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THINGS TO SEE AND DO: CELEBRATE LETTER LEARNING WITH A SEASIDE SUNDAE

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Farewell S. It was fun hanging out with you, we are looking forward to starting our adventure with W on Wednesday.

To finish off the week we stopped in for a special Sundae. While many of our regular haunts don’t serve Sundaes we found that Mures (now known to my kids as the ‘Seahorse Shop’ because it has a seahorse for it’s emblem!) was more than willing to help us out with the girls first ever Sundae experience. If you head down their for your own sweet treat see if you can spot some S creatures on your visit – Seagulls, seals, and 100s of seahorses are to be found around the walls of the dining area.

THINGS TO SEE AND DO: SORELL STRAWBERRY FARM

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A Sumptuous day of picking strawberries in the sunshine, who wouldn’t enjoy that!?

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Somewhere along the line we (collectively) stopped producing our own food in favour of supermarkets. While many families (ourselves included) are bringing back a bit of token home grown produce to the table, the true art of gardening for sustenance is not as common as it once was.

As a result, a growing trend in teaching kids about the process of ‘paddock to plate’ is emerging as an essential learning area to cover in the early years. This is a concept we will re-visit regularly throughout the year… And strawberry picking surely has to be one of the tastiest and most enjoyable ways to get started!

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Just past Sorell, this fruit farm was perhaps the children’s favourite experience yet. We met at tthe entrance, paid our entrance fee, and then were let loose to pick as much as we desired (provided that we didn’t leave with more than our container full – eating as much as you can on the farm is entirely encouraged.)

The costs are:

$13.50 per adult

$6.00 per child (3yo and under free)

By the time we left I had no doubt that we had well and truly got our money worth. We were at the farm for about 5 hours, exploring the different fruits at various states of growth, picked continually, filled our containers and our bellies with an array of fruits and all 5 kids were fully engaged throughout process.

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So while we left with a tub of berries each, we achieved far more than the acquisition of fruit:

  • We expanded our berry tasting pallet (even the pickiest eater was willing to try each new fruit that we came across while in this environment, and she found a new berry that is her favourite food now!)
  • We ran, laughed, jumped through the rows (with fairly good sight lines the kids had a little more freedom to explore independently while we could still see them easily). For young children the responsibilities to explore freely with friends are few and far between!IMG_3679
  • We searched, spotted, assessed for ripeness, plucked and tasted each fruit. The day was like a giant tasty tactile game of hide and seek, even the youngest member was delighted with this sensory rich experience.

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  • The kids asked lots of questions and we all expanded our technical fruit knowledge. (The different kinds of bushes that different fruits grow on, what shows us it is ripe for different fruits, what season each fruit ripens etc.) The kids (having seen corn and apples in the field near the berries) can’t wait to return in Autumn for another harvest experience.

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As always, learning is re-enforced by re-telling and/or acting out what has been learnt. The story telling process fires up and connects those exact same neurons almost as effectively as the actual experience itself. I’m delighted that the ‘harvesting’ has continued after we returned from the farm. We have even been treated to a ‘harvest festival’ entirely planned by the children. (With a selection of fruit, herbs (and weeds!!) that they picked from the garden – a good opportunity to hi-light that not all plants are good to eat!

With strawberry season coming to an end, get yourself out to Sorell Fruit Farm for a delightful day of exploration and learning. There are good facilities (toilets, a little shop and even a cafe) it is easy to find, open 7 days, and we highly recommend the experience!

THINGS TO SEE AND DO: BUILD A GIANT SAND SCULPTURE.

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Summers Bay, sunshine, splashing in the shallows, schools of small fish swimming past our feet, soldier crabs in the sand, and even the guest appearance of a stingray swimming slightly out of reach. We were delighted by the spontaneous S learning that we found at our trip to Sommers Bay (Tasman Peninsula, Tasmania). And while we’re told this is not unusual for this location it’s not something you can usually plan for in an outing. (As much as you’d like to, wildlife just doesn’t run to a predictable booking schedule!)

