Category Archives: numeracy

quick today

at the moment I am trying to seize the moment with the girls, and banish the dark side as it were.

so today we watched some cbeebies together, played imagination stuff, geomagged, read books – SB read 2 red nose readers and an apple tree farm with a bit of help. i then read why the sea is salty, and we discussed beaches and seasides. SHe then spent a while on jump ahead maths while I played allsorts of toddler things with BB.

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when bB slept, Chris set up and experiment for SB, and we watched how cooling gas in a glass makes the water level rise – well I’ll show a picture. We used the DK picturepedia explanation of molecules – really good – to help her understand what was happening, and she enacted molecules in various states!!

science - molecules!

BB and SB have both made plaster of paris foot and handprints [well, C and B's respectively at Kessingland were so good!]

When BB woke up, we did a great deal of sorting out of the hayloft, as someone locally is putting a few boxes of hers in there. If my future becomes less than pleasant, I guess we could rent that space for storage… BB played in the car, and I rescued my box – see previous post!

we played outside a bit, and then listed to little toe whilst eating tea, and discussed real vs totally made up stories.

Rebalancing

Life at work goes from worse to, well, thoroughly awful. It looks like there are going to be redundancies. I am last in…

O today I chilled. After all, if the worst is going to happen, worrying about it for the 6 or so months before I know, will just make them that much harder, and not actually make it any easier then.

SB spent half of the day doing jump ahead maths – its the easy one, and she is desperate to get to the giants birthday, as she gets it to 90 odd candles, and then the computer goes funy and the hard drive replaced etc etc, and she has to start again. So today she got 50 of the 100 candles. [reminds me a lot of me on games such as civ...!] Anyway, well impressed by her ability to stick to a task!

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other than that, we were mostly playing in the garden.

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I did get to play a lot with BB so we read, shape sorted, ran, cuddled, tickles, and whatever else a mummy and an 18 monther could think of! As Chris mentioned, her continuous monologue on the world is rather cute.

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oh, and I think our bees swarmed again. there was a huge buzzing noise, and a veritable ball of bees flying near the chimney, so I tooke the 2 girls in, and got distracted, so I think the main lot must have flown off before I got back out a couple of hours later – so the photos are of perhaps the remainder going back in? there has been a lot of flying activity, and also a fair number of bees dying on the lawn, so i wondered whether it was a swarm or a mating flight??? i just don’t know that much about bees. There’s still a lot of bee milling about going on anyway. They arrived May 9th last year

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what a scorcher!

suntan lotion – tick! hats – tick/cross/tick/cross etc!!

So today was an enjoy it while we’ve got it day! The MODHEU was put up again for some shade, and the girls whizzed and poddled about in the garden, climbing, swinging and sliding. Lots of giggles, laughter and ‘mine’ could be heard!

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Chris did a fair bit more weeding of the main veg bed, so when the temp drops a bit, I am going to go out and plant out squashes and sweetcorn [actually temp OK now, but bath and bedtime, so if I was outside it would cause mayhem!]

We did some home ed type stuff, when not running about aoutside, and some of it was simultaneous. SB made some more circuits with the brainbox primary plus kit – in fact she went and got it out and started without any assistance. It is a real hit. She has done half a hama butterfly and drew a lovely birthday card for my Aunty Margaret – writing and spelling herself on the back [except the aunty margaret bit] so slighty alternative, but no worse than my typing! She also did a wodge of explode the code 3 - this bit is about y’s and vowels at the end. SB was found reading a read nose reader as well – yay.

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Some mental maths today – mostly on number bonds for 10, and some ‘lumping together’ [aka multiplication] of 2 and 3 lots of … under the guise of running a shop, and how many egg boxes did I need etc. She suggested this btw!

Actually, we had a proud daddy moment in the shop when she added 12 and 12 and got 24. It seems to have been the only good moment of the shop as the post office queue was apparently hideous, and SB went into I want mode. [its also the 1 stop shop].

Last weekend, the grauniad had a recipe for paneer – 1 litre full fat milk and 1 lemon juice heated – so today me and SB made some. it is now wrapped in muslin in our jelly bag, and the excess whey dripping out. Cool! SB liked watching the curdling process, and we saw how little curds there were to whey. SB also helped me cook tea.

