Sanity in the car - backseat games

Mom, he is kicking me. 

He is being mean to me. No I am not.

He is being a baby….

I don’t want that song. I want to listen to the one that we just heard again….

Why does he always get his way? It’s not fair!

Ah, the joys of backseat bickering. Not that sibling bickering is limited to the car by any means, but in a car, there are no avenues for escape!! Anyways, deep breaths. In and out.

I am sure parents with preschoolers (or older kids) have this scenario playing in their head even while they sleep lol! 

So how DO you keep your sanity in car rides? 

On very long drives, I might succumb to electronic gadgets, but otherwise, I try not to...

When I pick up the kiddos from school, we talk about all the fun (not so fun stuff) at school. What was their best moment, worst moment, what new things did they learn that day etc etc. Or if I have some special expectations that day from them or vice versa. Negotiations for privileges usually not granted also takes place during that time.

Of course, it does not last the entire ride. 

Being a working mom, I try to engage them in fun ways and sneak in some learning and teaching; reinforcing concepts never hurt!

Counting games generally causes more ruckus than not. If I say count all the white cars, one always misses something, and other takes great delight in pointing that out. Not very peaceful. If I have only one child in the backseat, then we do counting games with school buses, concrete mixers, and other fun manly stuff. 

So I get my math fix other ways. 

• For 5.5 year old Batman: 5 ways to make 5. All odd numbers till 30. Or even numbers. Skip count by 5s. You get the gist.
  Read the speed limits. What happens if you add 10, or take away 5.

• For 3.5 year old Spiderman – it is simple word problems. If you have 3 candy, and you eat them all, how many is left? Of course, this only works if they don’t demand candy later, lol! Start with birds maybe, if there are 2 birds sitting in a tree, and one more joins them, or one flies away, yada yada…
  What shape is the Stop sign? How many sides does it have? Can you look for a triangle sign? How about a diamond?

 Other fun ideas:

• Try to read all the road signs. 
• Or identify the makes of cars. Batman is getting better at it than me. Almost. Or play a game by trying to come up with makes and models of cars from A to Z. 
• Or try to pick up hybrids or electric vehicles.
• Too difficult? Or maybe the kiddo is not into cars. Well, let’s go with stuff that we can find while on the road - A to Z. It is hilarious the way they try to justify some of their answers. Like refrigerator. How would you see one on the road? Well, if it was being transferred in a pickup truck, you could totally see it. How about ants? Well, just  because we can’t see them when we are in the car driving does not mean it is not there…
• Or 10 manmade stuff they see around them, and 10 from nature….
• Same trend, living and non-living.
• 5 things/vehicles that go in land, air and water.
• Identify the plants and trees around you.
• Ask them to look for big landmarks on the way. And get them to draw a map with those landmarks later.
• Names of animals. Start from A.  Go. Spiderman made it to J in 6 minutes or so, with lots of hint for I from big brother. Ant, Bee, Crocodile, Dog, Elephant, Fish, Gorilla, Horse, Inchworm (he got lots of clues and hints) and Jelly Fish.  We reached our destination by then. Added benefit – one engaged child, and one very empowered big brother who helped his little brother succeed!
• One day, my two would not stop with potty humor. They are boys, what can you say? So we decided to make it more challenging my coming up (or trying to come up) with gross stuff/bodily functions from A to Z. Needless to say, we did not succeed, because Batman and Spiderman just could not stop laughing after every new word that came up with every 5-6 minutes or so in between their cackles and chortles and snorts….

My favorite game: Place a bubble in your mouth. Be absolutely quiet, so the bubble does not pop. Whoever keeps quiet longest, wins!!

Here’s to peace and quiet in the car.

What are your brain waves for sanity in the car? And no, ditching the kids don’t count.

Monstrous Fun with Hard and Soft C Card Game

I love all the Pixar/Disney Animation movies, perhaps a tad bit more than my kids :)
 
Have you seen Monsters University yet? I am still trying to convince Spiderman that it is NOT going to be scary and super-fun. And of course, there will be popcorn. It is slow going so far.

In the meantime, to pacify Batman (who is starting to get the hang of Uno, and wants to play card games), I thought it might be fun to make a monster themed card game with some learning!

