Book Review : Handa's Surprise

~Medha is 3 years old~

I must thank Devaki from Little Reader's Nook for recommending this book in her story sessions. Not only Medha, even I loved this book a lot. This is such cute and sweet story. You must not miss this book for your kids.

Title : Handa's Surprise

Author : Eileen Browne
Age : 2-6 years
Pages : 32
Publisher : Candlewick

Medha Update

The people who follow my blog from beginning they already know that I believe Montessori Curriculum which basically allows kids to learn on their own pace. And in this, kid learns everything with play. 

I can proudly say that whatever Medha learnt till date, it's purely by PLAY. I never asked her to recite /read aloud any letters, numbers or any things. I just planned few activities from the ideas I got from various websites and other internet resources etc. She learnt all her letters, numbers, counting, sorting, and whatever she knew now is purely by PLAY.  That much I love MONTESSORI. 

And to continue same in her early years of education, we decided upon few Montessori Schools and joined her in Roots Montessori, IndiraNagar, Bangalore. But as montessori starts at 2 years 6 months, Medha is little late for Mont 1. (Nursery in usual terms) hence after speaking with management, I joined her in the school from Feb 1st itself. So that she can do the Mont 1 activities for another 6 months until she is 3.5 years and can continue to further levels. 

So far a week, Medha cried on the first day though school is not a new thing for her (she was going to a play school from past 7 months) as she was seeing all new faces. She was in school only for half an hour and then we came back. 

But after coming home, I told her that it's similar to her old school. My Little baby, I don't know how much she understood. But she didn't cry even once from second day. She loved the school as they have various varieties of Montessori toys. Way to Go Medha!! Hope you will love this school much more and enjoy your schooling. :) 

Book Review : Where's that cat?

~Medha is 35.5 months old~

Last week, we are talking about Farm Animals a lot, then I was searching for some simple books that involved animals, then I came across this simple yet beautiful book from Tulika Publishers.

The cover is pretty simple a picture of an innocuous orange cat looking out of the curtain and I am sure every one will like the text with humorous illustrations.

Title : Where's that Cat?

Author : Manjula Padmanabhan
Age : 3+
Pages : 20
Publisher : Tulika Books

Play dough Moldings

To improve her finger muscle strength and her fine motor skills, I have thought of this activity and she spent nice 2 hours of time with this.

I gave her a batch of play dough and the plastic mould trays I received as part of Mould n Paint Kit by ToyKraft and asked her to make the moulds with play dough.

She liked the idea and started doing it immediately.

This has following benefits :

• Working with clay improves dexterity and uses both small and large muscles. Children use their arms, back and shoulders to mold clay. 
• Working with clay also increases a child’s eye-hand coordination.
• Self-pride of creating shapes using the molds. 
• Filling the molds gives enough exercise to the fingers and hands.

This can be tried with younger kids too with the supervision of not putting clay in the mouth. 

Splendid Sites : Littlefingers.com

The Splendid Sites feature is designed to help you find fun and safe websites to visit with your toddler and kids. Some of the sites are educational in nature and some are just plain fun! If this is your first time visiting, be sure to check out some of the toddler websites that we've featured in the past.

Little Fingers is a website that develops software for children PreK up to 5th grade. While the company has a lot of software that you can purchase, they also have some fun games that you can play for free online.

** Note: Adobe Shockwave required to run online games. **

Sensory Play, Is this Really Necessary?

If you frequent kids activity blogs, you know that “sensory play” has been a hot topic for quite awhile now. There are even entire websites devoted to sensory play for your tots, and while they are super fun to read and full of creative (and sometimes elaborate) ideas, you may find yourself asking, “Is all this REALLY necessary for my child’s development?”

So this post is written as per the research I did on Sensory play in the internet and from the experience of doing one sensory tub activity with Medha.

