Learning to read is an exciting adventure and sharing in that adventure with the children I taught was one of my favourite parts of the job! Unsurprisingly, I’ve found teaching my daughter to read even more rewarding, and I thought I’d share this simple CVC word building activity which you can do with your child […]
Author: beccatooth
- Play
- ...
Should We Use Food for Play?
I love giving my kids the opportunity to explore messy and sensory play, and one resource, which is easy to get and relatively cheap to buy, is food. There are number of foods which we use on a semi-regular basis, such as oats, lentils, rice, flour, and cornflour. However, I’m aware that some people consider […]
How To Make A Spore Print
Last Autumn, T and I spent a number of weeks exploring all things autumnal for our learning theme. As well as looking at changes in the natural world, we learned about Harvest, Bonfire Night, and Remembrance Day. One of the things we spent some time looking at was fungi, and by the end of the […]
Letter Match Game
The case for lowercase Resources for teaching children letters are often based on the uppercase alphabet. Magnetic letters are quite often uppercase, for example, and in many workbooks on sale, capitals are used. You can see why – capitals are easier to form. Over half of them are made of only straight lines, in comparison […]
- Outdoor Play
- ...
Springtime Snail Race!
The days are getting warmer and it really feels like Spring has arrived, doesn’t it? If you head out into the garden or to the park, you might start to see snails which are coming out of hibernation just now. Depending on how keen a gardener you are, they may or may not be particularly […]
Make A Playdough Beetle
Playdough is one of my favourite go-to activities! My kids love some time with playdough – its calming, fun, and can be used for almost any area of learning. Here’s one of the activities we did with our playdough last autumn. Minibeasts T had been learning about mini beasts at home. On our way home […]
Make Your Own Shadow Puppet Theatre
In November as part of T’s home education, we spent a couple of weeks exploring and investigating light and shadow. As part of this, we created our own shadow puppet theatre! Here’s how we did it. Choose a story First thing is to pick which story you want to perform at your theatre. This can […]
Risky Play: Worth the Risk?
We visited RHS Wisley this morning. There are many great things about it, but one of my favourite things is this den building area in the playground. They have two basic den structures, and a whole load of branches. These branches are BIG – I’m talking 6-8 feet – and heavy as well! The kids […]
- Outdoor Play
- ...
Chalk Number Formation Activity
Last year T was finding number formation quite a challenge. She had just turned five, so I wasn’t worried about it, but it was frustrating her as she wanted to get it right! I wanted to come up with some simple, fun ways to help her practise this skill. There are innumerable worksheets you can […]
- Play
- ...
The Theory of Loose Parts
What are Loose Parts? If you are someone who is interested in play, or early years education, then you may have come across the term Loose Parts. This is a term coined by architect Simon Nicholson in his 1971 article How NOT to Cheat Children: The Theory of Loose Parts. It can refer to both large, […]