Hence our Soft and Hard 'C' Card Game. The monsters need some help with their C sounds at school. Think you can help them out? Well then, get ready for some "Monstrous Fun at  School"!!

 This is a a freebie. So just head on over to my TpT store and grab it. Just print on card-stock, laminate, cut, and you are all set.  

 

There are 18 cards with hard 'c' sound...

  
18 cards with the soft 'c' sound...

6 cards with both soft and hard 'c' sounds...

12 gotcha cards that make you lose a turn or draw again...

 and 12 empty cards.

And if your little monsters are not quite ready to read yet, no worries. The cards all have the pictures in them. So pre-readers and emergent readers are good to go. Everyone can join in the fun.

Long and Short Of It - Vowel Sorting Cards

Spiderman has mastered the short vowel sounds. He consistently identifies the beginning sound, is nearly perfect at the ending sounds, and is getting quite good at the middle sounds...

I thought it might be fun to introduce him to the long vowel sounds, although it is a lot to remember for a 3.5 year old!  I explained to him the concept of long and short vowel sounds. Then we decided to sort the cards by their sounds. Control cards made the column headers. If the vowel says its name, it goes in the column for the long sound. I was quite amazed that he took to the concept so quickly.

 My most rewarding moment was Batman trying to teach Spiderman the concept of Bossy E. How the Bossy E makes the vowels say their name. It was hilarious, and quite rewarding...

                
For Batman (5.5), sorting the cards according to their vowel sound, long or short, was not much of a challenge. He wanted to make his own cards. So this set has empty cards for those who are up to the challenge. Batman was  quite happily occupied drawing, coloring, and then figuring out the spelling of the words.

With 110 cards and 20 blank cards, it is sure to keep the kiddos engaged!  There are 22 cards for each vowel, with 11 each for the short and the long vowel sounds, along with one card for each vowel sound. The cards have the vowels on them in the bottom left hand corner for easy sorting.

But the fun does not end there. There are over 20 cards with CVC words, great for beginning readers. There are some blend words, and plenty of bossy e/magic e words as well. It was a great exercise for Batman, trying to read the labels. 

The set is great for pre-readers, because although the labels are there, you don't need to read them. Just say the word out loud, decide what vowel sound you hear, and sort!!

Check out the cards here.




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Count, Rhyme, Repeat with Free e-books

Or rhyme, count, read, repeat!!

One of Spider-man's current favorite is "Ten Little Ladybugs".

And recently, he has been reading "Ten Rubber Duckies" a lot as well!

They are really are a lot of fun, with tactile critters, magical countdowns, and rhymes all thrown into the learning mix...

Batman, inspired by the books, decided to come up with his own. Of course, he chose to do count-ups, and skip count.
This is all his effort, I only added the clip arts! Amazing how a good book can inspire us :) And what a great way to get ready for KG over the summer. Some of his rhymes are here as images. He started from 1, skip counted by 2, and stopped at 11. Simple. For this one, he decided to rhyme with the number. Start with 1, add 2, you get 3. So what rhymes with 3 that makes sense in the context of monkeys, forest etc, and off he went...

With its predictable ending, and repetitions, this makes a great simple reader.

Feel free to download the book here - Skip Count Up and Rhyme with Monkeys . 

Come up with your own rhymes and combinations. Count up, down, or skip count.
Spiderman soon joined us, and in collaboration, we came up with three more books, which were a hoot. All three are available  for free download as well - just click on the images.

Batman wants to share these with all his friends. I would appreciate if you 'like' us on FB, or follow our tweets, or subscribe to more of our fun ideas, or do them all - so the sharing circle is complete!

Take a peek at our other combinations...


Count up with spotted cows..

Count down with buzzing bees...

Skip count down with little fishies...

 

I would love to see if you have done something similar. Please leave me a comment. Have fun with rhymes!

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Things That Go Together Printables

Spiderman loves our collection of miniatures. See this post for his comments and observations about pre-reading fun with matching objects.

I decided to mix it up a bit, and created some "mostly" new cards for more matching fun...

