In the infamous “Duck Cake” episode of Bluey (season 2, ep 44), it’s little sister Bingo’s birthday and she is looking through a cake book for which cake she would like to have for her birthday. She chooses a duck cake because, when she looks at it, her tail starts wagging, which she knows means … Read more
There are probably a hundred things I love about the sisterly relationship between Bluey and Bingo. The show does such an incredible job at honoring their different personalities as well as their different stages of development (since they’re supposed to be 4 and 6 years old). The one I’m thinking about today, though, is the … Read more
Something that I desperately wish that we saw more of in the US is letting kids learn literacy on their own terms, without the intense pressure that it often carries. (I know that this is rampant outside the US, too. I just can speak the most authoritatively from within my own window of experience.) Children … Read more
Kids are very creative in play. They may be interested in symbolic play, using things to represent other things. They may be interested in sensory play, exploring the sounds and sights and textures of materials or the ways they interact. They may be interested in motor play, exploring how objects move and how they themselves … Read more
This particular camp* invitation was whole-cloth taken from Denita over at Listen to the Children. She’s been collecting clips, towel clips, and clothespins for a toy zipline for years and I only had about a month, but I managed to find a few that worked like I hoped they would! I should clarify here that … Read more
[Image description: There is a title at the top of the meme that reads “Verbal Referencing: Say What You See”. Three images of toddlers are shown, with captions beneath them. The first child is smiling with an open-mouthed smile. The caption says, “I see your big smile! I think you LIKE that.” The second child … Read more
I set up an invitation at camp* to make “nature soup”. If we had had the access, I would’ve loved for the kids to be able to pick whatever flowers and leaves and weeds and pinecones were interesting to them and were in the vicinity. However, for our specific purposes, all we had was a … Read more
The single play invitation that I was most excited for in all of Camp Creativity* was set for Thursday: the “make your own potion” station. This could totally have been anywhere from really simple to really complex. I probably fell on the side of the scale closer to really complex 😉 We have had several … Read more
Here’s a tiny little “this is working for our family right now so maybe it will for someone else too”: Our only form of screen time for our kids right now is TV shows and movies. We usually stick to preschool shows, Pixar/Disney movies, and YouTube videos about how things work or “behind the scenes” … Read more
Sitting is not morally better than standing. Sitting is not morally better than pacing. Sitting is not morally better than wandering. Sitting is easier for some adults to handle than standing, pacing, or wandering. Why are we more worried about what is easier for adults to handle than what makes it easier for children to … Read more