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The Whole Child, Issue #026 - Back with "new stuff"
September 02, 2006

MAXIMISING POTENTIAL

The Whole Child e-zine brings you free preschool activities each week to maximize your child's potential, build skills and parent-child relationships in just a few minutes per day. Useful tips, quotes, resources, opportunities and articles will added for extra value!

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3 September 2006, Issue #026

CONTENTS

1. Hello from Shirley
2. Updates at Shirley's Preschool Activities
3. Tips
4. Quote
5. Readiness Activities

1. Hello from Shirley

I'm back from our week's holiday, visiting my parents. We had a quiet week in the little seaside town where they live - no traffic noise and 2 minutes to walk to the beach. It was great, even though the weather was still cool.

My mom who was a professional teacher and now lectures teachers part-time at Rhodes University is always a source of inspiration and resources for me and so I have quite a bit of 'new stuff' to add to my site in the weeks and months to come, both info and activities.


2. Updates at Shirley's Preschool Activities

Having been away, I haven't added any new pages lately, but I recently updated an existing page, The Best Mom, the Best Preschool.

I think preschool teachers do a great job, but no matter how caring they are, they can never have the same relationship with a child as the child's own mother.  

Just this week I received an email from a preschool teacher who cares for little tots aged 18 months to three years. It breaks my heart to think of such little kids being separated from their mommies. I believe that society needs to redefine success and give more status to moms so that it is more acceptable to be at home with the kids, living on a lower income,  instead of in the workplace. Read the article above to see why little tots need to be with their moms.

3. Tips

I'm reading a great parenting book at the moment that emphasises that as parents we need to do more than just reactive parenting and positive and negative reinforcing of different behaviours.

We need to make sure that we meet our kids' emotional needs too.

If your child is whiny, clingy or acting up some other way, instead of reacting to that behaviour with severity, ask yourself: "What does she need? Why is she acting this way?" and respond to her emotional need. Maybe she needs you to pick her up, hold her and give her a few minutes of undivided attention.

(I'll review the book when I've finished it as it so far it is very promising!)

4. Quote

"Children learn to smile from their parents." ~ Shinichi Suzuki (1898 - 1998)


What does your face "say" when your child walks into your prescence?


5. Readiness Activities


To download the printable pdf you will need to have installed
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The Whole Child - Week 26-27 Activities - printable pdf

Week 26

Visual Perception
Play “Shape-I-Spy…”. Say, for example: “I spy with my little eye, something that is square-shaped.” Your child must guess what it is. Take turns and use various shapes.

 

Mathematical Skills
Play a matching game with your child. Write the numbers 1-10 on a page, then pick a number and ask your child to count out the correlating number of manipulatives (beans, blocks, buttons etc). Cut up the numbers and mix up the order as a variation.

Gross Motor Skills
Play ball games with your child, especially a slow game of soccer. Encourage your child to run and kick the ball.


Fine Motor Skills
Do some hand exercises with your child. Ask her to make a tight fist then open her hand and spread her fingers as wide as possible. Then shake her hands and relax the fingers.

With the palms up ask her to wiggle her fingers. Also do some action rhymes that use the hands and fingers. Go to www.shirleys-preschool-activities.com/rhymes.html

Auditory Perception
Do the following activity in a busy place, like a park or supermarket. Ask your child to close her eyes and describe all the sounds that she can hear.

Faith Building
Among the printable Bible Memory verses at
http://www.shirleys-preschool-activities.com/free-printable-preschool-worksheets.html you will find one from Ephesians 4:32 - Be kind to one another. Talk to your children about being kind. Talk about bullies and how it is unkind to pick on smaller children and how we should stand up for others if someone is being unkind to them. They should tell an adult if this happens too.

Week 27

Language and Thinking
Read your child a story about Spring or Fall, depending on the season where you live. Talk about the four seasons of the year, when they occur, how we recognize them. Use this activity to expand your child’s vocabulary on this topic.

Visual Perception
Using wooden blocks or construction blocks, design an object for your child to build and draw it two dimensionally on paper. Your child must copy the design using the blocks to build the design.


Mathematical Skills
Play a 'counting on' game. Say to your child, "if I have two buttons and I get three more buttons, count how many I have altogether." She must then start from two and count onwards, three, four, five, to reach the answer. If she masters this, then use higher numbers, but make sure she is able to succeed at the game.


Gross Motor Skills
Let your child balance on one leg. See if she can last for 10 seconds. She should be able to hop forward about 8 times on one leg too.
 

Fine Motor Skills
Let your child toss a bean bag from one hand to the other. Encourage her to increase the distance between her hands as she masters this skill.


Faith Building
Talk your children about being quick to obey. In our home we tell our children that ‘slow to obey’ is disobedience. Give examples that illustrate the importance of listening immediately e.g. when crossing a road, if mom says “stop” it could save a life! If necessary, do some role playing to get the message across. Teaching your children to be quick to obey will ultimately save you from losing your patience with your children! Never, count to three as this is training your child only to obey at number three!

 
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