This is a great problem solving and matching game. It encourages your pint sized learners to develop critical sorting, categorization, thinking skills, all the while extending their vocabulary. 
And all this when they are having fun!

I made  26 pairs of cards on a boatload of topics. So it is guaranteed to keep them engaged. 
This set is Batman's and Spiderman's fave.

 This next set gave them both a moment of pause! I could hear the gears turning :)

 The set is free, and available for download at my TpT store here.A big shout out to the wonderful graphics at My Cute Graphics! I adore them. They are cute and free!

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Pink and Pirates at TpT Store

No, it's not about pink pirates this time!

But I did put some fun stuff on the TpT store, and I hope you will find it useful and have some fun with it!

I started with the Montessori Pink Series for Language Arts (start at the beginning, right?).

One is free preview of the series with a little bit of everything....

....and the other one is  focused specifically on the Pink Series Rhyming Fun, with 30 cards, 4 worksheets, and rhyming chutes and ladders game with just words from the pink series...
My two super-heroes love this twist on the fun classics game.

If anyone is just starting with the Pink Series, and would like to see something specific, I am open to suggestions! Another file with just the Pink Series Cards will be up shortly, followed my more worksheets.
The ambitious idea is add more on the Pink, followed by Blue and Green, but I get ahead of myself, lol :)

I also added some ten frames, pirate style, from 1, all the way up to 20...

It has a fun ten frames game - along with the ten frame you get, you need to pick the corresponding treasure chest with the right number on it, so you can get to 10. In this case, a pirate picked up a 9, and needs the chest with 1 on it!

 

The file also has addition cards to reinforce the learning with the ten frames, and tons of cliparts for the pirates to fill up their frames with. It also provides some excellent fine motor skill if they cut the pix themselves!! 

That's all for now, although I am working on adding more fun stuff.

So if you have are interested, head on over to the TpT store, and give me some feedback please! 

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Laundry Lessons

Not to air our dirty laundry, but what can we possibly learn from this? 

A lot of moments can be teachable moments, but even knowing that, I was a bit taken aback at just how many things we did learn (yes, I learned a few as well) while doing something as simple as laundry!

First we sorted the kid's clothes, but of course, the lesson starts before that. The kids are required to put their clothes in the hamper. If they don't, their clothes don't get washed, and soon, we don't have our favorite angry birds t-shirts for school! But I digress.

• We sorted the clothes into mostly white (& cotton), mostly cotton that need a bit more vigorous washing, and mostly not (the ones that require gentle washing)! We fastened buttons, snaps, zippers etc, and turned clothes with prints on them inside out. Lots of fine motor fun.
• We also sorted the clothes to make sure that we had a whole set, like both socks in a pair, tops and bottoms of pajamas etc.
• The sorting into 3 piles prompted a discussion about the different settings on the washer, hot water cleaning more dirt, but also being tough on the clothes etc. And of course, energy. Hot water needs more energy, as the water needs to be heated up. Batman looked at the whites, which were not very dirty, and at all the settings, and decided on the warm/cold cycle as a compromise between cleanliness and energy efficiency! Perfect choice!
  

  
• When the time showed up, Batman asked me - is that time in minutes or seconds? Well, that got us talking about minutes and seconds, and what might happen if I add an "extra rinse" setting, or do a heavy soil vs. light soil etc. We made predictions about more time or less time, rather than the number of minutes!
• And then, the most fun part of laundry started. One kid (or mom) picks the clothes from sorted pile, and throws them after balling it up, and the second one, standing in front of the washer, catches it and places it in the washer!! Some gross motor fun...
  

  
• We also do some estimates about how many clothes might fit into the washer, and talk about not overfilling it....

So let's see, a simple thing like laundry, and we learned about responsibility, sharing, science behind dirt and soap, energy efficiency, math fun with sorting, prediction and time, fine and gross motor fun...

Of course, I don't do this every time I do laundry, but often enough, and mostly with the kid's laundry, to motivate them, and to have some fun!

I bet us parents do it all the time, we just don't write elaborate posts about our teachable moments!! But sometimes, we just need to make conscious decisions to go with the flow, and forget about toys, or gadgets, or printables, or books, and just teach as life happens!

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