Studio3Music Blog

Posts Tagged ‘games’

Oct
5

A Spelling Game

Some of you know that I home school my three children. The rest of you – now you do. I have two boys who don’t love to write (a pretty normal condition for boys). We use a spelling program called Spelling Power instead of a typical workbook.

Because it’s NOT a workbook , spelling words aren’t learned by simply writing them multiple times in exercises. My oldest son is not a good speller. He was an early and voracious reader, and breezed over and through phonics (spelling) rules, because he really didn’t need them.

My younger son is a good speller, and he carefully sounds out words. However, he doesn’t like making mistakes. And the way Spelling Power works is that you pre-test a list of words, and study only the ones you don’t know how to spell. To help him not feel like a failure, I need to make a game of learning to spell the missed words.

My boys are oil and water. I never thought I’d find game that would work to teach them their words. But I found one. That works, 100% of the time. Both of them.

Here’s all you need: a whiteboard and dry erase markers. We use a slanted (22°) whiteboard for a lot of our work. One of the reasons is that a slantboard (like the slanted desks I had in elementary school) reduces stress on the optic system.

The text in the math book is so much smaller than what we can write on the board. Less eye tiredness happens with the board!

A slantboard also allows children to write larger. My 4^th grader makes far fewer mistakes doing his math on a slantboard, than trying to write small in his workbook. The errors he makes on the slantboard are because he made a math error, rather than one due to trying to work in a small space. And I make my 7^th grader redo any missed Algebra problems on the board. He suddenly can see where he made his errors.

I suppose if you’ve made it this far into the blog, you are wondering where the heck the spelling game is I promised. Finally, here it is:

Write the missed word on the board.

Trace around it in 3 different colors, being sure to match the shape of the word.
Always while looking at the board, spell the word forwards, and then backwards. Yes, backwards. Really. You have to do that. And, at the same time, tap your hands on the table/desk/counter, or on your legs, once for each letter.
Erase one letter. (Don’t erase the shape of the word.)

Repeat steps 3 and 4 until the word is gone. (Keep looking at the board as you spell.)

Spell it forwards and backwards one more time.

There! That’s it. My 7^th grader FUSSED when I made him do this. For about 3 days. And then he stopped complaining because he realized it actually worked.

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who recommends the slantboard from www.visualedgesb.com

Tags: games, learning, Miss Analiisa

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Oct
2

Why? How come? What’s next? Can I? What would happen if?

Posted in Child Development, Education, Imagine That, Things to do

Do you hear those questions at home? We hear them in Kindermusik Imagine That classes all the time! Your child is a discoverer, and loves comparing and categorizing things, conducting investigations, problem solving, and most of all, talking about what they learn from exercising their curiosity.

The things your preschooler naturally wants to do will boost their cognitive development – the growing of thinking skills, including problem solving and decision making. Cognitive development is not about the acquisition of information, though that might occur in the process.

What’s important about helping your child acquire cognitive skills now in the preschool years is that this aptitude can then be transferred to any other learning experiences in their life. For instance, take puzzles. There is a lot of thinking involved in completing a jigsaw puzzle. Sorting, organizing, categorizing, visual discrimination, remembering (Where did I see that piece I now need?), a plan of action (Do I do the outside or the inside first?)

Now fast forward 30 years. Your preschooler has become a successful research scientist. And puzzles have helped her become so. She learned the scientific method as a child. She observed the puzzle, she hypothesized how to solve the puzzle, she tested her solution and concluded if her solution worked!

All mistakes or problems are really opportunities for cognitive development. Here’s why: Children thrive on routine and familiarity. When something happens that thwarts their “normal”, they are required to come up with a solution that is outside of their box, and in doing so, cognitive development occurs.

Take the proverbial spilled milk. Your child dropped his cup of milk. You could get mad (especially if you just cleaned your kitchen floor), but don’t. Remember – all mistakes or problems are really opportunities for cognitive development.

Ask your child to look at the spill – Wow! That little mug of milk sure spread out all over the floor. Is the puddle going to keep growing, or stop? Is it a deep puddle? How can you tell? What should we do about all this milk on the floor? Oh, clean it up? How? What should we use to do that? Milk gets sticky when it’s dried, because it has a kind of sugar in it. What do you think could put on our washcloth to get the sticky off the floor? Why do you think you dropped the cup? How can you hold the cup differently next time so it doesn’t spill? Observing, hypothesizing, testing and concluding!

