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Encourage Creativity

November 3rd 2011 00:55
9 Ways to Encourage Creativity


Creativity is not a frivolous trait. Children raised to be creative thinkers are also often excellent problem solvers and have an innate trust in their abilities. Your child may not write a Pulitzer Prize winning novel or star on Broadway, but then again, you very well may have a budding creative genius underfoot. Regardless, the benefits of creativity are wide-spread. Here are 9 ways to encourage creativity.

1. Ask lots of questions. Let your child ask questions. Indulge your child's curiosity by letting them pursue tangents and explore new subjects.


2. Tell stories. Encourage your child to come up with alternate endings to favorite stories or movies. Before finishing a storybook, see if your child wants to guess the ending. Imagine new characters or put the same characters in a different setting. Retell these stories at bedtime, while cooking dinner or driving.

3. Allow time and space to create. Exploring takes time. Resist the urge to give short cuts, or exclaim that an idea won't work, let your child try. Unless of course their idea is dangerous to herself or others. If you can designate a corner for art work that can be left out, great.

4. Be silly. Singing and dancing along to the radio or making up your own silly tune is the best way to encourage the same freedom for your child. Even if you are not a natural extrovert, you can let your silly side show every so often.




Read more here - 9 Ways to Encourage Creativity
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Kids Art Show

August 2nd 2011 13:28
Better than a lemonade stand, a kids art show can be a fun way to promote creativity, earn money and build a sense of community.

Host your own with the following tips for a One Dolla Holla, Fifty Cent Center or Quarter Show Tips

Invite participates. You probably have a basic group in mind. It could be simply your own children or expand it to their close friends, a street in your neighborhood or make it a club event. Scouts or sports teams can pull off an effective quarter show.

Suggest sale items. Compile a list of items that are acceptable for the show. This can be decided upon as a group, or set in place ahead of time. Baked goods such as cookies should be wrapped ahead of time and ready to go. Handfuls of trail mix in baggies were just as popular as brownies at our show. Sun catchers, dream catchers, home made note cards and bookmarks were some of the offerings. Simple crafts, home made jewelry and little bouquets of flowers kept the show pretty, while they were there. We had a table for gently used toys and a place to buy hot dogs, lemonade and chips, for a quarter of course.

Read on for more information...and why a single set price is best.

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A is for Always

April 2nd 2011 12:52
For 26 days in April (minus Sundays) I will be posting a blog for each letter of the alphabet.
"Sylvie's word of the day"
I am all for challenges, so when this was dangled in front of me in my writers group, I grabbed it.

Hundreds of people signed up, literally 1037 people. Go ahead, Sign up here, if you dare.

This mini adventure is fairly mundane, but with 1000 bloggers jumping in, stalking each other, chatting away everyday, something good is bound to happen.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Always is my word of the day, in honor of ALWAYS learning. Life is too ....oh wait, I'll just quote Henry Miller, he said it best.....


"develop interest in life as you see it; in people, things, literature, music, the world is simply throbbing with rich treasures, beautiful souls and interesting people. Forget yourself." ~Henry Miller

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Learn About the Human Body

August 2nd 2010 11:27
Learning about the human body involves knowledge that children can use for the rest of their life. Help them become literate regarding the systems of the body through playing games. There is a lot of information to absorb; facts about the circulatory system, endocrine system, digestive system, bones and organs offer lots of game playing possibilities.

Use riddles to teach the children facts about the human body. Choose an organ and list the different attributes. Use these to form riddles about body parts. For example, ask the class, " I transport nutrients throughout the body. I am located in the middle of your body to the left. I am about the size of your fist. Who am I?" The answer is the heart. Ask just one fact at a time to see how quickly they can catch on. Include realistic images of the body parts. Cover the majority of the image with a sheet of paper. Slowly slide the paper down as you ask the questions.

Consider letting children create their own riddles and quiz each other. Be sure to check their facts ahead of time to be sure they are accurate.

Magnetic Flow Chart and Online Human Body Games can be found here...
human body, classroom learning games, human body online games
A Human Body...(in her brothers football gear...)


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Fun Basketball Games

July 21st 2010 01:20
This weekend was my son's graduation party. We had approximately 200 people, give or take a neighbor. I had no idea my little ranch home could handle that volume...thankfully the weather was gorgeous and we had enough forethought to set up a volleyball net, corn hole and a couple of long tables to add to our outdoor seating.
The basketball hoop in the front driveway was a huge focus of attention for the boys. There were constant games, competitions and general silliness all night....well, until my son ended his own grad party by winding up in the ER. 18 stitches later, he is fine. Just a dunk shot gone wrong.

