Getting the Most of Your Summer Holidays and {Learn & Play Link Up}

We're having Ocean themed activities soon so I'm featuring these amazing posts from our last week's link up for inspiration!

A Weekend at the Mountain Park

A few weeks ago, we took a break from our busy lives and went to an outdoor adventure park.  We had fun!  The place was beautiful, everything there is like a huge nature playground for the family and kids.  Mavi enjoyed the trip the most.  He’s everywhere!

Mavi and I did some boating activity as well. Oh he was so ecstatic!  The boating experience for him was a lesson 101 on paddling as well. 

There were zipline for kids, tree houses and just about anything!

          

          

And while big brother is busy with his “big boy” activities, Vito our little one is all happy and contented riding the baby swing.  Oh look at that smile!

And yet the best part of the trip is when we were just sitting down on the grass, relaxing, admiring our view and thanking God for the gift of family and having happy healthy kids.

  

Happy Monday!

Weekend at the Park

We were blessed with a wonderful weather last weekend so we decided to visited a leisure park for rest and recreation :) 

First thing we did was of course visit the animals, as my son looooves animals!  We were so happy to see them all out in the open and were eager to entertain the kids.  I was glad that we get to see most of the birds from our Bird Study Unit I.  Rhea, Emu, Turkey, Chickens, Peacocks, Stork etc.  And surprisingly, there were lots of farm and zoo animals as well.

 

Oh and these are Bisons!! My first encounter with them.... such beautiful creatures!

 

When we're done with the animals, we proceeded to the activity  area the little boy to have some fun.  And look who's not scared of the Air Jump!

  

And the highlight of the trip was the pony ride :)  His teacher told me he can't stop talking about it in school LOL.

Linking to:

Montessori Monday
TGIF Linky Party
Teach Beside Me
Preschool Corner

A Visit to the Zoo

A few weeks ago, we visited the city zoo.  Mavi has been asking about it for a long time now and since husband was on leave we just have to grab the opportunity see the animals while it’s still summer.

We have been to 4 zoos in the past three years, and they’re all in different places.  Will tell you about it soon.  And by far, he enjoyed this one the most.   I love the zoo, and it’s not just my son who enjoys seeing the animals but its me and my husband too.  Just like this one, it’s our first encounter with a white rhinos and gorillas.  We were so enthralled!  They were even more beautiful in person rather than in books!

                  

The zoo has mini-conservatories as well.  They have this house that preserves the furs of lions and tigers.  My son had a great time ‘feeling’ their furs.  

         

And they have displays of some animal skulls.  Here they have the skulls of zebra, giraffe, chimpanzee, crocodile etc.

And of course, what made my son even more happier is encountering a human skeleton!! He loves it to bits!

 

Then before we headed home, we passed by the “Farm” area... and here kids are allowed to feed the farm animals.  Unfortunately, we didn’t make it to the cow milking session.  My son would have like participating on it :)  Oh well, maybe next time.

 

I don’t usually share or talk about our trips because I wanted to keep it private.  But some readers have asked me if there are some things that we also do aside from homeschool activities. 

Of course we do have a lot of fun things whenever the weather permits!! Whenever it’s safe to go outside (am talking about the weather), we definitely go out and play some ball, or go to playgrounds, or somewhere else other than the 4 corners of our house LOL.  We travel as well too. 

Anyway, will share about it soon.

Happy Thursday everyone!

Homeschool Wrap-Up

Mavi is 38 months old.

These days, my son isn’t into homeschooling.  All he wanted to do was play-pretend Artzooka or Mister Maker.  Whenever I ask him if he wants to play a game, he would always say “No, I’m playing artzooka.”  And this is the reason why I, at the moment, postponed my planned homeschool curriculum and decided to whip out activities randomly whenever he wants to do some ‘schooling’.  I really don’t want to take that play pretend at the moment because he really really enjoys pretending that he can create crafts and stuff without me being there. 

I am religious in reading books to him in the morning, but there were times that I get to be busier during the day so I would up reading books on him in the afternoon or during bedtime.  Sometimes, I also forget to read books because of chores and personal work.  So I decided to read at least one book everyday just to ensure that we have read a book.  And this week, we read Gingerbread Man (and The Very Busy Spider, The Elves and the Shoemaker, The Billy Goat Gruff and Kid’s Bible, etc).  Here  Mavi took out the animals that appeared in the Gingerbread Man story and in The Very Busy Spider.  We did some role playing using these animals.

We made Gingerbread Man paper dolls and dress them up.  My son enjoyed this the most!

 

Made window ornaments using colored tissue, construction paper and contact paper.

MATH

Practice counting using the leaves as we were discussing about the season Fall the other day.

Then we work with some patterns.  I downloaded this from here.

In lieu of Thanksgiving, we made our Gratitude Leaves and hung them in his room.  While I wrote all the things that I am thankful for, my expressed his gratitude by drawing those things in the leaves! (He’s busy with his Button Snake)

 

Counting from numbers 1 to 50 using these number chip cards which I made out of cardstock.

I made these CVC cards so we can practice more of CVC words. We're done working with our pink series and before I move to blue series, I wanted to expose him to other cvc words, those that were not included in our pink series set.

 PRACTICAL LIFE/SKILLS

I made this button snake for him to practice buttoning (and unbuttoning).  He got hooked! I was surprised to discover that it was difficult for him to insert the button in the felt squares. But after a few tries... he finally figured out how to do it.  I plan to make a few more, and vary the button shapes/sizes.

 

He’s just into writing these days. His favorite sketch pad is my notebook even though there are plenty of paper around the house! Thank goodness he doesn’t write on the wall.

 

Tearing paper and gluing them.  He wasn’t into this activity.

I am still trying to expose him to painting.  For some reason, he lost his interest in painting.  He just wants to draw(using oil pastels) and write... and painting his least favorite. Maybe, it’s because he doesn’t have a suitable table to paint, and is not comfortable doing this activity on the floor :) Yep, we’re still looking for his work table.  And we left his Crayola Paints back in SG, so that means, I need to shell out a few more cashing(again) to get him some paints.

 

Playdoh free play.  Always a favorite :)

FIELD TRIPS/OUTDOORS

A friend asked if we do outdoor activities.  Of course we do! We never missed an opportunity to go out when there’s sun! I’m an outdoor person and I wanted my son to pass that to my son :) It’s just that, well I wanted to keep those moments private so I try not to talk about it here nor post pictures of it.  So here’s the proof that we do go out.  This was when we took a day tour at the city center.  We visit this beautiful park where we get to see lots of ducks on the pond.  Then we walked our way around, do some sightseeing and just enjoy the crowd, the sun and mother nature.

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Le Louvre

The best museum we’ve been to.  My son enjoyed running around the museum.. of course he couldn’t appreciate it yet.  Hope we can go back so I can discuss to him valuable works of art that made it history.