Here is a list of 10 cognitive skill-building activities to do with your child.

Play Hot and Cold. Hide an object and give your child clues as to where it is by saying hotter, colder, or warmer.
Games like Dominoes, Uno, Skip Bo or Battleship
Cooking. Let your child mix, pour, etc. Lots of mistakes or problems can occur to solve in this activity. (Just ask professional chefs.)
Play I Spy with shapes, colors, textures, etc.
Household chores like sorting laundry or putting away silverware.
Ask (sometimes very silly) thinking questions. Is an elephant purple? Which is bigger – our cat or our dog? What did you eat for dinner last night?
With your finger, draw a simple shape or picture on your child’s back. See if they can guess what it is. Give clues if necessary. (It’s something you find outside. It is very tall.)
Category games. What doesn’t belong – cat, mouse, frog, tree? Find me 3 things that are yellow.
Create an obstacle course.
Let them make mistakes and then allow them to figure out how to solve them.

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who thinks she’s pretty cognitively savvy, until she plays the game Gobblet Gobblers with her children and loses!

Tags: games, kindermusik, language development, learning, Miss Analiisa, preschoolers, toddlers

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Aug
22

Inside, Outside, Upside Down

Posted in Child Development, Education

Prepositions. Can you name one? Before I started homeschooling my children (6 years of Shurley English later), all I could remember about them was that a preposition wasn’t something I was supposed to end a sentence with. And something about not dangling them… no, that is participles.

Anyhow, prepositions are all about spatial relationships – meaning, where you are in relation to an object. How important are they? Just try giving your child a direction without prepositions.

You: “Go get the ball.”
Child: “Where?”
You: “The backyard.”
Child: “Where in the yard?”
You: “Tree.”
Child: “Which tree?”

See, you can’t give the clear, accurate directions, “Go get the ball in the backyard. It’s under the tree opposite the shed”, without using prepositions.

Beside, between, and next to are all prepositions that must be understood before children can make and understand patterns (pre-math stuff). Prepositions are a really important part of language development, too. Children with sensory issues often have trouble learning prepositions as they don’t often have good body awareness.

So, how can you teach prepositions? There are many (because you say them so frequently) they will probably learn on their own. But games (musical ones, of course!) are a great way to teach new ones.

over under in out on inside outside up down behind in front beside above below through between around across with against following before to from

I’m using the song “Go ‘round the Mountain” in my Kindermusik camp this August. I’ve put it below for you to listen to. You can also download it at www.play.kindermusik.com.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

In class, we use hoops on the floor to be our “mountains”, but you can use a chair, an exercise ball, a taped-off square, a box, or other objects. Once you’ve learned the song, turn the music off. You sing, and change the words. Here’s a slew of ideas:

Jump in the box…
Crawl under the chair…
Tiptoe around the ball…
Fly above the mat…

See? Pretty easy. Be sure to play with prepositions two ways. Have your child do the preposition, like in the examples above. Then, sing again, and this time, direct your child to place an object (like a toy turtle) in relation to the chair, or box, or hoop.

Turtle on the box…
Horse behind the chair…
Shark under the carpet…

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who is sitting on the couch with her laptop despite how tired she is, but who shall soon get up and go towards the bathroom to brush her teeth and crawl under the covers and into bed, after she picks up the remote from beside her and puts it on top of the shelf!

Tags: brain, games, language development, learning, Miss Analiisa, music, preschoolers, sensory child, Things to do, toddlers

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Aug
20

Inspiring Natural Curiosity in Children

Posted in Child Development, Things to do

“Children who are allowed to explore freely in a safe environment become eager learners. As we encourage natural curiosity, we validate their innate need to know. So let them loose in the Tupperware drawer! Cover the deck with flour and give them a bucket of water. I’m always amazed at what they come up with!” – Carolyn Hornell (one of my favorite people and a Kindermusik Educator and owner of Notable Kids in Vancouver, BC.)

Here are some other ideas to encourage creativity:

Make a big plastic container of jello. Add some extra packets of plain gelatin to the mix so it is firmer. As it is solidifying, add some plastic animals, small colored rocks, and other objects like corks, bottle caps, marbles, etc. In the backyard (or the empty bathtub), provide your child with plastic utensils (yes, even a plastic knife!) and let them go for it.

Collect starch-based packing peanuts and give your child a boxful along with a little cup of water. Show your child how to dip the end in a little water and stick it to another packing peanut. Be sure to take pictures of their creations!

