ofamily learning together

Our latest Book Finds

Posted on October 13, 2015 by ofamily

I love reading posts about books that people have discovered and are enjoying. It often gives me some good ideas and sometimes when I am trying to choose between two books, well sometimes, reading that other kids have enjoyed x book does help me decide.

I have a few books that the kids and I have discovered lately that we are enjoying and I have wanted to write posts about them but each book was not enough for an individual post so I thought I would start a new ofamilyblog tradition. Every now-and-again I would combine our favourite books into a “Book Finds” post. It will be a combination of books that we have bought from bookstores, amazon, charity shops and some books which the kids have taken out of our local library and fallen in love with. I will only include books that my kids have loved reading and that I have also enjoyed reading too them. Some will be educational and some might just be a good old fashion kids story book.

In the evenings when the kids dad gets home he sits with them in their bedroom for around 45 mins and they either read together of just chat. Two books that my kids take upstairs for daddy time over and over again (my hubbie says he knows the words off by heart by now) are See Inside Castles and See Inside the World of Dinosaurs.

We have owned both of these books for some time and the kids just never seem to get bored with them.

A book that we stumbled on in our local library and is fast becoming my son’s go to book is this one called Jake’s Bones.

My son loves us reading to him from the book and he loves just paging though and seeing how the different animals have different skeletons. He recently ignored a TV program on Dinosaurs for this book (which for my Dinosaur obsessed little man was unheard of). Have a look at the pics below, great for young ones who find bones and skeletons fascinating

My daughter is finding the DK book A Street through time, very interesting. She is asking lots of questions and I can see that whenever we look at it together she is taking a lot in. I think it is helping her getting the sequence of events (she was getting a bit confused about who came first and what happened when). I think this is a great History book to have in your home library.

My favourite new book as to be our Kitchen Science Lab for kids. It is jam-packed with some great ideas, a fab book if you need some ideas for science experiments to do with the kiddies. I am currently putting together a Science box for the kids and this book has given me some great ideas on what to include.

I have included affiliate links in the post. 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 be the same.

Posted in Book Ideas | Tagged book finds, children's book, home ed, homeschooling, Kitchen science for kids, Usborne books | Leave a comment

Kids drawing on windows and sliding doors

Posted on October 10, 2015 by ofamily

No I am not totally crazy and yes I do let the kids draw on the windows and sliding doors IF they use their STABILO 3-in-1 pencils (they wipe off very easily afterwards). And if you have ever spent time talking to kids Occupational therapists it is actually really good for their shoulder strength which helps with writing and a bunch more good things.

We recently had a go at using some colouring pages from Activity village together with our STABILO pencils on our sliding door. The kids loved it and I must admit I did get a bit carried away taking photos.

I started off by sticking the witch colouring page and some swallow templates onto the outside of the sliding doors using masking tape. (Both pages are now part of the Activity Village membership package). With the younger kids I think it is best to stick to simple pictures.

This is one of those activities where I did not even have to ask the kids, as soon as they see me taping the pictures up they are standing there waiting to have a go.

My son really likes the fact that he can wipe off the pictures with a cloth and try again, with his swallows he had about 3 attempts before he has happy.

Once they have finished their pictures remove the colouring pages from the outside.

My daughter really enjoyed the end result so she also had a go at drawing her own autumn tree

Very easy to set up for the kids and very easy to clean up afterwards.

I think this would be a fun activity to do with the kids as part of the build up to Christmas. Possibly a Christmas trees, maybe a reindeer or two and a nice big jolly Santa on a few windows around the house.

The pencils that we used are the STABILO 3-in-1 pencils. I have often mentioned them in our posts, we love them. If you have never used them before I highly recommend them have a look at the links below (affiliate links).

You get three different sets .

The large STABILO woody 3in1 Wallet of 18 colours – Multi-talented pencil

A STABILO woody 3in1 Wallet of 10 colours – Multi-talented pencil

and the pack of STABILO Woody 3 in 1 Multi Talented Pencil, Crayon and Watercolour – Assorted Colours (Pack of 6)

I have included affiliate links in the post. 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 be the same.

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Posted in Art and Craft Ideas | Tagged children's art, children's craft, drawing on windows, home ed, homeschooling, STABILO 3-in-1 | 1 Comment

Simple home-made doubling and halving aid

Posted on October 8, 2015 by ofamily

I actually made this a while ago for my daughter but never included photos on the blog. As I have recently received a number of comments about the maths goodies that the kids use and some have asked for more of the home-made items I thought I would include this one.

