My children have developed a love for buttons. They love to sort through them and look at all the different shapes, sizes and colours. Sometimes they stow a few away - for safe keeping I'm sure. They place them in pockets and tell me they are treasure! It's a wonder they can find such excitement in playing with such a simple object! First we tried a sorting activity. I placed a dish with compartments on a tray and placed a bowl of buttons next to it. I purchased this mixed bag of buttons from Hobby craft for just £1 and the kids have had so much fun with the buttons. This activity was set up for R, who is 2.5 years old, as it's more for his age group, but D came over to look at the buttons too. It is a great activity for toddlers and preschoolers but remember to watch them carefully if they are still at the stage of putting everything in their mouth.
Sorting is a good way of developing early maths skills. It will encourage a child to think about the different properties of objects and learn to distinguish between objects that are the same or different. It can teach children to separate things into different groups by size, colour, shape etc. Next, I got D involved and asked the children to count the buttons in each group. We spoke about the groups; which group is biggest, which group is smallest, are any of the groups the same size? Then the groups were sorted in order from biggest to smallest. You could even do this with a group of buttons, as we did, if you have a mixed bag like these. Ask your child to take all the blue buttons for example and line them up in order from biggest to smallest. We spoke about the holes in the buttons. How many holes does each one have - one, two, three or four? Who would have thought there would be so many possibilities with just a simple bag of buttons?!
The next sense we learnt about in our discovery of the senses was the sense of hearing. This was such a great sense to explore. We were able to do a lot of fun activities about this topic. First we read the book 'Hear this!'. It is the next book in our senses series and had a lot of good activity ideas in it. We learnt about how we hear and about how sound waves travel through the air from the object making the sound to your ear where the sound is heard. D was fascinated by this and has been going around telling people about the sound waves in the air.
This is the book we read. After this I asked the children to close their eyes and see if they could work out where I was when I walked around the room. I walked, then stopped and asked if they could point to me by listening to where the sound of my voice was coming from. They thought this activity was great fun and after they had had a few attempts at listening D said it was my turn to listen! So I sat down and tried to work out where she was from listening to the direction her voice was coming from.
We spoke about which sounds we can hear outside.
And which sounds we can hear inside.
We spoke about different pitches of sound, how some sound high pitched and some sound low pitched. I set up this activity for the children to explore pitch. Simply fill some glasses with different amounts of water, get a metal spoon, hit the glasses and listen to the sounds. I asked the children to listen to the sounds carefully and tell me which sounded high and which sounded low.
They really enjoyed this homemade musical instrument!
We talked about different volumes and D told me things that sound loud and things that sound quiet. She started to write the words down herself but quickly got bored of writing so I finished the writing for her.
Next, we moved onto vibrations and learnt how sound waves vibrate to produce sound. I followed the guidelines in the book to set up this activity. Take a bowl and place some clingfilm very tightly over the top. Then scatter some rice on top of the clingfilm. Use the wooden spoon to bang the sandwich tin close to the bowl but not touching it. You should be able to see the rice jump around due to the vibrations.
We started off with quite a lot of rice on top but discovered it didn't work too well. So, we took some off and it worked much better. Wowever, it still was not moving too much so I decided to try something else; salt.
The salt is much lighter so jumped about much more easily. The children loved watching this. They loved to make the salt 'dance'!
Afterwards we spoke about the sound waves and how they vibrate. We filled in this worksheet.
The final activity we did was perhaps the favourite. I got some musical instruments and placed them on the floor. Next, I covered the instruments with a blanket. I played one instrument at a time and , after playing, I took the blanket away and asked the children which instrument I had just played. This is a really great activity to get your child practising their listening skills. It also involves sound discrimination which is a vital skill for speech development. You need to be able to distinguish between sounds in order to be able to produce them correctly as well as being able to distinguish between different words that you hear. Check out these posts to see how we learnt about the sense of touch,taste, smell and sight.
Everyone loves Frozen, right? It's the best selling Disney film of all time. I tried to put it off but in the end our home also got Frozen fever. I have to say I was pleasantly surprised when I watched the film; I really enjoyed it. The songs are fabulous and I don't mind the kids singing them round the house, in fact I am contemplating getting the movie soundtrack. I love it! With their love of Frozen in mind, I decided to create some Frozen themed bicarbonate of soda (baking soda in the US) dough for the children to explore. I saw it first on pinterest and you can see the original link here. Although we have tried lots of different play doughs and sensory doughs before, we had never tried this one so it was a new experience for us all. It is very simple to make, simply mix a little bit of water into the bicarbonate of soda along with the colours of your choice, We used liquid watercolours for this. You have to be careful not to add too much water or the bicarbonate of soda will start to dissolve!
I left some of it white and made some purple and some blue. Then the kids got stuck in.
They immediately started to mix the purple and white together. Things never stay separate for long!
They used egg cups and bowls to create blue sandcastles.
D even made a cake with star-shaped sequins as sprinkles! I have saved the leftover dough to use for some more sensory play soon.
