Eager to provide a slimy opportunity, we kicked off the week making string birdcages. It sounded simple enough to make: blow up a balloon; wet string with glue mixture; wrap it around the balloon until it resembles a cage.

 
As with all our slimy activities, a tub of water was nearby for N & M to rinse their hands.

 
The tub of water makes the activity more bearable for them, but before I knew it, they were more interested in playing with the tub of water…

 
… and blowing bubbles.

 
I then started wrapping string around the balloon, hoping that they would follow my lead and continue with the craft. It worked for a few more minutes, but they soon returned to the tub of water and blowing bubbles. Oh well, at least they gave the slimy craft a good try and without complaints.

 
I consider the rest of the craft as mummy therapy. It’s so easy to forget craft is also fun and relaxing for adults. (I can get so absorbed in the world of kiddy crafts). I continued wrapping string around the balloons. It’s been awhile since I’ve done craft myself. I think I had too much fun with it because I wrapped too much string around the balloons!

 
I let the balloons dry for a day. Then cautiously, I deflated the balloons and took them out, leaving balls of string which were now my birdcages.

 
Then, using some black felt, I cut out silhouettes of nightingales. I sewed some thread to the silhouettes and attached it to the birdcages. I wished that I had not gone overboard with the amount of string I wrapped on the balloons, because the birds are hard to spot through the masses of yarn, but hey I was enjoying the moment.

 
Lesson learnt: mummies need craft time too.

N & M: 3 years and 4 months

Mummy: who’s counting?

This post was shared in the following linky parties:

No Time for Flash Cards Link & Learn

After School

Living Life Intentionally

It’s Playtime

The Nurture Store Play Academy

Kids Art Explorers: Yarn

The post bird in a cage: mummy therapy by Pauline appeared first on Lessons Learnt Journal.

Rewind a few years. A university lecture hall. The Professor at the front of the hall presents his lecture on teaching children how to read. What is he going on about? Alphabetic principle? Fluency? Initial Phonemes? Segmentation?

There are so many facets to teaching literacy and literature but we must all start with humble beginnings. However, even humble beginnings are complex once deconstructed: vocabulary; background knowledge; alphabetic principle; phonemic awareness (ability to segment words into their separate sounds); comprehension; fluency; sight words; etc.

Let’s start with alphabet letter sounds. Alphabetic principle consists of both alphabet letter naming ability and alphabet letter sound knowledge. Often it is the alphabet letter sound ability that is harder of the two areas for students learn. (Also, these ideas will only use  lower case letters as capital letters only account for about 5% of all letters in the written word.)

Alphabet Letter Sounds: [s] is for Snakes

Simple ideas for introducing the alphabet letter sound [s].

Show children a written alphabet letter lower case [s].

• Model the mouth movement and sound [s].
• Visually connect the picture/word “snake” with the letter sound [s].
• Kinaesthetically move your hand like a slithering snake.

To further support the learning of the alphabet letter sound [s], make some loopy snakes

Draw patterns and stripes all over strong, thin paper.

Cut the paper into strips – some fat, some thin. Cut points at the end of the strips for heads and tails. Put glue under the head and tail.

Bend and stick onto paper. You can overlap the snakes when you stick them down. Finally, stick eyes onto the snakes.

N & M: 3 years, 4 months
September 2011

Looking for more ideas to teach letter sound ideas? Check out our:
[m] is for mixing the wonderfully sweet
[a] is for chocolate fairy apple
[s] is for stars
[e] is for egg

Check out these wonderful online literacy resources:

Primary English Teaching Association Australia
The Balanced Literacy Diet
Playdough to Plato

The post Alphabet Letter Sounds: [s] is for Snakes by Pauline appeared first on Lessons Learnt Journal.