Book Review : Chocolate Mousse for Greedy Goose

~Medha is 35.5 months old~

Having previously read few other titles by Julia Donaldson, I decided to try and locate another one of her books and across this one. I bought this from PassaroBooks for 150/-. 

The cover is pretty simple with the title and an illustration. The illustration; a goose holding a bowl of mousse, perfectly depicts the title. It gives young readers the chance to look at the picture and link them to the words of the title, a good way of young readers creating an understanding that words have meaning. 

Title : Chocolate Mousse For Greedy Goose

Author : Julia Donaldson
Pages : 24
Publisher : Macmillan Children's Books

Flinto : January Theme - Wild Life Safari

Animals, Zoo, Safari Trips - which kid doesn't like these? I am sure they are one of their favorite things for every kid. This month, Flinto Theme is based on Wild Life Safari. Oh My God, I must say they have picked up the activities very beautifully for this month.

Sneak-peak of the Wild Life Safari Theme Flinto Box contents is here.

Book Review : That's Not My Bunny!!

Touch and Feel Books are must try-out books for babies and toddlers. They respond especially well to books which feature different fabrics, textures and surfaces. These can be particularly good for stimulating the various senses. These books can help young children to collect information and explore the things through their fingers. These are perfect for discussing descriptive words like "SOFT", "BUMPY", "SHINY" etc. 

The prime age for touch and feel books is from toddler-preschool. Because these books are aimed specifically at helping children develop knowledge while increasing the use of their senses, appeal is lost to older generations who more than likely already possess the skills being taught. One of the key advantages to teaching senses and vocabulary through the use of touch and feel books is the connection a child can gain by instantly being rewarded with the texture which the word describes.

We read few Touch and Feel books from library earlier, but this is the first one we bought especially from Usborne's "That's not my....." series. 

Title : That's not my bunny

Author :  Fiona Watt, Rachel Wells

Publisher : Usborne Books

Splendid Sites : LiteracyCenter.net

The Splendid Sites feature is designed to help you find fun and safe websites to visit with your toddler and kids. Some of the sites are educational in nature and some are just plain fun! If this is your first time visiting, be sure to check out some of the toddler websites that we've featured in the past.

LiteracyCenter.net is a site that is devoted to helping children learn to read. 

“At the LiteracyCenter.Net, we believe that learning to read in a first language should be as natural as learning to speak. All research at the Literacy Center begins with parents and teachers because no one knows better what children need than those who love them and teach them.”

Splendid Sites - Fun With Spot

The Splendid Sites feature is designed to help you find fun and safe websites to visit with your toddler and kids. Some of the sites are educational in nature and some are just plain fun! If this is your first time visiting, be sure to check out some of the toddler websites that we've featured in the past.

If your child loves the Spot book series by Eric Hill, then you will enjoy the website based on the cute little dog! The site provides some great activities for kids and also resources for parents.

Online sites we buy kid's books

If we have to buy books online, I am sure most of us prefer Amazon, Flipkart or Infibeam. Recently I have come across following sites too. Please do check these and avail benifits if you like.

Kutoohala : 

A space with exclusive children's books, toys, parent and child workshops and story telling sessions. Checkout their website to see the subset of their collection of used books and new books. You will definitely love this as you can get international authors used books in a reasonable price. They have added only subset of books in their website, if you are in Bangalore, please visit their store to see full range of their book collection. I haven't been there to see their full collection.

I have bought around 5-6 used books along with few CBT publications books through their online site. Though they're used,  condition is good.

PassaroBooks :

It started recently, in 2013, with the objective of offering low cost, high quality Pre-owned imported (UK/US) books to the Indian public.They also have (new) activity books, children’s books (Geronimo Stilton, Hardy Boys, Diary of a Wimpy kid) etc of Indian editions from various publications. 

I had bought around 30+ costly books at a reasonable price from them. And condition of books is almost like NEW.

