sophie's Music Station. I love music but I cannot sing or play any instrument. But Sophie is exposed to music and instruments now so she will not end up like her Mama. We have a good collection of percussion instruments, harmonicas and a mini guitar or ukulele (4 strings). Papa is a fan of the Beatles so he hopes someday Sophie will be the drummer in his band with Uncle Won. But, I much prefer to see her play the piano or violin…

I am not a fan of round tables but in order to maximise the space in the Playroom, we got Sophie one from Ikea. It is placed right at the centre for her to use when she is working on something. To me, it is important for everything to have its own place or it will be pointless to teach her to put away her things after use. Also, I think she gets distracted easily if there are too many things around. And I prefer to display relatively harmless, unbreakable or mess-free items. For instance, I will gather the art materials from the cupboard if I want her to paint. That way, Sophie will understand that she has to get her organised before each task as well.

Currently, we are co-sleeping with Sophie... in HER bedroom. Initially, the three of us slept on the same bed in the master bedroom. However, we found it hard to manage her if she woke up before we did or in the middle of the night. Papa also could not sleep well with her in between us. So, we moved to her bedroom. Now, Papa sleeps on a mattress on the floor beside the queen size bed that Sophie shares with Mama. Sophie's room is smaller with less furniture and the bed is placed against the wall. Thus, we feel more at ease to leave her sleeping on her own. Of course, this arrangement is not permanent. Papa and Mama hope to move back some day. Right now, it is not quite ready to be posted.

The Kitchen

Ah Mah is so tickled by this set up. She laughs whenever she thinks about Sophie eating independently at the table. Before this, she was dead against self-feeding because of the mess. Now, she is looking forward to watching Sophie feed herself. I call this area the "Kitchen Table Activity Station". Besides having her snacks there, Sophie can do all the messy work here, like transferring, pouring and even simple food preparation (I hope! I hope! I hope!). I also shifted her kitchen play pretend accessories here. It seems to make a bit more sense for her to play with them in the kitchen. I bought for her some measuring cups and spoons so she can learn about some capacity as well.

There are still some areas that I would like to work on, but so far I think this ought to be good enough for now. Having the right infrastructure may not guarantee success in educating Sophie, but it definitely makes it easier and more efficient for Papa and Mama. It also sends her the message that we cater to her needs at home because she is an important member of our family. Of course we need to make changes as she grows older as well... but that is another tale for another time. Now our next step is to design a curriculum and a learning schedule that fit into her already established routine... that ought to be challenging!

ECP

Papa was on leave and the weather was good, so we went to East Coast Park for a late afternoon walk.



Sophie still did not like walking on sand although she did try to walk around the sandcastles.

Letter Of The Week - "y" For yo-yo

I saw how Sophie was watching some older children play with yo-yos. I bet she would love to swing one like them so today, “y” was for “yo-yo”.

When Sophie start painting the same spot over and over again, I wondered if she would lose interest again. But I told myself to stay calm and humorous, and just go with the flow... It took quite a while to finally paint the whole cardboard purple.

Then she put the marker cap into the paint and started stamping away, so I quickly added some white for her to do it on the "y".

As much as I would like to entice her with the idea that she was painting a yo-yo, it was impossible make a 2-D circle look like a 3-D yo-yo. We did our best to just complete it so that I could add the string and make it look more like one.

And how could I know if Sophie understood what it was? Well, the way she play with it, of course!



Eventually I asked Ah Gong to buy her one if he could find it anywhere... not that she could really play with it properly.

Letter Of The Week - "Y" For Yak

Yaks are not exactly easy to make because it could look like more like a goat. However, I cannot seem to think of any other animal.

It was not a particularly successful session with Sophie. She started out alright but it was not long before she lost interest in the "strange-looking" goat and preferred to just play with the paint. It did not help that the colours were totally unattractive to her.

I used twine to make the shaggy coat on the "yak", painting it with "dirty" brown. Yes, I ended up completing it AGAIN. I think Sophie likes to play while I WORK for her...

In any case, the "yak" turned out alright, not at all like a goat or buffalo, so I am happy. Sophie also managed to recognise the letter and the animal so some of the objective have been met at least.

End Product - "Y" For Yak

Mark My Face

By the way, do not do that unless you are prepared to sacrifice your markers...

