Something to Do Inside On a Hot Day

I taught kindergarten for three years, and a big part of math and science at that level is "sorting and classifying." It's just a fancy term for separating a group of objects into likenesses and differences - like sorting stuffed animals into dogs, bears, cats, etc. We had a tub of what's called "pattern blocks," colored wooden or plastic triangles, rectangles, squares, etc., and the kids would sort them by color, or by shape, or by three sides, four sides, and six sides. Children in the early childhood years love sorting and classifying.

You can create opportunities for your kids to practice this at home quite easily. Tons of stuff around your house can be sorted. Stuffed animals, as I mentioned. How about a box of pasta that's lots of different shapes mixed together? Or you can save bread wrapper tags - those plastic things that hold the wrapper closed - till you have a good collection. They can be sorted by color, shape of the hole, types of corners. Got a junk drawer? (Who doesn't?) How about all those pens and pencils? They can be sorted into pens and pencils, including mechanical pencils, or ones that write and those that don't, or by color of ink, erasers that work and don't. (Got an idea of what my junk drawer looks like?) I also have a pile of rubber bands that I've collected from the mail and the produce department at the grocery store. There are lots of ways to sort them - size, color, width. Sometimes at the craft store, you can buy a bag of buttons. Those are really fun to sort - by number of holes, color, size, smooth or textured, round or not.

Got the idea? Give it a try! I promise once your kids catch on, they'll love it!

Wanna Be A Scientist? Stick This in Your Mouth.

Sometimes people wonder why babies always put things in their mouths. That's actually the best way for them to learn about the world around them. Your tongue and lips are the most sensitive parts of your body, far more so than your fingers. Try an experiment. Take an everyday object, maybe a pencil, and feel it very carefully with your fingers. Now feel it with your mouth (don't worry, it won't make you sick). Your lips and tongue can feel where the wood and lead meet, the ridges on the metal band next to the eraser, the difference in texture between the raw wood, painted wood and rubber tip. You can smell it and taste it too, even taste the different parts of the pencil. Look how much more information your senses got! Think how much more a baby learns about his environment when they feel, smell, and taste their world this way! All those distinctions are the building blocks of scientific thinking. So as long as it's safe, don't discourage your baby from exploring his environment instinctively.

And tell me, did you try the pencil experiment?