Pack a box with totally random craft items you might have around the house (just a few of each) – feathers, googly eyes, pipe cleaners, glitter or glitter glue, dried pasta, buttons, cut up straws, fishy crackers, empty toilet paper rolls, etc. Hand your child a couple pieces of construction (or plain) paper and a glue stick or glue bottle – AND NO DIRECTIONS. This is about the process, not the end result!

Find some unusual building blocks – a whole box of plastic or paper cups, stacks of paperback books, plastic bowls and plates. Provide a few matchbox-type cars or a small ball and watch what happens.

Hand your child a spray bottle filled with plain water and some sidewalk chalk. Send your child outside. Alternately, put fill two spray bottles with two different colors of water (or even the 3 primary colors – red, blue, yellow), and put an old (or cheap) white sheet down on the ground outside. Made those starch packing peanut creations recently? Have your child spray them with water to make a little magic.

Here are the rules:
No hovering
No directing
No explaining what to do (unless your child has never used a glue stick or squirt bottle before.)

This is all about fostering natural curiosity. Yes, there are certainly times when we should be right there guiding and teaching our children. But not all the time. You are your child’s best teacher, but our children don’t always require our presence in order to learn. And sometimes, when left to their own devices (with some objects to work with) they discover things about the world they might not have learned otherwise.

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who warns you that the combination of child, markers, scissors and dog will end up being a learning experience for you, not for said child.

Tags: games, learning, Miss Analiisa, preschoolers, pretend play, Things to do, toddlers

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Jun
13

Making “Multiple Intelligences Theory” Practical

Posted in Child Development, Education, parenting, Things We Love

One of the things that is hardest for me as a mom is to parent my children who are different from me. After all, as I told you a couple of days ago, I’m mostly a visual, abstract-sequential learner. And internally-motivated. I get me really well.

I used to get frustrated with my oldest son, who is mostly the opposite of me, until I understood how he learned and processed information. Okay, I’ll confess. He’s 12 ½ now, and still frustrates me at times, but for different reasons!

Most traditional schools emphasize reading and writing (what psychologist Howard Gardner calls the Linguistic and Logical-Mathematical Intelligences), but not all children learn best that way.

Howard Gardner came up with 8 “Multiple Intelligences”. (A theory, according to the scientific community.) I’m going to tell you a little bit about each intelligence during the blog posts this week, with the hope that you’ll recognize your child in one of more of them, and then learn how you can help develop that intelligence – the practical reality.

Spatial Intelligence (Picture Smart)

These children will tend to see pictures in their heads. They have excellent spatial awareness and judgment. They can draw what they see both easily and well. They don’t tend to get lost. They can manipulate objects in their mind. They are good at catching a ball as they can anticipate movement in space.

These children are keen observers of the world, and notice details that many others miss. They are highly visual and right-brained. They are good at puzzles, mazes, and building things. Fine motor skills are often well-developed. They are the daydreamers (with very active imaginations), artists, architects, and creators.

How to Encourage Your Picture Smart Child:

provide things that can be taken apart and put back together
arts and crafts kits, clay
drawing paper, pens, pencils, paints, chalk, crayons
map making
microscopes, telescopes
legos, playmobil, blocks and other manipulatives to “design” play areas, buildings or other things
puzzles
anything that allows them to create
display their artwork

Linguistic Intelligence (Word Smart)

These children love words – spoken or written! They can have an aptitude for expressing themselves with words. They are good at reading, writing, memorizing and telling stories. They can learn foreign languages easily. These children even invent their own languages. They are great debaters and good public speakers – they love to talk!

Frequently, these children read at an early age. They can be what we call intuitive (almost self-taught) readers, meaning they might not rely on phonics as much for learning to read, but figuring out words based on context. As they grow up, they tend to love crossword puzzles. They are the poets, writers, journalists and public speakers.

How to Encourage Your Word Smart Child:

provide book-making supplies
write down a pre-writer’s stories
read, read, read to your child
let them have their own library card and take frequent trips there
alphabet games, magnetic letters
word games, puns, silly rhymes
encourage storytelling – let them talk
picture dictionary, atlas, globe
be the audience for their plays and skits

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who loves what Howard Gardner said when asked for advice on how parents could rear successful children, Gardner replied that we should not try to make our children good at what we ourselves were good at, or what we ourselves were not good at. Our job is to help our children become who they are supposed to be, not what we think they should be.