Tot School Week of 4.13

R-man is 12.5 months old

week of 4.13

Transferring- I stopped by the dollar tree one day to pick up some things for this activity! I wanted to focus on 'transferring' from empty to full with R-man. We worked on this concept by taking pom poms in one bucket and putting them into another; then we did it with only one color. Not too long into the activity, R-man was looking for every pom pom he could find to put it into the bucket! He had so much fun playing with the little pom pom balls, especially when i dumped the bucket out on top of his head and ticked his cheek with them. 

Learning through Play- it's a beautiful thing!

Fine Motor Skills: R-man LOVES buckles! Whenever he is in the high chair on on the changing pad, i take full advantage of his desire to learn how to put the buckle together! He lets me manipulate his hands to hold the buckle properly and then put one end inside the other.  I think it's a 'boy' thing because he wants to know HOW IT WORKS (totally not a girl thing!).

Another 'random learning moment'...i was cleaning up R-man's room a bit and he was toddling around on the floor when he discovered his favorite thing- the HUMIDIFIER! (no joke.) I watched as he was, for the first time, intrigued by the dial that turns it up and off. He was trying to turn it, so I encouraged the learning process of "turning"! He has yet to put this new ability together with the ability to turn the 'key' that is in his car.

During Outside Time, we played with the shape sorter! He doesn't quite get the concept of shapes fitting in the same shape hole, but he so badly wants to stuff them in there- we're on the verge...:) After some time on the blanket, we had an older friend stop by who wanted to learn too. R-man was great- he shared his toys and would offer blocks to her to play with! adorable. We enjoyed our gross motor skills to the fullest while outside too. Walking, swinging, sliding, and even rode in an airplane! R-man's favorite part is to point at things he wants to do- i love that he can communicate with me!

Today we focused mainly on STACKING during tot school.

He loves to play with blocks but had not really turned onto the idea of 'stacking' them.

Four about a minute today, I saw him trying to put the cups one on top of the other

. They wouldn't stay there, so he got frustrated and left them for the stacking rings, but I though that was a MAJOR breakthrough! I can't wait to post about how this has improved in the next two weeks!

We spent time with our ring stackers again. Normally I hand them to him and he puts them in order, but today I let him do it his OWN way. There were rings on the star stacker and stars on the ring stacker and some in a bucket, too! I love that he is using his own creativity to enjoy his learning time. It's hard to get a picture of him doing this activity, especially sine he'd rather rip the camera out of my hand, so this is the after picture. When i clean them

 up, i stack the rings to the side so that he can put them back on if he wants to.

We also played with some building blocks.  At this age, the activity consists of choosing a block, banging it on something, exploring its shape and texture then throwing it 

away for a new block.  I maniuplate the blocks, stacking them, making towers, putting them in little cars that roll- i hope as he develops, he will see how 'i play' and try to use his own imagination. right now, we're exploring and discovering which is right where we should be. 

No pictures....but we also practiced our animal identification by singing 'old mcdonald had a farm' and stacking...although stacking is more like 'demolition' as that's the only part R-man finds fun right now!

Language: he's babbling as if he is trying to convey something, but no new words that I can readily make out! So far, this week i have heard (no, mama, dada, dog, book, more). Pointing a lot, though, and that is a sign of language development, so i'm not worried.