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We did watch the rest of Sound of Music. I am def depressed, as I tried hard not to cry as I discussed why they were running away. SB actually missed most of the overtones, and really didn’t understand. So I didn’t do that much explanation – war we can do later. She does want to see the sequel film, of them getting to america – i explained there is no film, I just read the book of their life, but to no avail! We’ve listened to little toe – now a daily occurence she is so fond of it. Before tea, as we had 2 exhausted little beans, they have been watching the blue planet – well SB watches, and BB dances to the music [cute]

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BB and I have mostly cuddled and shape sorted, chased, swung and built towers today. I do try and get a bit of as near 1 on 1 as I can – but SB not entirely amenable! [this is usually when she is match and sorting or hama-ing!] However BB is such an independent thing she is quite happy to have short bursts – as long as she can feed whenever she wants, and has prime control of lap time!!

Argh moment of the day was a thrush flying in, and then not flying back out again, ut being frantic by a non-opening window [eside a wide open door!] I psyched myself up to try and catch it in a tea towel, when finally it flew back out again.

Sunny day – AT LAST!

What a lovely day. We got right out into the garden and tried to catch up. so at last a garden blog!

We didn’t do any ‘match and sort’ today, but a fair bit of mental maths and spelling – SB and her teddy were playing at schools with me today outside. She insisted she had hard questions and the bear easy [cos he is 4!] I was weeding and hoeing at the time, and BB poddling about the garden – mostly climbing.

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SB painted her tile she made at the Abbey, nicely with black, yellow gold and silver at her choice, It looks very nice. And it was then lunch time. We listened to little toe and classic FM. SB very taken by house on the prairie and tom’s midnight garden. We had a spin off discussion on landgrabbing from Indians, and how to make a firebreak.

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After lunch we decided to ring a history book – so she chose a picturepedia book about the body! Anyway we went all the way through the book. She is fascinated about the body. It lead onto a discussion on oxygen, and how it was neede to make energy in the body, and how it was needed for things to burn. So we did some really cool oxygen experiments. we lit candles inside jars and watched them go out, and chris remembered a really cool one where you lit a candle floating on water with a jar over the top, and the water gets sucked up. Her Xmas tree crystal is looking good too.

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BB awoke, and so she read me a stack of books. SB went through some red nose readers, and the went into garden for a ‘school break’ while BB and I had some 1 to 1 with the fun blox and some wooden peg teddies. The all back into the garden. BB to run about wildly and giggle, and me to read Ulysses to SB [a firm favourite!] Actually BB and Guinness were doing a fair bit of bonding too.

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We all made the dough for pizzas tonight, and then more fun outside. BB loves the little car we got from Merry, and SB is totally wild on the swings – particularly the trapeze bar, andging from her legs twirling around. My Aunt lost her 2 front teeth that way…

Hmm, what else, well we ate the pizza outside [incorporating home grown asparagus, and in the salad home radishes], with the girls running around the garden thinking it was great fun.

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Sb went to bed listening to 5 children and it – at last she likes the more grown up story CD’s – though Winnie the Pooh still her favourite.

it has been a very relaxing day.

My Little Nanny not had such a good day, as her next door neighbour [since they moved in after the war] and closest friend in hospital to die from her breast cancer. Although late 80′s, their friendship has spanned half a century [more], her husband and Nanny’s brother were prisoners of war in thailand together [building infamous railway, and against all odds both survived] and they’ve seen children and grandchildren grow up. So wishing a peaceful crossing there. She is heavily sedated and not really ‘there’ due to brain mets, but even so, lets hope for diginity and a gentle passing none the less.

Autonomy

they woke up early – far too early! luckilly they then went to sleep fro 2 more hours, so 8 when I got up.

we have had a very full day. the only non-autonomous things were cookie making and watching sound of music – neither were at all resisted!! Trouble is, we did so much today, that there is a real problem in recall!

Anyway, SB has been very keen on learning more about space. So we read a DK picurepaedia book and then started painting a picture of the solar system – we have done the sun, complete with solar flares and some constellations. when it is dry, we will stick on some planets. SB pretty clued up about the solar system, various star types, rockets and astronauts. however a bit unsure about the various unmanned missions, as not sure that remote control would work. [she could have a point, thinking of mars!]

