5 Minute Learning Center: Think Math!

Posted on July 9, 2013 by Veronica

Here’s a learning center that comes together in the same time it takes you to print out a picture. Find any picture with multiple things on it. (The picture above has several bats, pumpkins and houses.) Write “What’s the question?” on tagboard. Then sit back and wait for your kids to come up with all kinds of creative answers.

This learning center uses open ended questioning to inspire critical thinking skills. It is perfect as a ‘between lesson’ activity when you are working with another child. Post the students ‘answers’ below the question. The best part of this activity is one child can answer as many times as he/she likes…the possibilities for answers are endless and not limited to any age group. This ‘Think Math’ center can be used with all of your children from Kindergarten through 12th grade!

Remember to credit www.handsonlearning4all.com when you pass this idea for a “Think Math” center on to your friends!!!!

5 Minute Magnetic Learning Center!

Posted on July 9, 2013 by Veronica

Want your kids to practice spelling? How about math concepts? Here’s a quickie center that I set up for all of my kiddos to practice spelling their spelling lists.

I bought an oil drip pan at Walmart for $10. You can find one here on Amazon==>Drip pan. I used my magnetic plastic letters that I already had on hand. You can buy these on Amazon buy clicking here==>Magnetic letters. Finally I used duct tape to create a pretty border around the outside edges of my pan, but this isn’t necessary. The surface is write and wipe too! So you can write directions right on the surface! Yay!

Click here to download the free printable for the “Read it, Write it, Spell it” work mat==> Workmat.pdf! Have fun with your new Hands-On Learning Center!

Learning Centers at HOME! Wall Boggle!

Posted on June 28, 2013 by Veronica

At home learning can be tough for homeschooling or traditional schooling families alike. You want your kids to be engaged in educational games and activities but you don’t want it to feel like ‘school’. This post is the first in a series of educational learning centers that you can set up at home that will keep your kiddos learning but it will feel like fun!

Got duct tape? Got ziplock bags? Then you have all the materials you need to make this giant wall boggle game. Just start with a line of four ziplock bags and tape them together with small strips of tape to keep them together and spaced properly. Next you tape them together with one long strip of tape ==> only tape one side, you will need to open the ziplock bags to slip in your printed letters. Do the next row the same way and so on until you have four rows of ziplock bags. Tape your rows together and you have a GIANT Boggle board. Now print off the giant letters here. Cut them out and slip them into the pockets!

This is a fun game to hang in your family room or in your child’s room to play as a relaxing activity before bedtime as you snuggle together. Anywhere you hang it, it is sure to be a favorite game for everyone to play==> even the adults!

Positive Discipline

Posted on June 25, 2013 by Veronica

My son was chasing his sisters and dog around with a sword yesterday and the girls (and pup) were not interested in the game. It got to be a little too much for everyone involved so I asked my son to sit down beside me for a while and relax. In essence–a time out–but I never called it that. He sat, but he complained. “I don’t need to be here.” “They liked the game too.” Then came the big one==> “I could just get up from here and you can’t do anything about it.”

Well, now. That is a statement that gets a parent’s goat. A natural reaction would be to say something like, “Oh yeah, how about I take away the Nintendo for a week.” But I didn’t want to go down the path of creating a bigger argument and feelings of powerlessness with my son. So instead I said, “Yes, you could. You have that power. But, we live in a family that loves and cares about each other. And you know that by asking you to sit here with me, I am helping you work with your sisters in a better way. AND you love and respect me, your sisters and our family. So, you have made the right decision to sit here and relax for a minute.”

He didn’t know what to say to that AND his tone totally changed. He sat there quietly and calmed down. He hummed a little and talked about the dog. When I noticed he calmed down and had a shift in energy I said, “You look relaxed enough to get up now.” He chose to sit a minute longer and then he got up and played with his sisters in a better way.

It is easy to discipline a toddler or young child because the shear size of an adult is intimidating even if your words or actions are not. It is harder to use positive discipline with older children because we don’t have that intimidation factor anymore. It is VERY easy to fall into the habit of disciplining with negative consequences for poor behavior. But if this is the only technique a parent follows it just generates a feeling of powerlessness for the child that could result in lying and sneaky behavior.

I am not saying that I never choose to remove a toy as discipline. Here’s an example of when I removed a toy for positive discipline. A few weeks ago the Wii remotes were always on the floor—even with the drawer for them only 2 feet away! I really wanted the kiddos to just put them away when they were done. So I picked up all of the remotes laying on the floor and I put them in a hidden spot for a few days. They wondered where they were but continued to play. The next time the remotes were left out I did the same thing. Soon they had no remotes to play with. Then they asked, “Where are the remotes?” My question was, “Where did you leave them?” The discussion naturally lead to my explanation for the removal of the remotes and also letting my children know that if they put the remotes into the drawer they would be able to find them when they want to play.