Sand sculptures on the other hand are something you can create at any beach (or large sand play area). Bring a bucket, spade and an (adult sized) shovel to get digging! The kids (and you!) will be amazed at what you can create in a beach trip.

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First up we chose a location, and the kids told me what to draw as I followed their collective instructions mapping out a big tummy, curly tail, long nose and head on the sand. We then all got our little spades and started to dig a big trench around the shape (piling the sand in the middle of the picture, as you would when making a mote around a sand castle.) Gradually the children tired of digging and got a bit distracted safely splashing in the shallows near us, and generally had a good time in the water. As us adults continued digging (and sharing the few facts we had learnt about seahorses!) the children came back and joined us. By the time we were ready to pat down and sculpt the shape, all the children were involved again. The giant 4m seahorse came together remarkably fast, and then much time was spent as the children decorated it with shells.

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The older children planned and placed and organised themselves on a mission to complete the seahorse (very important work, this seahorse building!) while the younger delighted in sticking shells in the sand.

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Sand play is always a winner for many reasons. It’s the elemental stages of physics, it’s tactile, it’s physical… and when done in a team like this the social development, planning, and problem solving involved is spectacular.

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Plus it’s satisfying. Go build a giant seahorse that will be washed away at the next tide. It’s brilliant.

EASY ACTIVITIES TO BUILD YOUNG BRAINS: MAKE SIMPLE BUTTON CASTANETS.

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Simple button castanets are a delightfully easy way to bring a little spanish culture into your home.

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Ask your tot to choose 2 large buttons.

Give them some elastic to thread through the holes.

Tie off the back of the elastic and attach to fingers.

This takes just a few moments, then they’ll want to make a set for the other hand!

We then held a little dance performance where each child showed us their moves. What we intended as a simple fine motor skills activity with some cultural background (making the castanets) turned into a full body improvisation of spanish dance and the kids couldn’t have loved it more! (Even Anica, who typically shys away from any performance, allowed her whole body to become a proud spanish dancer – see her take the stage with gusto below!)

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Allowing children to act (and excell) out of their usual comfort zone allows those parts of the brain that are rarely accessed to get more of a look in and build stronger connections for other areas of their life. What triggers this will be different for each child, just as will the skills that are outside their comfort zone! Anica in this instance showed all the traits of a percussive, passionate, extravert in her Spanish solo – where as previously she has told me she is the best at ‘staying in the middle and not being seen’! Anica is likely to always be a little more shy than her outgoing sister, and we don’t want to change this about her, but the more she has the opportunity to choose to venture outside her comfort zone, the more she will be able to function with her whole brain in day to day life.

Without getting carried away talking about the plasticity of the brain, this applies to a variety of what we deem to be inbuilt ‘personality traits’ – Our brain changes to physically become stronger at what we are told we are and what we are allowed to do. As parents, carers and educators we have a huge responsibility to the young ones around us to explore all the possibilities of who they could be, rather than predict or label their personality and limit their ability to grow into the well rounded adults we all want to see in our future!

As an ex-dance teacher I was also delighted to see how this simple prop changed the way the children moved from a technical movement point of view. Having watched a video as part of our research last week (that showed some spanish dancing) the children instantly changed their default flowing movement (influenced by their friends mimicking ballet) into a staccato passionate movement that they had seen in the flamenco dance. Their feet stomped, their arms held power and their little castanets went wild!

THINGS TO SEE AND DO: TRY SPANISH SWEETS WITH YOUR KIDS.

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I’ve talked before about my mission to cook food from every country around the globe with my kids, so with Spain as our feature country how could I resist a bit of Spanish cuisine. Paella is perhaps the most famous dish that is surprisingly easy to cook (a rice dish that comes in many variations to suit almost every taste), but alas – once made, it was not a favourite with my own children.

