Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Living Room Board Game



The other morning, totally unprompted by me, in fact, I was in the kitchen pouring orange juices when the girls raided the craft supplies and turned the living room into a giant board game.

 The timing was perfect.  Dad had just placed bowls of cream of wheat on the table, and we had to wait until they had cooled.

 At the girls' request, I fetched two dice.  We all took turns rolling die and hopping on the colored spaces.  By the time everyone made it to the end, the porridge was just right. 




The girls were so proud and so enthused about their game that I figured we would play again after the morning meal, but by the time I had finished my coffee, the foam circles were declared to be magic and scattered about the room.  Then they became butterfly wings.  Then lily pads for frogs.  In fact, only after supper did the circles leave the floor.   


Sunday, March 9, 2014

Bugs Eating Bananas



Hungry. Hungry!  HUNGRY! 
Bananas. Bananas! BANANAS! 
Please read me a banana word.  Please.  Please.
“My!” 
nom. nom. nom.
“She!”
 nom. nom. nom.
“Tree!”
 “Good!”
 “Is!”
nom. nom. nom.
Hungry. HUNGRY! 
Please give me banana word. Pleeeeeeeease.  Please.
“Me!”
“He!”
“She!”
nom. nom. nom
Tasty.  Tasty.
Oh!  A tricky one.  Sound it out.  Tricky ones are tasty. 
“Horse!”
nom. nom. nom. 
Tasty. Tasty.
“Following!”
nom. nom. nom.
Thank you.  Thank you so very much.

BURP!
Excuse me.





Addition in Chalk



Chalkboard arithmetic may have been a mainstay of my childhood, but for my child, they are a novelty and made for a morning of mathematical amusement. 

She quickly created the template.  The five chalkboard stickers served to clearly distinguish addends, symbols, and sum.  Quickly I realized that we had never worked through a written equation so we brought in the bears.  Three bears joining four bears at a party is way more fun and less abstract than 3+4=7. 


Totals in the double digits gave her pause,


but she figured them out.