After I brought the remotes back things changed. All I had to say is, “I am going into the living room…is there anything you want to take care of?” Now I don’t have to say anything, the children are cleaning up the remotes every time they play the Wii now. I never had to raise my voice. I never had to threaten.

Want to read more about positive discipline? Here is a great book by Jane Nelsen that parents love called Positive Discipline. This book helps parents understand how to correct poor behaviors in a positive way so that the relationship between parent and child is more loving and family time is more enjoyable!

Kid Entrepreneurs!

Posted on June 19, 2013 by Veronica

I homeschool my three children. They are always coming up with new crafts and items to sell. So a few years back I decided to organize an entrepreneur day for some children in our local homeschool group. From this simple idea came many, many wonderful and exciting new products. The children that attended sold cookies, purses, toys, jewelry, bows and so many other great things.

One child in particular took her idea for a booth at our little entrepreneur day and turned it into a money making business with a goal in mind. She wanted to earn enough money to send herself to cheer camp. AND guess what===> she did!!!! I recently interviewed this young entrepreneur about her business with the hope that her story may inspire the inner entrepreneur in your children.

HOLFA: What is your business and your business name?

Maddie: My name is Maddie Waschak and I am 10 years old. I hand make and sell hairbows attached to rubberbands or barrettes. I mostly make my bows out of tulle, but I also use ribbon and rhinestones. My business name is Maddie Bows!

HOLFA: How did you get started in business?

Maddie: I first got the idea when Ms. Veronica decided to do an entrepreneur fair for home-schoolers. I know a Mom that makes really pretty cheer bows and I thought maybe I could make some bows of my own for the fair. I was so excited when people liked my bows!

HOLFA: How did you learn to manage the money for your business? Are you saving for anything?

Maddie: At first my Mom bought me all the supplies I needed, but when I started making money she told me that I would have to use my profit to buy more supplies. At first it was hard to spend my money on supplies but I learned how to price my product so that I could buy supplies and still make money. I have a special wallet that I keep all my money in; I also use it to make change for people who buy my bows. When I get too much money in my wallet my mom takes some and puts it into the bank. I wanted to save up enough money to pay for a really expensive sleep away cheer camp this summer.

HOLFA: Do your family members help you? How?

Maddie: My family sometimes helps me. The really tiny rhinestones are hard for me to apply so my mom puts those on. She taught me how to use the glue gun and checks to make sure that all my bows are selling ready. My brothers have helped me by going to events and taking turns sitting in my booth to sell bows when I can’t be there the whole time. Sometimes I will get orders when I am busy with school or gym or other stuff and my Mom always say school comes first. She sometimes helps me fill orders so I won’t miss out on other important stuff. My friends and cousins also help me come up with new ideas and help me make bows.

HOLFA: How do you see the future of your business?

Maddie: My brother wants to open an ETSY store for me and get me my own website. I would love to start selling my bows at stores and online. Right now I have someone who is helping me get started doing craft fairs and boutiques.

HOLFA: Do you have anything else you want to share?

Maddie: I managed to raise almost $600 this year and I was able to pay for my sleep away camp with a little help from my Mom. I can’t wait to go!! I have learned a lot this year from my business. I learned that making money is not easy and you have to spend money to make money and it takes lots of work.

I hope that sharing this interview with you has inspired you to listen to the entrepreneur waiting inside your child. Children are capable of being business owners and in some ways they are better at taking this leap into the unknown because they are natural risk takers. As adults we have too many responsibilities to take a risk with our career and income. But as children they have nothing to lose and EVERYTHING to gain. Successful entrepreneurs will tell you that it has taken a lifetime of mistakes and failures to get where they are. Why not start as a child?

Activity Ideas Using Books as Inspiration!

Posted on June 17, 2013 by Veronica

I love reading books with my kids! Something just feels right about snuggling up and reading a good story. After the story we both feel like there should be something else that we do together. So here are a few of our favorite follow-up activities. You can do these or use these as ideas to create your own. Either way it will be double the fun from the same book!