Snack Time

I set up a small dining area in the kitchen for Sophie to try self-feeding. So far, she will only feed herself if she likes the food and I am very fearful of food mess. However, I hope that she would slowly learn to self feed as she gains better motor control. Also, I want to gradually wean her off the highchair. So many things for her to learn in such a short time…

Caught A Bug

Sophie has got the common cold so we took her to the Eu Yan Sang Clinic at Rivermall for some TCM. We have no idea how she caught the bug, but Wong Sinseh told us to let her swim and exercise more when she recovers. Did she mean to say Sophie is fat? Er... I mean she is tall and big for her age (88cm and 13kg) but I think she runs around (exercises) more than both Papa and Mama put together.

Anyway, she is also against Sophie doing waterplay in the bathroom. According to her, the bathroom is humid and cold so children can catch a chill easily. She added that we should let her swim when there is good sunlight. I have to agree with her. Swimming is different from waterplay because we can submerge our whole body in the water and prevent rapid heat loss. During water play, the water on our body evaporates and thus we lose heat quickly. Of course it helps that Sophie wears swim suit for her water play and I usually limit it to 15 minutes.

Alphabet Tube

When Sophie grabbed hold of the paper tube and refused to let go, I wrote the Alphabet on it and let her do some letter search. That worked for the whole afternoon… giving me some personal time and peace.

Open-ended Art: Mosaic (Beans Mania)

Sophie was apparently not quite done with her bean mosaic. She came into the kitchen, searching high and low for the beans and looking really excited. Thus, I filled up a plate with a canister of Playdoh and let her put the remaining beans in there.



Then I tried to entice her with ten beans in a Playdoh canister. She seemed to like the “shaker” so I stretched it further by asking her to guess the type of beans in there. Clearly, she was not interested. She was much better at matching animal sounds to pictures of the animals.



I have always wanted to try “pouring” with lentils but I was too scared of what might happen. But one thing led to another today and somehow, I found myself giving Sophie a measuring pitcher, a cup, a bowl and some beans to try pouring! Although it might seem trivial, it was a great leap for us.



Our first few attempts were disastrous, but I could see Sophie’s effort and I was so happy she did not become frustrated or discouraged over her “failures”. In fact, she always burst out laughing when she spilled the beans all over the floor. I had to hold her hands to show her how to pour properly. I really hated picking up the tiny beans from the floor and Sophie was not always willing to do it. In the end, I made her sit on the floor and it worked beautifully! I think I was even more excited than her!



I realised that Sophie is definitely able to stay focused and accomplish Montessori tasks if I allow her to make mistakes and “play”. She loves how we cheer for her and she enjoys working on such activities. I should not have any doubts on her ability and I have to let her exercise some autonomy as well. I decided to set up a permanent area in the kitchen for her to work on potentially “messy” stuff and perhaps even food preparation.



When I was arranging the materials, Sophie started playing with the jelly cups. Usually I would stop her because she tends to throw things around. And I was right. But today, she did more. She picked them all up nicely. Yes, it is time for her to come into the kitchen…

Open-Ended Art: Mosaic (Beans)

The Open-ended Art Carnival is now over at Growing And Learning By Leaps And Bounds with this week's theme: Bean Mosaic. So go on there and take a look at what other mummies are doing with their little ones on this theme. And here is what Sophie have done...

Before we started working on the craft, I had to stock up on beans - many different types of beans. We do not really eat beans so it was quite an experience for me to shop for beans of different colour, size and texture. I grabbed some black beans, red beans, green beans, black eye beans and some other "bean" looking foods like sago and popcorn from a provision shop. I avoided kidney beans (too expensive) and soy beans (look like black eye beans). And I took the opportunity to get some orange and pandan essence for Sophie's scent bottles.

We began with creating the base for the mosaic. I wanted to let Sophie experience using a different sort of adhesive material so I "sacrificed" the jumping clay. It ought to dry and harden after a day or two and it should hold small objects pretty well. Hopefully, she would not be able to remove the beans easily.

After the base was done, I put some beans for the mosaic on small jelly containers and let Sophie play a little with them. I must admit I was very nervous about the potential mess so we moved to the kitchen for today's craft. Around then, I began to daydream about her doing all her future art and craft without her highchair.

To me, Sophie's patience was quite admirable. I was bored to tears with fixing tiny beans onto the jumping clay base but she was rather accomodating. And it felt great to just sit with her while she worked on the craft.

Of course our session was not perfect! Sophie spilled the beans several times throughout and we had to painstakingly pick up all the beans each time. Fortunately, she helped.

The result was alright. I think it provided Sophie a chance to exercise some patience and focus. But more importantly, it opened up new channels to what activities we can do going forward.

For a start, she started fiddling around with the end product after it dried completely.