Pappadum : 

It is co-founded by Priyanka Raghunath and Harini Lakshminarayan and offers us eco-friendly range of products for children aged 0-5. There is clothing, books and stationery, toys and much more. They do have a unique collection of books like Olivia books etc. But they don't have a catalogue to browse through. You have to check their pinterest board here to see the books and they are very friendly and prompt in responding to your queries on price and availability of books. 

And I keep updating this post whenever I come across such sites. Keep browsing and get your kid reading wide collection of books. 

Science Experiments : Disolving sugar at different heat levels

~Medha is 26 months old~

Learn about solutions as you add more and more sugar cubes to different temperature water. This easy experiment shows that you can only dissolve a certain amount and that this changes as the water gets hotter.

What you'll need:

• Sugar
• Cold water in a clear glass 
• Hot water in a clear glass (be careful with the hot water) 
• Spoon for stirring 

Book Review : Postman Bear

~Medha is 33.5 months old~

Received this book as part of Little Reader's Nook December kit. And also Devaki mentioned that all Julia Donaldson's "Acorn Wood" series are beautiful for younger kids.

Title : Postman Bear

Author :  Julia Donaldson

Pages : 14
Publisher : Macmillan Children's Books

Website Review : Peekuboo

Peekuboo is a FREE interactive site for toddlers and parents that has online books that your child can read through. There are a variety of books and games.

Review : My Little Chatter Box - Tale In A Mail

After subscribing to Little Reader's Nook, I had came across My Little Chatter Box (MLCB) "Tale In a Mail" box. This is also just similar to Little Reader's Nook. Their each box will have 3 books, some activity cards, and some information cards about the books. 

I thought of subscribing to this too as I really impressed with the books they are selecting for each theme every month. Some of my close friends asked me to know do I need to subscribe to 2 when both are same? I had thought about this lot of times and finally decided to go ahead for 2 reasons: 

• Medha loves books and lot of books. We read again and again at least 10 books per a month. 
• Both subscription boxes are different in terms of the themes and books they select.

Pattern Match Activity

Pattern Match is an engaging pattern matching exercise for kids. It is designed to enable children to learn and grasp the concepts of patterns and sequencing in a fun way. In this simple exercise, kids study the given pattern and identify the missing shape or symbol, to complete the sequence. This exercise will help to lay the foundation for logical thinking as well as teach kids the names of some basic colors, shapes and symbols. It will help to reinforce the child’s understanding of the basic concepts of maths.

I wanted Medha to do some pattern making activities hence I thought of creating some pattern cards myself instead of buying. I was thinking which would be good to start with pattern make. Then I remembered the wooden shapes pieces puzzle bought recently. 

Book review : Hippo has a hat

~Medha is 33.5 months old~

One of my new friend, Rajeswari, suggested this book for Medha as it's a big hit for her daughter. As this book is also from Julia Donaldson, the author of Room On the Broom book, without second thought I ordered this book for Medha. OMG, how I missed this book all these days. I should have own this book right from when Medha is a toddler.  Better than never, here is our review. 

Title : Hippo Has A Hat

Author :  Julia Donaldson

Publisher : Macmillan Children\'s Books (2010)

Book Review : What Makes a Rainbow?

~Medha is 32.5 months old~

I received this book from Devaki, as part of Little Reader's Nook November kit. This book is also called as MAGIC RIBBON BOOK. I must thank her for this beautiful book as part of kit. Medha loves this book and calls this as Color Ribbon Book. :) 

Title : What Makes a Rainbow?
Author : Betty Ann Schwartz

Publisher : Piggy Toes Press
No. of Pages : 14

Learning Letters Game

~Medha is 33.5 months old~

The people who was reading my blog from beginning already knows that Medha had learned all the alphabets and numbers mostly by playing matching games. Here is another variety of matching letters. 

To play this matching game, you'll need:

• Post-it notes
• An ABC poster or floor mat (We used our foam floor mat, but a poster on the Wall would work as well)