Viking Ships at Sunrise by Mary Pope Osborne

This book inspired activity will be especially intriguing to kids from 5-8 years old. We used floral foam and popsicle sticks to carve out our own viking ship figureheads. Start with a small block and a picture of something you want to carve. We used the cover of the book as inspiration. Start with a drawing of the figure on the front face of the block and work backward. Again, perfection isn’t important here. Your children will be developing critical visual thinking skills and having fun at the same time. Be sure to do this activity outdoors as the floral foam can get messy.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

Photo credit: http://pinterest.com/pin/343258802819169275/

This book inspired activity is great for kids of all ages but toddlers will gain the most from it. The fine motor muscles of your toddler/preschoolers fingers and hands will get a work out poking the grapes onto a skewer, squishing cream cheese out of a piping bag, and poking mini-chocolate chips for the eyes onto these critters. Be sure to use the whipped cream cheese and a homemade piping bag (from a ziplock sandwich bag and zip the top closed) for maximum success. Remember perfection isn’t necessary here because these caterpillars will be delicious no matter what they look like AND lots of fun too!

The Indian in the Cupboard by Lynne Reid Banks

Photo Credit: http://pinterest.com/pin/343258802819221851

This book inspired activity is great for older elementary kids from 8-11 years old. Using popsicle sticks soaked in water, dental floss, a moderately sharp cutting tool (AND a little help from parents here), and Q-tips as arrows your kids can make a really cool bow and arrow set. Click on the picture to follow the link to Pinterest for full directions. My kids LOVED using these and even set up a mini target for aiming their bows and arrows.

I hope that this post has inspired you to read with your kids and to get them creating some book inspired activities. I would love to hear about the great things you come up with!

Five Fun, Favorite Activities!

Posted on June 10, 2013 by Veronica

A whole week ahead of you with your kiddos and nothing to do? Here are some ideas to get you motivated. Many of these cost little or no money and are guaranteed to strengthen your relationship with your kids. Have fun and enjoy your time!

1. Play the Dress Up Game!

This game is so much fun. You grab a bunch of play clothes (or old clothes) and a timer for play(you determine the time based on the players. Older kids less time, younger kids more time.) Set the timer and everyone works together to dress one person up in a unique way. Use a shirt as a hat or a wig. Use pants as pig tails. When the timer goes off admire your ‘creation’. Take turns so that everyone gets a chance to be the model! This is a great party or camp game too! You can even play it as a competition with judges that give prizes like “The Most Creative Use of a Clothing Item” and “I Would Actually Wear this.” Be sure to have your camera ready because this game produces GREAT pictures!

2. Draw outdoors

Photo Credit: Santa Cruz Museum

Get a different perspective on art and the outdoors. Take crayons, water color paint, chalk, or just pencils outside and draw something. Show your kids pictures of Georgia O’Keeffe’s work from this website. Or go to the zoo and draw some of your favorite critters. We have a zoo membership to the LA Zoo and my kids love to take their sketchbooks there and just visit a few animals and draw. People stop and comment on the beauty of their work. Noticing the beauty of nature and the natural world has a calming effect on my kids and I love the discussions we have. I bet you will too!

3. Build a Fort

Photo Credit: http://pinterest.com/pin/343258802819169238/

Whether you use sticks from outside and a blanket to make a teepee or the cushions from the couch, making a fort is always a good time. Kids LOVE to pretend that they are camping or adventurers. We recently built a fort with newspaper. Just tightly roll a sheet of newspaper and tape the end. Then attach another rolled tube to the first tube with tape. (We used masking tape.) Making triangles is the easiest way to build a solid structure. Before we knew it we had a building with a roof. We taped flat sheets of newspaper to the ‘roof’ and made a cool fort. The kids used it as a dog house, a camping tent, as a prehistoric cave, as an alien outpost…they used it until it fell down. It was a ton of fun!

4. Play with Ice!

Photo Credit: http://pinterest.com/pin/343258802819159282/

My kids LOVE this activity! When we do this we freeze a lot of containers with ice. Cups, plastic shoe boxes, and yogurt containers. By the way, the plastic insert in the Qtip packaging makes great bricks! Then they take their ice blocks and go outside and play. We have played hockey in the driveway with some of the round ‘puck’ shapes. We play archeologist with the ice that has frozen creatures in it. We build igloos with the brick shapes. This activity is great on a hot summer day.

5. Play Blanket Ball!

Photo Credit: http://metoo.clubspaces.com/

Get a blanket or sheet and use it like a party parachute. Have your children grab the ends and bounce a ball on top of it. See how long you can keep the ball on! Or if you have a large group of children you can make two groups each with their own blanket and try to pass the ball between the two groups. We have played this as a birthday party game but I can see it as a team building activity for a scouting group too.

These activities are sure to keep you and your kiddos busy for hours and best of all you will have a great time doing them. Make sure you have a camera handy because you will be making memories!

Activities that Keep Your Children Entertained for Little or No Money

Posted on May 23, 2013 by Veronica

We all have those days where we just need to get stuff done. Whether you have to do a bit of work at home, pay the bills, or clean the oven—it’s a job that the kiddos just cannot help with. But children have an uncanny sense for this type of adult activity and seem to NEED you when you need to get your stuff done. Here is my solution to that problem. I have standby activities ready for this moment that will help you get your work done while your kiddos are playing happily.

