OUR HOMESCHOOL ADVENTURE SERIES
Last week we were all about creating The Owlery and 3D Printing; and while Mr Teen has continued on with this project we've been a little more focussed on our littlest learners this week (it's Queensland school holidays and that means Little Miss is home from Kindy, so it has been a great opportunity to do lots of fun things).
Little Miss is starting to learn to read and she enjoys doing 'school work' (meaning she loves anything that involves getting the pens and pencils out), she has also been enjoying mazes and search and find books - so we have been exploring lots of things that cater to her interests this week. Read on to find out more about how we're including our 'Little Imps' in our Wizarding World Adventures...
Sensory Play
What We've Been Doing...
Of course when you're on a magical adventure the thought crosses your mind about potion making...and normally this would be super fun and we'd jump at the chance - but by the time we got ourselves organised and decided it was potion making day Mr Teen was at work (we can't do potions without him!) and it was raining.
So messy potions were out and potion substitute were in!
The little ones had already had some wonderful sensory items in their sensory tray that weren't the drippy, oozy kind of messy so we made up a potion making game to play with our sensory tray items (pom-poms, string, ribbons, elastic, cups, containers and tongs).
Mr Toddler and Little Miss had a wonderful time selecting ingredients from the assortment of colours, textures and shapes available and mixing them together in their 'cauldrons' (I know we have some actual cauldrons around here somewhere...we'll have to pop finding those on our list of things to do before we do REAL potions!).
Why We Love This...
Potion making is an excellent opportunity to expose young children to recipes, ingredients and procedures. This provides excellent opportunities to introduce English topics and understanding through play.
We have plans to create a mud kitchen where we can absolutely go to town with all of the muckiest, drippiest, ooziest, fizziest kinds of potions when the weather is a little better for outdoors. By adding some simple printed cards with ingredient images and some simple text, you can extend your children's exposure to these important English topics and understandings - it gives them loads of practice in unique ways (yep, cooking together in the kitchen is another great way to introduce these concepts).
Some other things we thought were super about the less messy potion making we just did was that it was a great opportunity for them to talk about the ingredients they were selecting, identifying colours and textures ("This worm is stretchy mummy!" and "I love the pink fuzzy beetle"), and as you can see, an incredible opportunity for them to use their imaginations! Who would have thoughts that pom-poms, ribbons, string and elastic could be so many different witchy ingredients!
Games
What We've Been Doing...
As you know, games are one of our absolute most favourite things to do in the whole world! So we never miss an opportunity to incorporate them into our homeschool.
This week we've been exploring all kinds of games; but some of our favourites have been a Spot-it style game from Waldock's Wizards and Wands unit, Room on the Broom Memory, Lego Building Challenges and Dumbledore Says!
Why We Love This...
The Spot-it style game and Room on the Broom Memory are great for little ones because they aren't too hard, they encourage them to focus, match, remember and most importantly, they are fun!
Our little ones love helping each other when the other one is finding things a bit challenging and there is never really a focus on winning these kinds of games because they are just so much fun to play! We have done so many rounds of Memory that I wouldn't even be able to remember who won the most games anyway!
Lego Building Challenges are great for all ages and they can be modified easily to support different ability levels (and levels of attention span!). Because we have a toddler, kindy-aged and a teen - this is one of the few things that they can all be equally engaged in at their own level and it isn't competitive! It is a supportive, creative endeavour where all of our kids can come together to share knowledge, help and play together.
And Dumbledore Says...well, this no-prep game is the perfect opportunity to have a few laughs (sometimes at your own expense!) and it is super easy for everyone to play. Just think up some wizard-inspired things to do (or add in some good old favourites like touch your nose, stand on your toes etc.) and see who you can catch out when you don't say Dumbledore Says! This game is good for more than a few laughs and a fun time though - it gets everyone up and moving, helps to foster focus and concentration, and develops listening skills; just to name a few things!
Reading & Writing Fun
What We've Been Doing...
As we mentioned before, Little Miss is just starting to learn how to read (which starts with letter and sound recognition) and she enjoys 'school work' so we have been trying to incorporate fun activities for her that reinforce what she is already learning.
We have been lucky enough to participate in a fabulous pilot program, 'road-testing' a gorgeously simple and effective reading curriculum before it is released officially and we love adding in our own activities too.
After discovering that Little Miss loves to do mazes we wanted to create opportunities for her to practice skills, reinforce knowledge, and have fun doing things she loves - so we created some Alphabet Mazes (Wizarding World-inspired of course!) for her to do whenever she wants.
Why We Love This...
What we love most about this is that not only is Little Miss learning skills she will NEED, she is learning things that she WANTS to in ways that are meaningful, relevant and fun!
By allowing Little Miss to complete the letter mazes linked to our stage of learning we are giving her opportunities to re-engage with the letters and become more familiar with how they look. By engaging WITH her while she works her way through letter mazes, we have opportunities to have conversations about the letters, their sounds, where we might find them in our home and the wider world, and words that start with those sounds.
Whilst we are not actively engaged in a 'lesson' per say; we are still reinforcing the learning we have already done through our activities and conversations - and that is the most important and effective way to learn anything - use it, or lose it!
Little Miss is also able to have short periods of time working on her concentration and focus, problem-solving, critical thinking, and fine motor skills. And the best part is, that we can use these mazes over and over again because we laminated the pages and use a whiteboard marker which is easily rubbed off! We can also stick these letter mazes up in our learning and playing spaces as fun decorations that serve a dual purpose - they look nice AND provide a text rich environment for our little ones.
Grab your copy of Room on the Broom Memory (and other Julia Donaldson inspired free activities and printables).
Grab your copy of Waldock's Wizards & Wands Unit Study with study plan, workbook, fun games & resource recommendations included.
Grab some free Brain Breaks from Rock Your Homeschool - loads of great active games, crafty activities & inspiration!
For more ideas of how to use Room on the Broom for learning fun; check out the recommendations over on Teaching Ideas.
We are having so much fun integrating our wizarding adventures into all aspects of our homeschooling at the moment - and we're loving how we are finding so many fun ways to explore this topic! We can't wait to share all of our adventures with you, so join us each Wednesday to learn about something new we're doing in our very our Wizarding World (a.k.a our homeschool)! AND Head on over to Little Sprouts Homeschooling and join in the conversation about all things Harry Potter - just click the image below!