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BB also keen to paint, and did a lovely daub picture – she concentrated very hard, and didn’t make too much mess either! It was great having them painting together.

Back into play mode, adn SB insistent she wanted to play Jojo in numberland – so worked her way with ease through first CD whilst I played with BB.

BB and I read, had more fun with those Ideal blox from Merry, played with teddy and dollies etc. BB jabbers away non-stop. it sounds more like words now – though not my lnaguage yet! She has been rather fascinated by our hama window decoration, and worked out that if she moved a chair from the playroom to the window she could finally reach. She was careful though, and didn’t pull any off.

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A quick lunch and BB fell asleep. I had promised SB we would start to put together her roman villa, so we started taht. I had thought she would get fed up very quickly, but actually we did a fair bit. we read and chatted about the accompanying book about roman life as we went. The house lararium we decided was dedicated to Minerva – goddess of crafts amongst other things. Actually, it highlighted how much SB has picked up about ancient greece from reading around the myths and legends. I failed to find a suitable alternative goddess to Hestia for us, in the books, but now looking it up, it is Vesta, of vestal virgins fame! Hmm, her feast day is coming up. This comparative religions lark!

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when she looked flagging, we moved on to hama a flower for Aunty Margaret’s birthday. [more of Merry's goods!!] We were going to play the piano, but instead SB started excavating out a pretend triops fossil [that tesco's dinosaur tube]. we msut get some replacement triops eggs [unfortunately chris spilled the last lot all over the floor, though they hadn’t hatched - actually does anyone know how long they usually take to hatch, and if we can just use pond water, or need to get a new nutrient bag as well?]

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BB woke up, so some playing upstairs with happy street – and SB joined us when she had lost interest in teh excavating. it was time to offer the baking cookies. Somehow we muddled through – BB loved making them! S’s mixture was ‘interesting’ so I added flour until it felt more reasonable! They were topped with smarties, and the girls ate the spares. [where is Sam when we have cookies?]

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SB went back to jojo, doing the second CD all through – multiplication and division. Although we have done grouping and sharing as mental maths, she’s not seen it written, so I did have to do a bit of helping. However, the easiest level seemed pretty much right for her. i just had to occasisionally remind her of the signs.

More general messing about type playing, imagining allsorts, and arbitrating between BB and SB as the inevitable ‘mine’ war hotted up. Honestly, SB winds up BB on purpose. I think this might been the greenest phase she has been through. We do our best to treat diferent but equally -IYSWIM – and explain what is funny in an 18 monther is not in a 5 [when it is plain naughty] – yep, a difficult concept. I suppose BB is going through a rapid grow and develop phase and their relationship has to adjust too.

Ah well, tea of noodle, veg and seaweed soup, listening to little toe show and then settled down to the first part of sound of music. BB was slow to fall asleep tonight, but SB out like a light. She needed to be as took a long time last night – though she does now enjoy the 5 children and it story CD [partly as the phoenix one has been on little toe]

What we didn’t do was any gardening – wail so far behind!! but the weather was awful – even hail, thunder and lightening. The good thing is though, that there will be frost. And its been so long since we planted anything that I’d have prob planted out all the tender things as well ‘while I’m at it’ hopefully we will get a lot of things in this weekend. today [and working the weekend] has left me fair worn out. Must have a shower, as have paint in my hair.

Drumming

This morning saw us head off to a local HE group meeting (arriving late due to 20 minute wait in traffic jam getting onto A1….) for an African Drumming Workshop which was great fun, and rather noisy Stringbean enjoyed the drumming, BB enjoyed the poddling about, saw Merry and Tammy and relevant children, though didn’t have that much time to chat. I was amused by Sam’s dislike of the drumming – standing there with his hands over his ears – and the desire to go off to the palyground :-)

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The groups singing at the end was good as well. SB also made shaker and helped out cutting up fruit for the fruit salad, though she didn’t like eating it for some reason.

Shaker making Communal Fruit Salad Making
Afterwards we went down to the playground for a bit. There are a couple of older girls, 11yo twins who seem to have taken a shine to SB and vice versa and they have taken her under their wing abit, so she spent some time playing with them. They went into the woods at the back of the playground for bit, building a bridge across a stream and generally getting muddy and wet feet. BB just went paddling in puddles to get wet feet…. I at and chatted with couple of other parents, until we got fed up getting damp as it had started to rain.