Beanbox

This activity is just as easy as its name. Pour some dry beans into a large box with some trucks, scoops (old laundry detergent lids work well), spoons and whatever else you think of. I use an under the bed storage box and then I save the activity by putting the lid on the box.

Toy Washing

This one is great for the summertime and outdoors. Just put your children into their bathing suits. Get a big tub or kiddy pool and put some toys in with some dish soap and washcloths or sponges and let them play.* Set the wet toys in the sun to dry and you have clean toys AND happy kids!

Cardboard Shoebox

Model of the Natural History Museum

Give them markers, bits of old carpet, wall paper, dolls and toys and let them make a house, or museum, or another planet!

Pots and Pans

I think this one explains itself. Add some table cloths and a play table with dishes and napkins and they can make a restaurant. I know they have play toys that are pots and pans but using your stuff is more fun! Sometimes I even take the pots and pans to the bean box and they have a BLAST!

Mixing and Pouring

My daughter is doing her Kitchen Chemistry while I get dinner prepared!

Here’s my BLOG post on this activity that I use as a stand-by when I need to get some cooking done and the kiddos can’t help.

Building Sticks

Home Depot and Lowes offer FREE paint stir sticks. Next time you are working on a home improvement project and you need a little time to get some stuff done, grab a few paint stir sticks. While you are working on your project they can ‘work’ on theirs!

*Warning- anytime your children are using water you should keep them in your view. A child can drown in an inch of water.

Mixing, Pouring and other ‘Childish’ things!

Posted on May 14, 2013 by Veronica

My daughter is doing her Kitchen Chemistry while I get dinner prepared!

When I was a kid I loved going into the bathroom (of all places) and mixing products together like a scientist. My sister and I would use dixie cups from the bathroom and mix toothpaste, baby powder, water, baby oil, lotion—anything we could get our hands on—in those cups to make potions.

Guess what? My sister is a scientist for a pharmaceutical company today, and I love cooking in the kitchen! So what does that mean? You have probably heard this a million times but I am here to repeat it to you….playing is work for kids. Kids really need to mix, explore, and get their hands dirty every day! AND when they do, you will see magic happen. My six year old is using words like ‘dissolve’, ‘solution’, and ‘incorporate’ as she mixes random ingredients from our pantry closet.

To get them started just start saving things that you won’t need anymore. Ingredients from a recipe that didn’t work out and you will never try again. Or give them inexpensive ingredients like flour, salt, and sugar to work with. Save these ingredients in a special cabinet or drawer that they can access when they want to do kitchen mixing. (We call it mixing without tasting.) I even bought my kids special measuring cups and spoons for this activity, but you don’t have to. Just make a rule that they have to ask you for the stuff they can use (to make sure they don’t use every measuring cup you have while you are trying to bake a cake!)

This is me—cooking dinner while my daughter is doing her kitchen mixing! (She took the picture!)

Not only is this a great activity to keep them busy while you are cooking, but it is also a great way to get them thinking about science, cooking, language, and math. I give my children measuring spoons and cups and pieces of paper and pencils to write down their recipes. Anything they can practice as a child may become a career later in life. So get your children playing—-I mean working!

Clean up is part of the game!

Plus the clean up is also a part of the activity. They pretend they are real parents cleaning up the kitchen. My kids LOVE this activity and can do it for at least an hour. Definitely enough time for me to get dinner prepared and my work space cleaned up! Yay! What can you do with an hour of time?!

Cardboard Boxes = Big Fun

Posted on May 13, 2013 by Veronica

Something about a fresh cardboard box that drives my kids crazy with creative energy! They LOVE the endless possibilities of what this blank canvas can become. Will it be an airplane? a museum? a time machine? a dinosaur cave?

Two knights ready for battle!

I always help them cut the holes, doors, windows, etc. because cardboard can be stiff and little hands have a hard time cutting it, but I let them draw the lines on which to cut! It is very hard not to let my perfectionist out at this point because I have a strong need to straighten lines and round curves….but I resist the urge because the finished piece is totally their work when it is all finished.

Model of the Natural History Museum

Whatever it is that your child wants to create with his empty box, I am sure it will be a great invention. Just don’t tell the person who gave him the present that he liked the BOX more than the present!

We have these boxes to build with at our house. My kids love to build these and use them to make mazes too! They even made an obstacle course for our dog with them!

A Diplodicus built with cardboard blocks, cardboard box, brown paper, and broom sticks!

Check out the directions for this dino on my Fun Projects page!