Three day potty training -yup! It works!

No More Pull ups! Do the Potty Dance! I never thought I would be writing a post about anything related to the bathroom. However I really wanted to share the success we had and thank Crystal from Growing a Jeweled Rose for the clear plan she provided.

Growing a Jeweled rose's 3 day potty plan

This time last week Mini Piwi was wearing pull ups and was showing no signs of giving them up. As I write this she is pretty much potty trained. I say 'pretty much' because as I am still putting them on her overnight –just in case- but so far she has been dry at night too.

I also have to give credit to Big sis who was awesome at reminding Mini Piwi too. She said later she didn’t want a puddle in her room –what ever her motivation it was great to have her help and we are proud of her too!

Our Potty kit!

Now that we are nearly a diaper free household we have taken on another potty training challenge...

Meet our new little furry bundle of joy....

Butter the Basset Hound

 Perry the cat is not very impressed but has decided to tolerate his new housemate because the puppy seems to understand that Perry is still the king of the castle (and Miss K's bed).

Have you got any good tips for Kitty and Dog harmony?

Preschool Butterfly Science Unit

The Piwi''s just can't seem to get enough Butterflies and Insects. It seems our Save the Monarch project has ignited a shared love of (most) things creepy and crawly - Hairy spiders, Scorpions, Worms and Fire ants aren't so popular...

Everyday for nearly two weeks we have been moving our Milkweed seedlings into the sun in the morning and putting them undercover at night. While we are outside the kids have taken to observing the Roly poly bugs and Lizards that are out basking in the spring warmth. Some days they collect some beetles to watch for an hour inside other days they just like to watch them go about there work in the bark chips.

 After reading Eric Carle's Hungry little Caterpillar we used the cutting practice printable to make a poster of the caterpillar/butterfly life cycle (she also added some extras because 'they are 'friends'). We loved this Bug tot pack from 3 Dinosaurs.

The Dollar store had these cute Spring Sun catchers. There are so many great things there at the moment, little gardening aprons, bug study kits, kids garden tools, seeds.....we had to get out of there fast before I had the urge to fill up my basket. I only went in to get art supplies for a parcel we were sending overseas...

 I hadn't been printing out too many worksheets lately because Mini Piwi wasn't enjoying them. I added a couple this week to my folder of 'stuff' and she spotted the cute pictures and asked to do them. I was amazed how much more control she now has over the pen she insisted on using! These sheets are from 3 Dinosaurs and Two Teaching Mommies.

While tidying up the bookshelves the Piwis found books they hadn't read for awhile. Mini Piwi was fascinated by a kids cook book. She actually slept next to it for a few nights and would wake up asking to make something out of it. Her favorite creation was a Yogurt & Berry 'Butterfly' 

My other Dollar store find was a little bug observation set.  Mini Piwi loved finding this in her tray. It included a 'bug catcher', plastic magnifying glass and magnified bug holder. She just used the catcher on the pretend bugs because I was worried she might squash live one with it.

'Plastic Bug catching'

 By the end of the week our 'Sharing board' was full of color!

I captured my favorite moment: Here are two friends sitting by the window..Perry is pretending to be part of a Montessori activity while Mini Piwi is playing the Hungry Little Caterpillar app.

What is the warmer weather inspiring you to do?

Geometry unit for Preschool and Elementary age

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We use Math in Focus as our main curriculum. This does include some hands on activites and extensions but I am always open to adding more! I have been waiting for Miss K's geometry unit so we could do this Shape lap book from Hands of a child.
 

To align it with the Math in Focus lessons we added some extra mini books into it for:
Properties of Trapazoids & Hexagons
Line segments and curves
Area & Perimeter
I printed extra so Mini Piwi could make her own shape poster. Unfortunately i dont have a photo of this because she later took to it with her safety scissor.
She also enjoyed a lot of the Shape printables from 3 Dinosaurs.com

Online resources we used for practice:

Sorting Plane shapes and Solid Shapes
Identify the 3D shape game
Shape Inlay -Tetris crossed with a Tangram type of game
Triangle sort
Shape Lab
Polygon Playground

We also made shape biscuits. I got distracted with spelling and overcooked them a bit but they were still popular.

Including Mini Piwi in the Shape activities:

I had printed extra copies of some of basic shape mini books so Mini Piwi could make her own shape poster. Unfortunately i dont have a photo of this because she later took to it with her safety scissor.

She also enjoyed a lot of the Shape printables from 3 Dinosaurs.com

Online Pre School resources we used:

Umi Zoomi Shape building game @Nick Jr
Shape puzzle
Purpy's shape search
ABC Mouse

She spent a little bit of time making pictures with the plastic shape but wasn't as enthusastic about it as I thought she might be.

Our Fun Math books

This week we read Which is round, Which is bigger by Mineko Mamada.
It was a great way to prompt Mini Piwi to make comparisons between shapes and objects. The cute and funny title is an English translation from the original Japanese book.  Toddlers and preschoolers will enjoy answering questions about objects, the answers at first seem obvious until the next page reveals a twist.

Another point and giggle book with a Math theme we read was 100 Animals on Parade by Masayuki Sebe. We all spent a long time with this book counting animals and spotting all the  objects the author asks you to find. The kids loved the busy illustrations and the I spy concept.

*Disclosure:  I received a free digital copy of these books through Netgalley in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the FTC Regulations.

Preschool Spring Bee and Butterfly Trays for Colors and Counting (Free Printables)

When we made Spring flowers from egg cartons I starting thinking about how else we could use them. Ultimately they ended up inspired 3 math and matching activities...

Butterfly and Flower Color Matching 

 We used this tray for two activities

I told a story about how each butterfly wanted to visit a flower that was the same color they were. Mini Piwi then 'helped the butterflies' by matching each card with their matching flower. Later on in the day I turned the cards and the flowers over and we played memory match with them.

