Thanks for the support and feedback on my first blog of activities for 2-3 years old. Many great suggestions and ideas. Some asked how I have the time to do all these. Well, I got a lot of help. My in-laws looked after Megan, my helper looked after the house, Ken and me looked after learning and playing. NOW for more ideas.
Stamping
If painting is too tedious, try stamping instead. Luckily for Megan, we bought boxes of stamps from Spain. Now is the time to unleash their power!
If you do not have ready made stamps then go creative with a spoilt potato or the extra cucumber. I don't think they really care about the shapes you carved out, they are just keen on the process.
And, forget about those ultra expensive stamp pads. Just use the same poster color set!
Spelling and Word Recognition
Tried this new game last week and boy it worked. Megan can now spell CAR, CAT and COW. Introduce simple words that consist mostly of alphabets your child already recognised. For Megan, words like BOY and CAR are a great place to start since A,B,C and O are easy so Megan just needs to learn R and Y.
For BOY, I drew a boy and wrote B-O-Y below the image and stuck the card to the wall. Then on individual wooden pegs, I wrote out the alphabets. For the game, Megan had to search through a row of pegs to find the exact three alphabets to match those on the image. She will then re-peg them accordingly onto the card. Its like... hmmm... learning simple words through matching.
However never make the same mistake as me. I wrote "Y" differently on the peg and the card (see above). Such minor differences is very confusing for the kid. Just keep things consistent.
The Toilet Roll Fish
Very excited to introduce the glue stick to Megan. Time for craft work using the trusty toilet roll. This is one of those activities that evolves over time and Megan really got addicted to the toilet roll. "I want to make fish, I want to make fish", she will pester me every weekend. But only the first session (see above) looked anything like a fish. I guess the moment I stop monitoring and helping her, she starts creating from her own imagination, which was great.
For this activity, I gave Megan a tray that has a pack of motif printed paper (S$2), a pack of color paper ($2), two glue sticks (S$1.40), a pair of scissors ($5), a flower puncher(S$2) and a star puncher(S$2). The tray is useful because it keeps all the shreds of paper and punch outs in place. While the supply of toilet rolls never ends, my pack of three glue sticks went dry in less than a month. So just buy a lot of spares. And be warned, this is a messy affair.
These are two spin-offs from Megan's masterpieces. My only involvement was to cut the orange and green shreds and a moon on the paper she supplied and TADA, she finished with both for me to pin up on her board. Great job!
Beading
After attending Megan's nursery orientation recently, the activity of bead treading stuck with me. It is an activity that helps develop kid's hand eye coordination, I went straight home and offered my secret stash of beads to Megan. According to the teachers, hand and eye coordination is important for handwriting development.
"Mummy mummy, I do it" came after I tread the third bead. Megan took over the needle and my job was reduced to tying the knots after she is done. If I try to help, she will nag "Be careful mummy. The needle is SHARP and the hole is SMALL". She has since exhausted all my supply and asked me to buy more.
Writing
Too serious for a two years old you say? Yah... but surprisingly Megan enjoyed it. It reminded me of my SNGS days when I had to learn Higher Chinese. All the adults found it cruel and too difficult for me but I did not recall suffering. I had no basis of comparison between Chinese and Higher Chinese so I just did it and got through. It helped that mimi did not expect good grades (or maybe she did!?).
The writing book that Mimi bought for Megan looked like a boring workbook but Megan kept going back to ask us to write with her. Maybe she loved the novelty, maybe she loved the erasable ink. But how fun or serious you want this activity to be really depends on your attitude because the child will take it as it comes. It did not matter to us if she was tracing triangles or 123, it was merely an activity for her to pass her time. But in this case, she happened to learn writing 123 as well.
Five Stones
Five stones is all about concentration and precision. I love five stones and used to get real competitive with this game. But we are not playing five stones in this way for a 3 year old. Mimi brought giant five stones in a basket to my place one day. This is how we play it.
Game One:
Two teams compete to see who can throw more of their colored stones into the basket. This is really a stupid game for adults but it is not that simple for a kid. It requires concentration and focus!! Another hand eye coordination game.
Game Two:
Create an obstacle course along your vestibule. Place stones at intervals to create an S course for them to run. Penalty points if they touch any stones. Make them jump over two stones at a time. Pick up objects as they go. Whatever... you get my drift.
Festivals
Festivals are great because they give me something specific to do outdoors. If not for festivals, we will be doing playground times infinity. Megan loves the Lantern Festival. I used to love it too as a kid... Burn all the lanterns. Burn them all!!!!
Sadly, in the name of safety, kids these days play with battery operated lanterns. Despised them but regretfully, Megan also has such. Will do the traditional way next year! Oh but special mention on the Hello Kiddy lantern Nicholas bought for Megan. THAT is cute and all the mothers in the park were exclaiming with jealously.
Sigh, sometimes I feel Megan is growing up way too fast... We need to play more!