Over the past few weeks we have been exploring the senses; sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. We have had a lot of fun learning about them and doing activities to investigate each one. We have not covered all the sense yet. Here I will be sharing our work on eyes and seeing.
First, I introduced the whole topic of the senses by asking the children to draw faces on paper plates which we labeled with the different senses.
Here is D's face.
Here is R;s face. He insisted on me drawing spider man's face for him! He has a bit of an obsession with spider man at the moment.
Next, I explained to the children that some people cannot see, they are blind. We talked about how it might feel to be blind and how blind people use braille to read. The children were blindfolded so that they could experience being blind. They found it fun to walk around the room trying not to bump into things. It made them realise how hard it would be if they couldn't see.
D wanders off trying to find her way around without being able to see anything.
I gave the children pictures of the eye to colour in and explained what the different parts of the eye were called.
Then, we spoke about how the pupils get bigger or smaller depending on the amount of light in the environment. We experimented with this by looking at our eyes in bright light and dim light. They found this fascinating.
I showed them some tricks of the eye, explaining how our brain can trick us into thinking we can see things that aren't really there. I have a series of books about the senses, some of which I picked up at school fairs, that are really good at explaining the senses to young children. They have a lot of activities in them to explore the senses and also lots of simple information. The children are enjoying listening to them. Here is the one about sight: Finally, D asked me what some animals eyes look like. I wasn't expecting this but it's amazing what questions children can come out with! She wanted to know about butterfly eyes and snail eyes in particular so I found some information for her on the internet and printed off some pictures for her to look at. I didn't know much about animals eyes. It's amazing what we can learn alongside our children. Check out these posts to find out how we learnt about the sense of touch, hearing, taste and smell.
Parents often worry about their children reaching their milestones. We worry during pregnancy that the pregnancy will go to full term and the baby will be born healthy. Then we worry if the baby is feeding enough, sleeping through the night or crying too much. Then we wonder if they will sit up at the "correct" time, walk at the "correct" time or talk at the "correct" time. Being a parent is a constant worry. So is there a right time for your child to be meeting these milestones? I will be focusing on the topic of talking for this post.
There may be a number of reasons why your child is not talking yet. There are quite a number of children who have straightforward language delay, and although they begin talking later than most, most of them catch up with their peers in the end, they may just need a bit of extra help or they may work it out on their own. There are other children who have autism, and depending on where they are on the spectrum, they may start speaking slightly later than average or they may be unable to produce much speech at all. They may have an underlying health condition which may cause delayed speech or mean that they are unable to speak, but I won't go into that here. I will be focusing on typical delayed speech, if it can be called typical.
So why does a child have delayed speech? Well, some children just start to speak later than others, just as some children start to walk later. The first thing I would check is your child's hearing. If they have a hearing impairment this may be the reason they are talking late. If they can't hear it they are not going to learn to understand language or produce sounds and words. Hearing impairment is usually picked up quickly as all babies are screened for it soon after birth. These children may go on to get hearing aids or cochlear implants. However, there are lots of children who have normal hearing at birth but then develop glue ear at some point during the first few years of life and this can affect there hearing and, therefore, their language development. Glue ear is quite common in young children. It is caused by the build up of fluid in the ear normally after a child has had a cold. The fluid often goes away on its own, but sometimes it does not and this can cause difficulties with hearing. You may suspect your child has glue ear if you notice they do not respond when you call them or you may be repeating things to them quite often. Also, they may complain of noises being too quiet or too loud. You may not expect complaining of loud noises to be a sign of glue ear but it can be. If you suspect that your child has glue ear then you can take them for a hearing test. There are guidelines as to the typical ages for speech and language development. When a baby is born it is unable to produce many sounds. During the first 3 months you can expect your baby to make some cooing sounds which are produced at the back of the throat and often accompanied by a vowel sound. They will use crying to communicate their needs. They will begin to smile at around 4-6 weeks old and soon after, they may begin to laugh. From 3-6 months babies cries start to sound different when they are trying to communicate their different needs. They start to turn their head towards voices and begin to recognise their own name. They may begin to imitate facial expressions that they see. They start babbling which involves consonant and vowel sound combinations. They may appear to be trying to interact with adults. At 6-9 months they can start to use gestures and exchange gestures with adults. This is why baby signing has become popular; babies are able to produce signs using their hands far before they are able to communicate via talking. They may begin to imitate repetitive sounds that they hear. Babbling becomes variegated, meaning they are starting to produce different combinations of sounds together and not just repetitive ones. They may begin to show understanding of simple commands such as 'come here' and may wave in response to a 'goodbye'. At 9-12 months a baby may begin to say his first word but it is also normal for them to produce their first word after 12 months. The first words produced at this stage tend to be 'mama' or 'dada' which are easy, as well as important, words for them to produce. They may say one or two words spontaneously. They start to imitate more consonant and vowel combinations. They may also imitate the name of familiar objects. They begin to use jargon, speech-like utterances which sounds like they are talking without using meaningful words. When producing jargon they may sound like they are trying to have a proper conversation! At around 12 months is when we expect to see the emergence of the first word. From 12-15 months they may be able to produce a few words. They may shake their head to communicate 'no'. They may imitate animal sounds and also other children. They start to use real words within their jargon. They also begin to take turns during play or conversations. Between 15-18 months you will begin to notice that they are producing a few more words. They may try talking more often than using gestures. They may begin to ask 'what's that?'