If we would have stuck to these classic games ( or even the online versions) we could have avoided yet another doctor bill....but, ah, the memories.
The party sort of followed us to the hospital...his closest friends and the majority of the soccer team waited on the lawn eating Taco Bell until he was all stitched up. Good friends are hard to find.

Read more...

basketball, fun basketball games
what should have happened...
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Cranberry Thanksgiving

October 2nd 2009 18:39
Cranberry Thanksgiving written by Wende and Harry Devlin in 1971 is one of those time honoured books that lends itself to family traditions - in the case of Cranberry Thanksgiving it is Cranberry Bread.

Cranberry Thanksgiving is the story of a young girl named Maggie who lives with her Grandmother near a cranberry bog in New England. The book includes some interesting characters and colourful illustrations and the story takes some interesting twists and turns, demonstrating that looks can be deceiving. It even includes Grandmother’s Famous Cranberry Bread recipe for you to bake at home


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Don't Discount Second Hand Stores

September 18th 2009 17:35
Investigating a new area to live, I started checking out all the stores - second hand stores included and noticed what bargains they had to offer particularly in the way of kids educational computer games and books. We managed to make some great savings and many of the books and cds were priced at $2 or less!

The Little Bear Preschool Thinking Adventure normally sells for between $10 and $15 and we picked it up for $1. A definite bargain


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Garden Week

June 5th 2009 04:20
Spring is here in the form of Garden Week this week inspired by her Little Golden Book entitled Dorothy's Garden. Dorothy is the dinosaur from Wiggles and while she has outgrown the television program, she still enjoys catching clips of them and dancing along from time to time. My guess is this is where the Wiggles website will come in handy.

Handprint flowers seem to be the common theme on children's craft websites. We are also going to try our hand at pressing and drying flowers as well as doing leaf rubbings
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Speakaboos

June 2nd 2009 02:38
The Speakaboo website served a great purpose this week as it gave us an online version of The Ugly Duckling to read and view as well as a follow on activity, but the site itself holds an interesting premise.

Coming soon, as the site announces, is a record your own story section which will allow kids and parents to record their own voices reading (or singing!) their favorite story, song, or nursery rhyme. Anything that aids in the improvement and creation of kids wanting to read or listen to stories is a great idea.
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Ugly Duckling Week

May 31st 2009 07:02
This may sound like some poor joke but it is the book to which my daughter has chosen to base all of her crafts and activities this week. Again being a popular story like The Three Liltte Pigs, there is no shortage for either crafts or activities we can do together.

We have various Ugly Duckling and Swan pictures to cut out and glue together, although my favourite is this 3D duck. We are unable to source the plastic eggs although are going to amend it slightly by using small paper cups which should do the trick just nicely


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Send In The Clowns

May 24th 2009 02:59
Admittedly I am not a fan of clowns, preferring to see them at children's parties rather than adorned all over my wall. So the inclusion of Clown Week into our schedule took me a little by surprise to say the least.

Loonette and Molly from the Canadian Series, The Big Comfy Couch, are a particular favourite in our house so at least I had a starting point on which to base our activities. And in particular I love the concept of a 10-second tidy which we are going to incorporate with a clown based cleaning chart
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BBC Stories

May 14th 2009 00:50
CBeebies, the children's BBC website, has a great range of stories to watch and read along with and will easily inspire your children.

Currently my daughter's favourite, she enjoys listening to the stories and selecting her own depending on her mood. The stories are excerpts from the children's programs featured on the BBC channel such as The Tweenies, The Story Makers and Charlie and Lola


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The Three Little Pigs

May 12th 2009 04:39
From one classic fairytale to another, this week's activities surround the ever popular children's tale, The Three Little Pigs.

Being such a popular story, it seems that there is no shortage for inspiration on the web covering all kinds of activities, colouring pages and ideas to complement the story


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Jack And The Beanstalk

May 3rd 2009 10:22
My daughter was very excited that today marked the first day of Giant Week aka Jack And The Beanstalk Week. Having changed her mind at the last minute from her original choice of The Ugly Duckling, she had me do some last minute website searching in order to come up with some creative ideas.

Thankfully the BBC had an online adapted story about Jack and The Beanstalk which she enjoyed watching which led us into a discussion about Real or Make Believe. Tina's fun little online game came to our aid just to refamiliarise her with our discussion


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