ofamily learning together

Creative Lettering For Kids

Posted on November 3, 2017 by ofamily

The kids loved writing their calligrams so I thought it would be fun to extend that into some more creative lettering. I was looking for lettering ideas / examples that I could do with my daughter when I spotted this book Creative Lettering for Kids: Techniques and Tips from Top Artists so I asked if we could test it out.

The book is filled with lettering ideas that are totally manageable. My daughter can page through the book, find a page she likes and she can try out the idea herself and she can manage them. Okay her results will not look exactly like the photos in the book but she is able to get achieve something similar and her results are close enough that she feels proud. (I feel very strongly about kids art books that look stunning but contain activities that are not manageable for the kids. I think it can squash a kids creativity).

Don’t get me lettering ideas are stunning, you get lovely results but the most important part for me is the kids can actually recreate these ideas. And most of the ideas use art items you probably have at home – watercolour paints, heavy paper, pens and pencils.

And if you don’t have the exact item you can probably get away with trying something else. In the one activity they used gel pens and we used our Sharpies instead and my daughter was still happy with the results.

We have tried numerous ideas from the book, sometimes copying everything exactly, sometimes taking inspiration from the book and adapting it in our own way. Every time we have been happy with the results. And my daughter is still eager to try more ideas from the book.

It is a great art book for kids but it is also a fun way to get kids writing, trying out different styles and getting creative with letters and words. The book encourages the kids to see words in a creative light and have fun with them. Whether you are using your paints or your pencils, whether you are writing chunky letters or curvy cursive letters it does not matter the kids can let their imaginations go and just have some fun.

My daughter likes the book because it has given her some fun ideas and ideas that she can manage. I like the book because it turns words into something creative and the more fun my kids have creating words and writing the more the kids will want to write.

We have only be using this book for a few weeks but we think it is a great addition to our creative book collection. Both my daughter and I love it. (In case anyone is wondering about ages my daughter is 9).

As I mentioned above I approached the publishers and asked if we could review this book.

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Guy Fawkes Activity Village Pages

Posted on November 2, 2017 by ofamily

We have never really done many Guy Fawkes activities in the past so this year I decided it was time for both the kids and myself to learn about Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder plot. A couple of our history themed books mentioned it so we went back to those sections and reread the relevant parts and then I spotted that Activity Village had published a bunch of new pages so we were set.

I started by downloading the Gunpowder Fact Sheet for the kids (both my kids like to be able to reread what we have discussed). It is 2 pages long and is a good summary of the events.

I also downloaded their comprehension pages for my daughter to have a go at (nice way of reinforcing what we had read together).

And my youngest tried the Guy Fawkes Cloze page. He is not quite at the comprehension stage yet but he likes to be able to do a similar type page where he has to answer questions about the people or events that we have read so this really suited him well. (My son’s handwriting is fairly large but I believe Activity Village are going to make the spaces a bit bigger).

And of course with my two if there is a word search for a topic we just have to print it out.

They really liked the Gunpowder Plot one just because it was a slightly different version to the standard word searches that they normally do. You need to search the page for the word gunpowder (seriously this is such a brilliant way of working on spelling – because they keep having to search for the same word over and over again – on my list to see if I can find other pages like this).

And the kids also did a combined effort for the gunpowder plot word creator page. I loved this one. Because they both really though about different words they could create using the letters. Talk about spelling and vocabulary extension especially for my youngest.

We were actually planning on using the Guy Fawkes template to create our own Guy Fawkes but I must be honest we ended up spending a lot longer talking about what happened and why their was such a big divide between the churches and what treason meant and why would people fight and kill each other over something like going to a different church that we never actually got around to doing our craft (we needed to go out). But maybe this weekend we might have a go at making our own Guy Fawkes.

Activity Village have a lot of other great pages all on Guy Fawkes so if you are looking for something it is worth having a look.

All pages mentioned above are part of Activity Village’s membership deal

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Posted in History | Tagged activity village, bonfire night, Gunpowder plot, Guy Fawkes, History, home education, homeschooling | 1 Comment

Reading Classic Stories Together

Posted on October 30, 2017 by ofamily

My oldest is a confident happy reader, she enjoys reading to herself but she also LOVES it when we read a book together. It is honestly one of her all time favourite activities. Curling up on the couch while we dive into a book and yes she does not NEED me to read to her she can manage the books herself but it is not about Needing it is about nurturing that enjoyment of quality stories.

I know in our busy lives finding time to still read a book together with a child who is a confident reader may seem like a waste of precious time. I get that, really I do. But for me to is about developing that love of books, nurturing that desire to get lost in a story, encouraging the idea that good literature is entertainment in its finest form.

And when we read together a lot happens. She follows me as I read, words that she might have struggled with become easy words, phrases that she might not have 100% sure about get discussed and her vocabulary and understanding of a past lifestyle gets broadened. She listens as I read with expression and she copies the expression. Her younger brother often joins us but he does sometimes opt for an activity on the floor while he listens.

We don’t tear our way through the books, we read them slowly, chapter by chapter and we discuss the events and the characters we encounter.

We don’t always read curled up on our couch at home we often take our current book out with us. Sometimes to a local park or a coffee shop and we read a bit more there.

And often once I have finished a chapter and am busy with something else she will find her own spot and reread the latest chapter.

