Fixes for Mealtime Madness

Do you ever feel like your children are more closely related to barbarians than you when at the dinner table, not me, NEVER ;)  but just in case you have I found this post through Owlhaven and just had to share, Seven Strategies for Dinner with the Barbarians from "Like Mother, Like Daughter

Potty Talk

So here's a very mommy post, we've been potty training and so I've had some fun ;) conversations with my daughter about the amount of toilet paper that you should use along with just how to use it.  For anyone out there that would like to know how you're actually supposed to use toilet paper you can refer to this blog post from Cottenelle a year ago or read on.

Since kids use an average of 8 sheets for #1 and 16 for #2 this guideline is a good one for them to learn early on.  For my little ones just learning I have them use only two sheets, their hands and bodies are small and any kid of potty training age can count to two at least so it makes it easy, then I show them how to fold it in half twice and then in half again the other direction so that you have a square.  For #1 I have my girls wipe from front to back but for #2 I have my kids wipe from the back so that they won't wipe so far forward that they are wiping poop where it doesn't belong.  It's a bit of a stretch but easy to reach the parts you actually need to get to.  I teach them to wipe once and then check the paper and if there is poop on it then to get another two sheets and do it again until it comes back clean.

If they are making a mess wiping then it is often a sign that they aren't really done yet, there should be very little to wipe if they have actually gotten it all out and usually one or two wipes will do it.

This doesn't work with the cheap toilet paper, you usually have to use at least twice as much so keep that in mind.

1 2 3, Math is Easy

Does math make you nervous?  Do you feel completely inept to teach your children math in any form?  Well if you do you are not alone, most of us feel inadequate when it comes to math and esp. when it comes to teaching math but it doesn't need to be hard at all.  Did you know that all math boils down to counting, sorting and patterns?  Really!  Even Geometry, Calculus and Physics are nothing but formulas that are shortcuts to a whole bunch of those two things.  Adding and subtracting are counting more or less of something, multiplication and division are just adding and subtracting several times in a row, the rest just builds from there, and patterns and sorting help you memorize certain figures so you can calculate faster.


So, teaching math to our kids is as easy as picking up their toys, counting fingers and toes, stringing beads, and countless other everyday things you can do with your kids.

I have a tendency to turn everything into a game so we do a lot of these things on the fly like writing my kids names and counting the letters or letting my kids help put away the groceries and asking how they think we should sort them.  My kids love to think of patterns so we clap, color, stack, and string whenever the moods hits.

These same skills are basic for science as well, mammals, reptiles, birds, are sorting, you can chart how many times they brush their teeth or who likes ice cream and who prefers cake, science and math are very interconnected so it's easy to kill two birds with one stone.

So what do you like to do with your kids?

Teaching Nutrition to Tots

Today's post was inspired by Simply Modern Mom's post about the "Choose My Plate" gov. site.

Teaching good eating habits to my kids is easier said then done, my 5 year old son is particularly difficult, he won't eat any fresh fruit and only takes a taste or two of smoothies but he could live off of milk, mac & cheese, and sweets or junk food of any kind.  He's not too bad with his veggies, esp. broccoli but he struggles with trying new things and I'm frustrated with how little fiber he gets.  This is the same boy who used to eat broccoli like it was candy and ate curry anything with gusto when he was two.

My daughter is easy as long as I keep the food coming in small quantities, she'll eat half a doughnut and hand me back the rest but I have to remind her not to eat the seeds in her apple if I didn't cut out the core, it's pretty great.

So out of frustration came inspiration, I would make a "food rocket" that my kids could put together piece by piece with every meal until it is finished at the end of the day when they add the flame on the end so it looks like it's flying.  If they have too many sweets, junk food or don't finish the rocket then they can't add the flame.

Here's my "prototype" for it, I'm working on getting a much cuter version of it.

(Speaking of feeding tots, my 6 month old gags on sweet potatoes but adores broccoli. Go figure.)

Hickory Dickory Dock, Or Why Rhymes Are So Important For Our Little Ones

I always loved nursery rhymes growing up, I still do actually, the rhyme and meter and short silly stories were something I was always clamoring for my mom to sing with me and were a source of plays my siblings and I would put on for my parents.  Today my kids favorite nursery rhyme is The Itsy Bitsy Spider because I do the finger play on them with my spider fingers crawling up their water spout bodies and my hands raining down or drying them up, they love it and I love that I can turn it into a tickle game for extra giggles.  Who'd have thought that these simple rhymes would be so good for their development as well?  I certainly didn't but they help our little ones in many wonderful ways.

When they hear nursery rhymes they hear the sounds the vowels and consonants make in a way that's easy for them to process, they hear different words like fiddle, contrary, fetch, pail, etc. that they don't usually hear, and since they are so short, rhythmic and repetitive they are also easy to memorize so they are often a child's first sentence.

Nursery Rhymes use patterns and many even use counting, size and weight which helps with math skills and they tell a story with a beginning, middle and end which teaches sequence and how to follow along.

Children benefit both physically, and emotionally as well since they develop coordination, self confidence and learn to express themselves as they act them out.

With all the great benefits that nursery rhymes have for our kids I enjoy them even more when I share them with my three.  If you want to apply this to the learning triangle you can watch Barney, or a video that uses rhyming, talk about and recite your favorite rhymes, and then act them out or make a book of the rhyme together.

An Easy Principle for Teaching Our Kiddos

I took a wonderful class that taught a lot about how you can create a full and rich learning environment for your children by using what she called "A Triangle for Learning".  Here is the basic idea:

An example: You see an episode of "Curious George" (Season 1 Eps. 11 "Animal Magnetism") about magnets and talk to your child a little bit about what they thought of the show.  Later you read a book about magnets like "The Wiener Dog Magnet by Hayes Roberts" which is a very funny story about a wiener dog magnet that attracts actual wiener dogs and discuss it a little bit.  You can make a trip to the library for this or already have a book on hand, it's a lot of fun either way but making a special trip to the library every so often for a book about something your child has seen can really make your child feel extra special too.  Now that you've done the first two you can do a fun activity about magnets, it can be as simple as letting your child play with refrigerator magnets and see what they will stick to or you can get other ideas from books like "Mudpies to Magnets" or from websites, You can also get a Magnetic Discovery Board or make one yourself.

You don't have to follow in that exact order, or even all in the same day, as long as you do all three, relatively soon, there are benefits for each so do what works for you.

Free Stop & Go Printable Game

Here is today's free download.

(The link no longer works but if you send me a request I'd be happy to send the file your way.)

Free I SPY Game Page

I SPY

I have been making things to keep my kids busy during the ALL DAY plane trip in a week and you can benefit.

My kids and I love I Spy, the books, the computer games, everything.  This page is ideal for my 19 month old DD who would really struggle with overlapped or too small images.  Just click on the picture to take you to download the file.  I'll be posting other free activities throughout the rest of the week.

(The link doesn't work any more but if you leave a comment with your email and I'll send you the file and then delete your email so no one can send you spam.)