Monday, July 18, 2011

Playing With Electricity

I bribed them; told them they would get chocolate covered goji berries if they came up with a better project than just turning on a light or turning the motor. So they did. Here is what they built:

4 year old: The snap circuits pro is easy to make for you and you can make what ever you want BUT you have to make a circuit.

6 year old: Circuit means it has to circulate. That means go in a circle. The circuit has to be complete. It will turn out the way you want, just look for the numbers and letters and follow the instructions.

Friday, July 8, 2011

Capoeira

Getting a solo lesson because nobody else showed up. I look at these pictures and realize what a little boy my little boy still is even though he's grown quite a bit in the last few years.
Blurry but we put it in anyway.

BI says: Capoeira is fun.  Capoeira is a mix of fighting and dancing.  I like to move my body.

I am stretching to get ready for practice.

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Play Math, Feed Brains...

Little boys playing with cars is as natural as summer following spring...just add a tiny twist and they add some math knowledge too...I was quite surprised when I asked  the older boy what 7 plus 3 was and he responded 9...took him a bit to realize it was 10.  More practice.  They get more than math out of it too, they get to refine their motor skills, and of course a place to park their cars...they have more than 5 times this many cars...when we were playing with them we also counted wheels. Which means counting by fours. For you adults, the wheels are the multiplicand and the cars are the multiplier, and we would write it 4 x 6 = 24, multiplicand, multiplier, product.   That is 4 taken 6 times NOT 6 x 4 which is the same product but we didn't have 4 cars with 6 wheels each did we.  The 5 and 6 year olds (and even the 7 thru 12 year olds don't care and you don't need much of a lesson on this at this age. I mention for the confused adults...soon we will tackle why we invert and multiply too, but not today.



The "milk" is made in a vitamix, soon we'll have a vid on that too. It's pretty easy to make, just stick the stuff in and put it on high...nutrient dense food, in liquid form.