So if you peek into our window you might just spot us on the couch with me reading to the kids and if you look a bit harder you might spot my daughter following every word I read, correcting me if I make a mistake and quizzing me about how life back then was different. And hopefully if you stop back in a few years time she will still be curled up on the couch with another classic book, hopefully she will still choose reading as a form of entertainment and enjoyment.

A Bit about the Books that we using as Family Reading

We are loving the Oxford Children’s Classic Series and they are without a doubt our current favourites for Family Reading. I am busy reading The Railway Children to both kids and my daughter is actually attempting The Secret Garden – it started off as just her book but her younger brother has convinced her that it should be THEIR book (ie she is reading it out loud to the both of the them). And with all the family reading going on my youngest has now even started trying some of the books himself. For Quality Read Aloud Family Books we Highly Recommend this range of Classic Children Stories – All three of us are LOVING the three books that we have.

These are the three Oxford Children’s Classic stories that we currently have

Oxford Children’s Classics: The Railway Children

Oxford Children’s Classics: The Secret Garden

Oxford Children’s Classics: Heidi

I did approach Oxford University Press and requested sample copies of these three books as I was wanting some classic Children’s stories for Family Reading.

I have included some Affiliate links. If you follow an affiliate link and go on to purchase that product, I will be paid a very small commission, however your cost will remain the same. I only include affiliate links for products use and love.

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Posted in Homeschooling | Tagged Children's Stories, Classic Stories, english resources, home education, homeschooling, parenting | 1 Comment

Improper Fractions

Posted on October 27, 2017 by ofamily

One of the new Math ideas we introduced this year was Improper Fractions (when your numerator is bigger than the denominator) and how you convert that Improper Fraction into a Mixed Fraction (combinations of whole numbers and fractions). And as is normal with our Maths work we started off by explaining it using some Maths manipulatives (in this case our snap cubes and Mathlink cubes).

If you have seven thirds you need to get 7 items (the numerator) then the kids need to create groups of 3 (the denominator) and that will tell them how many whole numbers there are and whatever is left over will be the remaining fraction.

You can do the same procedure with any Improper Fraction. Eight Fifths. Get eight objects and split them into groups of five – you will get one complete group of five (so 1 whole number) and then have 3 left over which is going to represent the fraction three fifths so you end up with One and Three Fifths.

One of the ways we practiced converting the Improper Fraction into Mixed Fractions was with the Twinkl Improper Fraction Loop Cards. You need to match the correct Mixed Fraction to the correct Improper Fraction.

And we also had a go at a Bean Bag Improper Fraction game – you throw your bean bag and then you convert the Improper Fraction that the bean bag lands on (or the closest one) into its Mixed Fraction. To help with this I actually printed out another set of Loop Cards from Twinkl and then glued the correct Mixed Fraction to the back of the Improper Fraction so that my daughter could check for herself if she was correct.

$Improper Fraction Bean Bag game. Fun way to practice converting Improper fractions into Mixed Fractions$

Both Twinkl resources mentioned in the post are part of their paid for platinum classic account. As with all my posts written the packages are valid as at the date that I write the post, any changes which happen subsequently are at the company’s discretion.

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Posted in maths ideas | Tagged fractions, home education, homeschooling, Improper Fractions, maths, Mixed Fractions, Twinkl | 1 Comment

Adding and Subtracting Fractions

Posted on October 24, 2017 by ofamily

We are back onto fractions again, working on decimals but I realized I never wrote a post about how we looked at adding and subtracting fractions with the same denominator or how we looked at Improper Fractions (post later this week).

When I first showed my daughter a fraction sum like 2/6 + 3/6 her first reaction was to add both the top and the bottom giving her 5/12. So I dug out our Learning Resources Fraction Tower Cubes Equivalency Set

$Learning Resources Fraction Tower Cube set. Prefect for helping kids with Equivalent Fractions, adding and subtracting fractions and working out decimals and percentages$

The Equivalent Fraction Towers are a great visual aid for children to use when they are working with Fractions. We have used them with my youngest when he was just starting to learn about different fractions (easy way to show that the bigger the denominator the smaller the fraction) and we used them a lot with my daughter when we learnt about Equivalent Fractions last year.

Using the fraction cubes the kids can set out the sum for themselves and they immediately can see that 2/6 + 3/6 = 5/6. It was right there.

When you add two fractions together that have the same denominator the denominator stays the same (i.e. the size of the fraction pieces do not change, you just end up with more of the same sized fraction pieces). And the great thing about this set is they have fractions up to 1/12 so the kids can create sum after sum and keep checking and every time they create a new sum they will see the denominator does not change.

So then we used our towers to see what happens when we subtract fractions with the same denominator

We started with 4/5 and took 1/5 away and we had 3/5 – the denominator did not change.

This is why I am such a big believer in using visual tools with Maths. It really helps when the kids can see for themselves what happens. And with my kids being able to pick up and move the maths tools around really helps them.

The Equivalent Fraction Towers are perfect for helping the kids to see what happens when you add or subtract fractions with same denominator.

If you are busy looking at fractions with your children you might also be interested in this fun Rainbow Fraction Bingo Game or our Fraction shapes that we made.

I have included Affiliate links. If you follow an affiliate link and go on to purchase that product, I will be paid a very small commission, however your cost will remain the same. I only include affiliate links for products that we own, use and love.

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