This is very simple, no frills at all, so as not to distract my daughter.

I started off with a piece of A4 card, folded it in half and then divided the length into a number of smaller sections so that I would know where to cut. (In the photo below I only cut up to the vertical line.)

In the middle I wrote the numbers and then I folded over all the flaps and wrote the answers under each flap.

Yes very simple and no frills at all but when my daughter started doubling and halving numbers it was a great reminder for her.

Posted in Folders /Lapbooks, ks1 maths | Tagged doubling and halving, home ed, home-made maths, homeschooling, ks1 maths, maths aid | 2 Comments

Rugby Maths is Cool

Posted on October 7, 2015 by ofamily

The kids watched some of the World Cup Rugby with their dad over the weekend and they really enjoyed it. We had almost continuous questions throughout the whole game and both kids have been talking about the game a lot, so I thought it might be fun to include it in our Maths.

I had spotted these Rugby jersey’s on Twinkl (Platinum ) and I liked the look of them. They have a jersey for each number from 1 to 20 and they have a matching jersey for each number with the corresponding number of dots on them.

I printed the Rugby Tops on card, cut them and stuck each jersey (or shirt) onto a craft stick with some tape. We started off by just matching the Rugby tops with the numbers to the Rugby tops with the dots on (I really like that the dots have been grouped into 5’s).

We also set out all our numbered Rugby tops in a green rice tub.

I removed some of the numbered Rugby tops and my son had to place them back in the correct position. (We extended it a bit for my daughter and she had to remove all the even numbered tops and then she had to remove all tops in multiples of 5)

My son has been asking me for his own sums lately so we had a go at doing a few with the tops. We first did the sums just using the tops with the dots on them and then we added the tops with the numbers below.

We later added the dotted tops to our rainbow rice tub and my son (with some help from his big sister) had another go at allocating the dotted tops behind each of their numbers.

My son told me afterwards ” Mom, Rugby Maths is cool. ”

So tomorrow I think we might have a go at using our Rugby Tops with some playdough.

Posted in foundation stage | Tagged foundation stage, home ed, homeschooling, maths, Rugby Maths, Twinkl | Leave a comment

Using Stabilo 3-in-1 pencils on laminated pages

Posted on October 6, 2015 by ofamily

We have been using our STABILO 3-in-1 pencils for over three years now and for some reason I never thought of using them on our laminated pages. I wish I had tried this earlier. They write beautifully and they wipe off perfectly with a damp cloth. Perfect for little hands and the kids they now have a wide range of colours to use on their laminated pages.

We have tested our pencils on a number of different laminated pages – all with great success, here are just three of our test pages.

We have used them on our laminated playdough mats (Flower playdough mat in picture below is free from Twinkl). The wide range of colours really was a big bonus when we used these pencils on our laminated playdough mats. In the past we have used our whiteboard marker pens on these playdough mats but the kids never had such a wide range of colours at their disposal before.

My son has used them on his laminated number and letter formation pages (Free number formation page in the photo below is from Twinkl). He loves that he can now do his number and letter formation pages using his favourite colour – light blue.

My daughter also had a go at using them on her division pages that were inside the Learning Resources Wipe Clean Pockets. And yes they are perfect to use with the Write and Wipe Pockets , they write on easily and they wipe off perfectly.

So for me another win-win with our STABILO 3-in-1 pencils. The kids get a wide range of colours to use on their laminated learning pages and I find them easier to wipe off than their old whiteboard marker pens that we used.

The STABILO 3-in-1 pencils come in a number of different packs. I originally bought my kids the large STABILO woody 3in1 Wallet of 18 colours – Multi-talented pencil
around 3 year ago and recently my kids were given two STABILO woody 3in1 Wallet of 10 colours – Multi-talented pencil, you can also get a STABILO Woody 3 in 1 Multi Talented Pencil, Crayon and Watercolour – Assorted Colours (Pack of 6). My favourite is the box of 18, which is expensive, I know, but you do get a wide range of colours and there really are lots of great ways of using them.

I am going to be posting some crafts ideas on using these fab pencils soon.

I have included affiliate links in the post. 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 be the same.