Once home later on, not much happened. Both ahd dozed off in the car and were a bit sleepy, so we sat and watched a bit of TV – SB watched a bit of videoed CBeebies followded by variosu schools programs on geography, something about Egypt.Soem sort of potted histroy programme was showing ‘highlights of the 1980′s – had? bit about Live Aid, the Ethiopian famine etc.? so that prompted various questions about that, don’t think she could grasp the idea that the people couldn’t just go somehere there was food, or just buy some more, or possibly even the whole concept of not having food to eat at all may? have ben beyond her, seing as it is totally outside her experince.SB did a bit of Jump Ahead Maths later before and after dinner.

Poor Helen has been very tired (we did both go to bed post 2 am last night for no good reason) and has been asleep since she gave BB her bedtime feed.

Out and about

today we went out with one of our local home ed groups to Denny Abbey. there was stained glass making and tile making put on, and for the older children a bit more history, but SB was having so much fun playing, that the youngest group played making arches and then sundry imaginative run around games! A huge turnout.

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BB was much taken by looking through the coloured plastic to see how the world changed colour, and did this will all the colours she could grab. SB had a lollipop design for her stained glass- rofl. She was quick to answer questions, and enjoyed the tile making too – she concentrates really well on crafts.

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A reproductive lesson too by a rather frisky bull in a field full of cows and calves. Ended on a sour note, as SB ran off with her friend M and hid just as I was putting BB in car. Took me 5 mins to find them. She knows she shouldn’t run off from carparks. grr! So she looked sad all the way home as she had been naughty – by which point I felt sad too!! And I hadn’t done too much of a major telling off either.

Anyway, got home. Chris went to the meeting with the council about the pubs request for musi 4 days a week. he got chatting to the owner, who prob isn’t going to use music so much, and it seems part of the deal is some kind of noise limiter device thingy. So we’ll see.

SB did some maths – difficult bit again, so we cut it short – its adding over a 10. She’s fine at adding and subtracting within the 10, and her understanding of tens and units seems fine, its just that making tens thing. Some playing with cuisinaire rods and pattern making with that and the ideal blocks. We also made a mask – it was SB’s present to me as a sorry for being naughty, she made me a make-a-mask kit and wrapped it up – ahh, all friends again, and a long cuddle! She really can be thoughtful[yep, there is one of me in the mask!]
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We then spent most of the afternoon outside, running around, making up games, and SB and BB playing together beautifully. We lost track of time, so have had chips for tea listening to little toe radio – we are all enjoying the little house on the prairie adaption. We finished the day watching some more of the blue planet DVD series – shores this time. SB has become very taken by natural history DVD’s
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Yesterday, I sneaked away…

… as definately in need of r and r!

came home to find in-laws visiting, and much merriment. i had stopped off at tescos, and they were having a womens clothing sale, so last of the big spenders, I bought shorts for 2.50, top for 1.75, another 2 for 5 each, and then a 20% discount on the lot – v pleased!

And since miserable and no money whatsoever, i then bought a dinosaur testtube kit for Sb and some v cheap walkie talkies.

so we played with the walkie talkies. SB was fairly hopeless at keeping her finger pressed down! no doubt practice will improve things. BB was very jealous – so SB let her play too.

we buillt the glow in the dark dinosaur together. a t-rex, and then she and it squiggled into a cupboard to make sure it did glow in the dark. BB read books to me. She now says ‘mine’ well!
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She and BB then spent a considerable amount of time putting on a show for us – to the fimble radio! lots of dancing and twirling, with Sb dressed in her ballet togs.

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SB did some singapore maths 1B – 10s and units, which she is galloping through, and then Chris’s parents treated us to a curry. thankyou!! it was delicious, I was ravenous, and BB seems to be a real curry girl too. in fact i’m about to have some reheated.

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what else? Oh, SB insisted BB did some match and sort – counting to 10 flap book – rofl! And they both played with the ideal blocks.

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Earlier, SB had done some hama, some explode the code and lots andlots of playdough with BB while Chris did a good tidy up of the main downstairs – for which I was very appreciative [actually i thought his mum had done it - oops]

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Unfortunately the garden and gardening gone to pot. I am trying not to care.

