Fun Learning Ideas

I checked out a book from the library this month, The Ultimate Book of Homeschooling Ideas.  As you may guess, it has a million good ideas and I've been writing down my favorites in my little homeschooling spiral notebook.  I thought it would be lovely to share some of these ideas on here.  I think I'll list a few at various times to break it up a little.

I'll start with ideas I am already implementing.

For teaching Spanish:  Use commands and/or actions to make words more memorable.  For example, "Veo un avion!"  I see an airplane!  We know a little bit of sign language at our house, mostly from Baby Signing Times, so we are going to throw in some signs to help us remember the Spanish.  For, "I see an airplane," we put our hand to our forehead (looking into the distance) and then sign airplane.  I plan on carrying "veo" through and using it with other nouns.  I also think it will be good to use words they know signs for, so the sign can tell them the word without Mom having to tell them the word in English. :)

Make your own books.  My kids LOVE reading books that they colored and put together themselves.  A new variation on this idea that I had not thought of is to have your kids create their own easy readers.  Make a list of words they can read and help them create a story from it.  Put it together and illustrate.  Super fun.

Creative play: One creative learning activity this book gave me, we tried today.  I gave the kids little tupperware containers and measuring spoons in the bath and filled each container with food colored water.  It was super novel to the kids to end up with colorful bath water and my 3 year old enjoyed seeing what colors he got from mixing different colors together.  My one (almost two) year old seemed to absorb the colors I am trying to teach him a little better than usual in this environment.  I realized after they were already in my bath tub that I should have used the tub that is not bordered with carpet.

More ideas to come! :)