Descriptive Words and Other Language Activities

We have been enjoying our new gifts from the holidays this week but have been missing our usual classes and time with friends.  We are getting ready for the new year with a new schedule of activities though.

Genevieve has really been enjoying these Water Wow books by Melissa and Doug.  She has been practicing her letters and numbers and playing with animals in these books.  She is really trying to figure out what letters words begin with.  She also loves counting.  The animal book is just fun for her to play with.  So far she has really enjoyed these books, and they are very reusable.  The water board she had before was similar, but tended to collect dirt which was really difficult to clean in the end.  These brush markers are great, but your toddler may press to hard and slowly scratch the pages.

Since there aren't any storytimes this holiday season, we have just spent some time playing at the library and picking out new books.  It's actually really interesting that she seems to be ignoring a lot of picture books and choosing board books and chapter books.  She also really enjoys the puppets.  Tobias wants to play with beads and peek-a-boo with the puppet tree.  Because she has been having so much fun with puppets, and got some great new ones handmade by her grandmother for her birthday, we used a leftover cardboard box from Christmas to make a puppet theatre.  She started painting it this week.

 One of ABCmouse's newer activities is a song about using more descriptive words, like drizzle instead of rain.  This inspired us to look at some other sources for descriptive words.  We read Rhymoceros and Hippopposites by Janik Coat which were filled with great descriptive words and simple illustrations to demonstrate each word like blurry and furry.  Over in the Jungle uses great verbs to describe the animals motion.  It also follows the rhyming song she loves, additional learning activities, and interesting illustrations.  The illustrator, Jeanette Canyon, uses different techniques in clay to create the images.  We followed up our books by making a texture collage and discussing the way the different items feel.

We ended the week with some puzzles.  I love puzzles, and have great memories of putting puzzles together with my dad.  Melissa and Doug make some great wooden puzzles.  Some have chunky pieces.  Others have large or small knobs for picking up pieces or even magnet poles for lifting the pieces.  But why do puzzles with your little ones?  First off, they are a great starting point for dialogue.  Sometimes it can be difficult to try to talk with your infants and toddlers.  You know the more words they hear from actual people, the better but what to talk about?  Puzzle topics are a springboard.  From shapes to colors, animals to letters and numbers, puzzles cover a range of topics.  Puzzles can help improve fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, and spatial reasoning as they maneuver pieces into their place.  You and your toddler or infant can work together, building teamwork skills, or they can build self-confidence completing puzzles on their own.  Plus Tobias will tell you puzzle pieces make excellent noises as you crawl with them.

For more information about puzzle benefits in early childhood education:
Learning for Kids
Teach
Child Development Institute
University of Chicago