Simple Sunday again

Had a lovely day. My lovely sister got up early and cleaned the kitchen – yay! the children all played nicely together, a bit of dashing outside, but rainy. They watched some more blue planet, and went finally mid afternoon.

SB then did the yoga video 2ce [thanks again Katy], and since SB was still asleep, we played games of set until she had woken up. We don’t play competitively yet, just take turns, but she doesn’t ail to spot one now, and is starting to be fussy about ‘what kind’ of set she wants! She had wanted to do some more electric circuits, but i couldn’t find those, and education city, but we have run out of free trial!

instead she made some more dream avatars, while I got BB up. they played bounce over mujmy and the bed and general rough and tumble for a bit [chris dug up some weeds in the rain, and had a shower to warm up!] . SB read me some say the sounds ladybirds books – she was very impressed, as was I, even though the imp and troll story must be one of the most phenomenally tedious I have ever read!.

BB practiced saying book to me, and brought me a fair few to read whilst SB played with the lego – so we did turn and turn about of lap and book or lego. i read SB some dr seuss. So BB gradually getting the hang of speech. [shoes, mummy, daddy and book are the clearest]

Rather hysterical was the pre and post bath olympics that SB and BB had, running the upstairs circuit again and again [naked as a nod to ancient greece!] while I counted, and SB tried to beat her own time. BB just chuckled madly. At bedtime Sb insisted on an encyclopaedia as bedtime story – so we did various pages of ‘C’ . We are so behind with piccies that I shall do some flickring.

Sorry we couldn’t go to Fran’s party – so happy birthday Fran.

A bit slow

Things seem to have been a bit slow here last couple of days. After her late night on Wed SB had bit of lie in, which did give me and BB time to have a good play together, which probably doesn’t happen often enough. She is really into trying to copy you and say words for things now, which is entertaining. She likes books as well, esp. those that have touchy/feeling bits, – she really likes the ‘That’s not my..’ series. She will often go and get a book from the shelf and come and climb on you lap.

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Not really sure what happened with SB in the morning, she played with the cindy/Barbie and cuddly toys – apparently she likes to tell them a story everyday. We did what a couple of schols programs. There was one comparing two farms in UK and France which she liked – about sheep farming, shearing and making cheese.

There was some reading of library books again, she will often now read bits of books as we go along. She wants to do some stuff about Space. In particular, Rockets, Astronauts and stars so we looked at books about that sort of thing and talked about why the Saturn V rocket was so big, but the bit that the men travelled in was so small. Must organise some thing on this – any good links?

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In the afternoon we walked the scenic route via footpath and old railway line to the veg shop. Walk was pleasant, BB enjoyed toddling along, played Pooh Sticks, looked at some of the flowers and at a Badger set. BB blagged a pear in the veg shop. She went, in made a beeline for the box of pears took one and started munching it. didn’t notice at first (it’s normally unstaffed as it’s at the garden nursey and the staff there come in to serve you) until it was too late. The woman who served us let her have it free.

Home in a hurry (losing BB welly on the way) out to Ballet. Visit to the playground, home for dinner, watched the Coral Sea episode of Blue Planet. SB got to saty up very late as said she could wait up for Helen who was giving her talk, but she didn’t get home until well passed 11pm. She was quite happy and spent ages playing on Webland.

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Friday

So again SB had little bit of lie in. :-)

BB helped me tidy the kictchen a bit, hang up nappies (waste of tiem it was soon to rain later) etc. SB hama beaded over breakfast – though rather upset when she knocked it and dislodged lots of the beds – BTDTGTTS, put away quite a few of childrens clothes upstairs. Went hrough all her T shirts, shorts etc. to check on stocks before th summer. soem reading with SB, SB did some more Explode the Code, almost at the end of the book now. she has fair whizzed through this one. She does the same thing as me and gets ‘b’ and ‘d’ mixed up wehn she writes them. At least she won’t get sent back down to sit in the younger class like I did at primary school – presumably the teacher thought I was doing it deliberately.

After lunch we hit the supermarket – forgetting I was not going to go to the Tesco at the moment as it’s pain while they rebuild the store. hoem to meet Mumy back from work SB did some maths , red Nose readers with Helen.

Both went to bed bit late, for reasons that I’m not sure about.

Cousdin M coming to visit this weekend so time to egt the hoover out.