 Buzzy Bee Pollen count and Clip

 This one was extra fun because Mini Piwi and I made the Bee clips together.

We made bee pegs 0-10 so the activity can grow along with Mini Piwi. Right now she is only starting out with recognizing numerals and counting objects so to begin with I only included 4 flowers. I placed the 'pollen grains' into the flowers and together we counted them and choose the correct bee peg to clip to visit the flower. Once she got the hand of the pegs Mini Piwi thought it was great fun!

Would you like to make your own version?

You are welcome to print the bees, pollen and butterflies I made for the above trays....Pre K Bees and Butterflies Match and Clip (free printable)

You will also need 10 flowers in colors to match the butterflies on the printable.
I explained how we made them in DIY Ballerina Hair Garland from Egg Cartons but you could use real flowers, silk flowers, paper flowers, the sky's (and your craft supply's) are the limit. I'd love to see what you come up with!
 If you don't have pegs then you can match the bee number cards to your flower the way we did with the butterflies. I just happen to have some pegs leftover from another project.

We read one of my favorites to go with our bee activity...I think you might recognize it :-)  

By chance I also found a new book at the Library: Butterfly colors and Counting  (by Jerry Pallotta, illustrated by Shennen Bersani).  I think Mini Piwi thought it had been written just for her and her butterflies and flowers!

What are your favorite Bee or Butterfly books?

Sir Cumference Inspired Co-ordinate Mapping Skills Activity

Miss K (7) was a princess fan until last year when she gradually started moving away from all things pink and frilly and became animal crazy instead. Now that she is 'over Princesses' we set out to find something about Knights for this month's theme. Miss K chose:

Sir Cumference and the Viking's map is the latest, in a series of books, by Math Teacher Cindy Neuschwander.  When we first read this title, we hadn't read the earlier ones. This didn't seemed to matter though.

Without giving away any of the other adventures, Sir Cumference is a knight of Camelot, married to Lady Di of Ameter. They have a son named Radius. When the book starts Radius and his Cousin, Per have become lost during a horse ride in the forest. While trying to find their way home they
discover a treasure map created by a legendary Viking Xaxon Yellowbearyd. Can the map guide them home...and to treasure? It won't be easy:  the cousins don't understand how to read the map's strange numbered grids and they have bandits following them!

Miss K liked the adventure story a lot and was surprised to find out that co-ordinate mapping was Math!  This book introduces co-ordinate graphing in a way that Miss K had no trouble understanding. Other titles include topics such as Place value, decimals and area. I appreciate any effort made to make Math understandable and fun and Ms Neuschwander has thought of a topic that can be enjoyed by Girls and Boys. Athough it is a picture book our Librarian assures me that older kids still like the series because they 'get' more of the math puns.

In order to have our own graphing adventure Miss K and I made up a map.

All the locations on the map were Medieval themed.  At this point what Miss K didn't know was that they actually related to something near our home.

Without the kids knowing I set up a treasure hunt for them, leaving co-ordinate clues at each location. The neighbors were polite enough not to ask what I was up to.

On treasure hunt day we set off with the map and first clue. And a scooter. Mini Piwi had to take the scooter.

They found 'rabbit feild' which was actually neighbours' animal scultpures

and the 'creepy Tree'

There was a lot of map consulting

But eventually they found the treasure locked away in the ' Secret Message chest" also known as our Mailbox.  No pictures of the treasure because my hands were busy unwrapping gold chocolate coins!

Mini Piwi chose:

 

Dragons love Tacos, by Adam Rubin, turned out to be a great choice! From the title we know what you should serve at a Dragon part. However a little boy throwing a Dragon party discovers the hard way why you should stick with Mild salsa. The story is as funny as the illustrations.

Mini Piwi decided to make a blue egg carton dragon. She took a lot of care painting it and then we let it dry. The following day I suggest we go back to finish her dragon. Dhe told me that it was finished, it already had a tail. Oops.

We really enjoyed being a part of the Poppins Book Nook this month. Here are all the blogs taking part. Please go visit them to see what they are sharing for about all things Royal.

Enchanted Homeschooling Mom - Royal Baloo - 3 Dinosaurs - Monsters Ed - Chestnut Grove Academy - Growing in God's Grace - Royal Little Lambs - Life with Moore Babies - Teach Beside Me - The Usual Mayhem - Mum Central - Fantastic Fun and Learning - Kathys Cluttered Mind - Play Create Explore - Toddler Approved - Growing Book by Book - Adventures in Mommydom - B-Inspired Mama - The Fairy and The Frog - Edventures with Kids - Learning & Growing the Piwi way - A Gluten Free Journey - Rainy Day Mum - Mom to Crazy Monkeys

Come back next month for:  Wizards!

DIY 'Find it' style game for lil kids

Have you seen the 'Find it' games. It is basically a plastic tube filled with plastic rice and lots of tiny 'treasures' to find. The concept is great for older kids, DD7 spent ages playing with a friend's one. For letter X week I decided to try and make a Pre k version as one of our treasure hunts activities.

A bottle would be perfect but we only had glass ones -a scary option for a toy! We went in a differnet directions an made a find it 'box' from a 2lb berry container. The shape turned out to be great for little hands to hold, tilt and shake.

 

After a scavenger hunt to find little items to include,  I took a picture of the treasures and printed a copy. Mini Piwi could refer to the card to check what else she needed to find.

Mini Piwi used various scoops and cups to fill the plastic container 3/4 full with our well used sensory box beans. We stirred in the 'treasures' and sealed up the box with tape.

 Mini Piwi was pretty happy with her 'treasure chest'. It turned out to be pretty tricky to find everything but we all had fun trying!