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Churros however, is a chocolate dipped treat that no child could resist. We had plans of cooking this but then stumbled upon it on the tapes menu at a lovely little coffee shop. We enjoyed ours very much, if you would like to make it yourself then here is the recipe (tried and tested by a friend and her children as a great success) or if you’re in Hobart and want an excuse to get out then Rain Check Lounge in North Hobart currently have it on their menu – invite a few friends and make a afternoon of it!

COOKING AROUND THE WORLD

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Last year my children and I embarked on a culinary adventure around the world, with the vastly ambitious goal to cook food from every country on the planet (that’s almost 200 countries, just incase you were wondering!)

The exercise (still far from complete!) has proved very successful in terms of capturing their imagination, and indeed opening learning across a divers range of fields.

Measuring the ingredients for Anzacs from Australia.

Measuring the ingredients for “A: Anzacs from Australia.” Also a great opportunity to talk about the amount of sugar in sweets like this.

It comes as no surprise that cooking is a wonderful educational tool in itself: It is tactile (pouring, stirring, needing), sensory (taste, smell, sight), draws heavily on numeracy skills (weighing, counting, timing), scientific reactions (dissolving, heating, cooling), and literacy (from recognising the simple word ‘cup’ when measuring, right through to being able to read recipes independently) … Plus you get the satisfaction of creating something that you can eat at the end. This is probably the benefit my own 3 and 5 year olds enjoy most!

When we embarked on our culinary adventure around the world, we didn’t buy a plane ticket – instead we looked at what was in our own cupboard. From making Vietnamese rice paper rolls in the park, to investigating the origins of the pancake. Each county we ‘visited’ on our cooking journey we added a little geography, and a lot of discussion, and play surrounding that county. As a result both of my children have an expanded world view.

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BIG HISTORY FOR LITTLE PEOPLE

/ sandidoherty / 3 Comments

The stories we tell about our being (both public and private) are a cornerstone to our developing sense of identity – for an individual child, and indeed for the community as a whole.

After watching a presentation by David Christian (a key mover and shaker in the Big History movement) I am further inspired to incorporate ideas of ‘Big History’ (that is; history understood form a big picture perspective) into play based learning for early childhood.

My own daughter, Elka 3yo, insists that everything before now is ‘last year’ (yes; yesterday is a very long time ago when you are 3!) So with this daily reminder I fully understand the realities of a developing mind struggling to grasp the concept of time passing. Research shows that neurological pathways in Elkas young brain are forming to understand the complex idea of time, but the extensive process of developing that understanding will only be fully accomplished with the experience of time passing.

With this unquestionable evidence noted, even 3yo Elka can tell you (with some genuine understanding) that ‘dinosaurs lived a long time ago, and they’re not alive any more’. This is a concept that has been built upon by the numerous references to dinosaurs around her (from dress ups, toys, and stickers, to book and even all out dinosaur birthday parties). While history is usually reserved for older students, it is not such a giant leap to conclude that other milestones in our ‘big history’ could equally be as engaging subjects for play based learning in these early years!

From imagining the world of ancient civilisations to looking at how our landscape was formed (volcanic eruptions and a century of erosion is as simple as sand play with some added baking soda and vinegar!)

While I am yet to experiment on my darling offspring, I believe that her being able to understand a vague order of chronology (ie dinosaurs before kingdoms, pyramids before Nan and Pop etc) is well with in her abilities and would be aided by a general time line in her environment that we can refer to when we make new discoveries.

This sense of belonging (and owning a place in time as well as physical space) is something that will enhance all aspects of the growth: from empathy and understanding, to exploration and a desire to invent the next thing to change the course of history.

Now, on the topic of history: the Yoyo is believed to be the second oldest toy in human history. (Without google) do you know what the oldest is? (Note your answers in the comments below, future post will show how we made the oldest toy in history.)