Leaf Trouble

I’m never quite sure when the start of autumn actually is. The recent warm weather and my continuing to wear flip flops makes me think it’s still summer. However, today I think I might need a jumper, to consider alternative footwear and put the heating on so it must be the end of summer.  All this weather changing means I can finally start introducing LBM to some of the ideas I’ve got for autumn. I’ve made play dough for him before using a really simple recipe. The recipe also involves no cooking so today was the first time that he stayed the whole way through the process. It also meant we covered so many areas of learning without him realising.

 

First off he “read” the recipe. I might turn this into a picture one so he can really understand the stages as this can be done will little adult involvement and only supervision. He measured 1 cup of flour having loads of fun smoothing the scoop off. Then he measured 1/2 cup salt which he amazingly managed to measure correctly. (luck rather than judgement I think!). Measuring 2 tablespoons of cream of tartar was a bit harder as he likes leveling it off but tends to keep going until only half the spoon is full. Don’t know what that would do to the recipe but it’s probably not that important to be accurate with play dough.

1 tablespoon of oil added and then it was my turn to pour 1 cup of boiling water in. (that’s the only real adult involvement required). It was then kneaded to make dough which felt hot at first and we then divided it into two making one section yellow and one section red. The reason for the title of Leaf Trouble is that it’s a book by Jonathan Emmett which introduces the idea of Autumn. The leaves are all changing colour and falling off the trees and this book tells the story of what happens to deciduous trees and the squirrels that live in the tree. I read it to LBM as an introduction to colour mixing and then used the play dough to show what happens when you mix red and yellow.

We now have lovely orange play dough (which smells of oranges after I added two packets of Kool Aid I bought from ebay) It will last for a couple of months and my plan is to go out on a walk to collect other autumnal nature items and incorporate them into activities with the play dough. We will also be able to make great pumpkins nearer to Halloween.  Not sure if oranges are really autumnal though – a bit more Christmassy perhaps but as that’s only about 10 weeks away maybe I can use it then too.

 

Children’s Artwork Gallery

For a long time I’ve struggled to work out what to do with the artwork that LBM and now BBL produces. I tend to do large painting activities with my children because an A4 piece of paper depresses me with it’s limitations. We do still use it though because it fits things like laminators, files and picture frames. Up until now artwork has been stuck onto the wall by the front door or in the kitchen somewhere brightening the place up and sometimes even dripping down the wall and onto the floor. I’m considering using the children to repaint when we move seeing as they’ve done so much already…

But finally I had an idea on what to do with it. There’s some wallpaper I’ve had my eye on for a while called Frames by Taylor and Wood which I always thought would be good for arty things for kids. I got mine from ebay for about £12 a roll. I cut up some of the larger pieces of artwork  and stuck them in the frames http://www.grahambrown.com/uk/product/52050/Frames and then cut out letters I found on this blog http://theviolethours.typepad.com/blog/2010/04/time-for-alphabet-cups.html to write the quote by Pablo Picasso that everyone seems to be using for children’s artwork. I’d also treated myself to a Melissa and Doug frames sketchpad and cut out the frame shapes to stick over other pictures. I’m really pleased with the wall now – pictures look so much better framed. There are some which are still too big for the available frames so I may have to cobble my own larger paper ones together in the future but for now the display is much more attractive and visitors can’t help but notice and comment as it’s by the front door.

There’s still more wall space to fill and I have another plan for recording other artwork that’s being generated. Hopefully my children feel that their artwork is valued and important. I always find it sad when I visit other family homes and you can’t see any of the children’s pictures. As it’s such a great way for them to express themselves not displaying it is like telling a child to shut up and go away when they’re telling you something important. I know that crusty brown blobs aren’t always that aesthetically pleasing so picking the best bits and cutting them up helps. Just make sure it’s OK for the picture to be cut up first though. You don’t want to find you’ve just cut yourself out of a picture and thrown yourself in the bin!