. They also start to ask for 'more'. From 18-21 months they begin to understand more commands and action words. They may begin to identify pictures when you name them. They begin to imitate household chores and start to lead adults to an object that they desire. They may even imitate 2-3 words that they hear and engage in 'adult-like' dialogue. At 21-24 months is when you can really expect your toddler to understand a lot more and be able to follow simple 2-step commands. They begin to refer to them self by name and may begin to start putting 2 words together as well as regularly saying new words. By the age of 24 months, children can have a vocabulary of between 50-200 words! As you can see, there is a huge variation there, all children are different. After 24 months months is when you can really start to see a language explosion! Toddlers are saying 2 word phrases and are beginning to produce 3 word phrases. They start to use action words. During the second year they learn to put more words together and talk to other children. They answer to yes/no questions correctly and start to use plurals and prepositions (on, in, under etc.). By the age of 3 years old you can expect your child to be talking in sentences, counting to three and following 3-step commands. So after covering that, what are the other reasons your child may not be talking yet? Well, I have seen children in the past who did not talk simply because they didn't get a chance to! They may have a few older siblings who answer for them or the parents may jump in before giving them a chance to respond. Always give your child a chance to respond, they may just need a little more thinking time. I have often heard parents of bilingual children worry that a second language is confusing their child and are concerned that it is contributing to their child's speech delay. "Little Tommy across the road hears 3 languages spoken at home, that's why he can't talk and he's almost 3 and a half!" So does multilingualism contribute to speech delay? Well, according to research there may be a slight delay for bilingual children but this will only be a delay of 2-3 MONTHS not years. So, instead of a child saying their first word at 12 months, they may say it instead at 14-15 months. Hardly a delay! Afterall, there are a lot of monolingual children who do not produce their first word until 14-15 months or even slightly later. So really, bilingualism is nothing to worry about. You can find some information on nurturing multilingualism here. However, do not confuse this with a child who has just began to hear a second language due to moving abroad or starting at school and having to learn to communicate in a language which is different from their home language. These children will not begin to learn the language right away, although they will pick it up very quickly, in most cases, if they are young. You may notice that the new child in school will not talk much at all because they are going through the 'silent' period. This is a period where they are adjusting to the new language and taking it in before they begin to produce it. It is important not to confuse this with language delay.
It is important to remember that the guidelines are just that - guidelines. There may be children who say their first words slightly earlier or slightly later and that is fine - it's normal. There's nothing to worry about. However, if your child is 3 years old and only saying a few words there may be more reason for you to be concerned. If you are at all concerned just talk to your child's health visitor or GP who may be able to refer them to see a Speech and Language Therapist. There are some tips and techniques you can try to help your child's language development and I will be covering these in another post soon.
We do not really celebrate Valentine's day as we believe you should make your loved ones feel special everyday not just on one special day of the year. However, I know it's easier said than done with the busy lives we lead. The children do not actually know about Valentine's day but were inspired by D's leaving card which she received when she left Farm Adventurers last week. It was a handmade card with paper hearts stuck onto the front and can be seen in this post. She said she wanted to recreate it but we ended up making the cards slightly differently to the original as we used different materials - D had taken a liking to some bright pink fabric.
We got some sheets of metallic A4 card and folded them in half. Next, I cut out rectangles of fabric to stick to the front of the cards. Then, I cut some hearts out of the pink fabric for the children to stick on.
R loves sticking! You can see some flowers on the table which were a surprise present from my husband.
Here are some of the cards the children made.
And some more! The children loved this activity and kept asking to make more and more cards so in the end we ended up with 6 of them. They said they were for me, their Baba (father in Turkish) and their Babcia and Dziadek (grandparents in Polish). R also said he was going to keep one for himself! Do you celebrate Valentine's Day? Who will you be giving cards to?
I recently purchased some plastic sewing needles for the children and they were very keen to use them. Plastic seemed a good idea as it won't cause any injuries, however, it is not at all easy, perhaps impossible, to sew fabric with them (unless you make holes in the fabric first). So I decided to make some homemade threading cards for the children to use.
I cut some winter themed shapes out of white card, two snowmen and two penguins. I drew features on them and then the children helped me to punch holes around the edges. They had great fun using the hole punch!
The children helped to colour in the penguins.
Then I threaded the needles for them and left them to it!
D enjoyed this activity and easily guided the needle in and out of the holes.
R had a really good go at this. He was thoroughly excited to be given a needle to use!
D has mentioned that she would like to try sewing something out of fabric or felt, so I'm on the lookout for child friendly metal needles for her to use.
