Creative Ways to Use Cookie Cutters #2: Shape Books

April 20th, 2013

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This is the second idea in the blog series “Creative Ways to Use Cookie Cutters.” This time we are making a shape book. If you have younger kids, these shape books can encourage your young writers to write fun stories, descriptions, or summaries. For example, a child can draw (or cut out a small picture from a magazine) and describe a different flower on each page of her flower book.

Or your son could summarize the storybook, The Gingerbread Man. Each page can explain a part of the story where the gingerbread man kept telling each character that he couldn’t be caught. He is gobbled up by a fox at the end of the story, so the concluding shape book page can be funny, with cookie crumbs all over it and a fox licking his chops.

creative-ways-to-use-cookie-cutters-3Grab a card stock paper for your front and back covers, and using the cookie cutter as a stencil, use a pencil to trace around the inside of the cookie cutter. Do this to both pieces, and cut them out. Now use the card stock shape as a stencil, cutting a stack of 3-4 sheets of blank paper at a time, to make this process go faster. You can make the book as thick as you want, as long as the staples will go through it. Staple the book all the way through on the side or on the top. Two staples will make the book more sturdy than one staple, but I decided to staple the top of the gingerbread man with one staple through the top of the head, and it was fine.

Now give these cute books to your sweet, dear children. If you don’t have any children, give them away to a Sunday School class at church, for prizes. You can make a shape book of a lamb, and tell the story about how Christ came to earth to be our sacrificial lamb.

Stay tuned for “Creative Ways to Use Cookie Cutters #3.” Hint: This next idea will come in handy at your next tea party.

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Posted in Fun Spring Activities | 2 Comments »

Creative Ways to Use Cookie Cutters #1: Fruit Shapes

April 19th, 2013

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I’m starting a blog series called, “Creative Ways to Use Cookie Cutters.” The first way to use a cookie cutter in an unusual way is to cut fruit into the shape of the cookie cutter. If it’s winter, cut the fruit into snowflakes or gingerbread (fruit) men. If it’s autumn, cut the fruit into a maple leaf shape. If it’s spring or summer, use a flower cookie cutter.

When cutting melon, you need to cut from the side to get a piece flat enough to shove the cookie cutter through. Don’t just cut the melon like you normally would, or the melon will be curved and will look like a lousy wilted flower instead of a cheerful flower that’s not about to die.

I obviously cut the grapes in half for the center of the flowers; otherwise the silly grapes would have rolled off the flowers. I’ve seen flower stores selling fruit flowers stabbed into bamboo skewers, making a gorgeous edible bouquet. You can make these fruit flowers as fancy as you want.

Stay tuned for “Creative Ways to Use Cookie Cutters #2.” Hint: You can’t eat this one; it’s made out of two kinds of paper.

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Posted in Fun Spring Activities | 12 Comments »

Fun Ways to Overlearn Math

April 16th, 2013

Fun Ways to Overlearn Math

Before I dive into some fun ways to overlearn math, you might be asking, why do children need to overlearn math? And what does it mean to overlearn something? Overlearning means that a skill is practiced far beyond the point of initial mastery, to the point where the skill becomes automatic. You don’t want your children counting on their hands when taking their timed tests for college, and neither do you want them to get ripped off as adults because they do not have their basic math facts down cold.

Cheryl Lowe, the founder of Memoria Press, explains why overlearning is so vital, especially for math: “Math is systematic, organized, orderly, logical and cumulative. In a cumulative study, each skill builds upon the previous one; nothing can be forgotten; everything must be remembered… Math begins with memorization, computation, fractions, decimals, percent, word problems, and proceeds to problem solving, algebra, geometry, trig, and calculus. Math is hard because it builds so relentlessly year after year through every year of the child’s education. Any skill not mastered one year will make work difficult the next year. It is unforgiving. It has to be overlearned. That is why few students reach a high level in math. They reach a glass ceiling because the cumulative nature of the subject catches up with them. Eventually they are over their heads and quit.”

So how can you drill basic math facts in a way that the kids don’t get sick of it? Here are some fun ways to overlearn math:

  • Roll two dice and add, subtract, or multiply the numbers together. My kids loved doing this with extra-large foam dice that we rolled on the floor.
  • Jump up and down on a trampoline while shouting basic math facts. The movement of the body causes the mind to remember the facts more clearly later.
  • Make a large number line on the floor with construction paper and ask younger students to add and subtract by running the correct number of squares back and forth on the number line. You can also do this with skip counting, hopping over a square to count by two’s, or hopping over two squares to count by three’s.
  • Play games like Yahtzee to learn to add quickly, since each player must add the numbers on five dice every time it’s their turn.
  • Grab a deck of cards and make two piles, face down. Draw one card from each pile and add, subtract, or multiply the numbers.
  • Buy many-sided dice that are colorful, and have kids shake all the dice and add them up. Go around in a circle, to see who gets the highest points for each round.
  • Skip count using an abacus, pushing the beads across by three’s, or four’s, or five’s.
  • Grab a set of dominoes and add, subtract, or multiply the two numbers on each domino.
  • Place 4 matchbox cars in 8 plastic bags. Skip count by four’s by counting the bags. Place 9 matchbox cars in each bag. Now skip count by 9’s. (Use any toy or object to put in the bags.)

Overlearning math doesn’t have to be tedious, but it is necessary to help our children not to struggle with math in future years and on timed tests. Have your kids choose some of these hands-on ways to learn their basic math facts. Then give them timed drills, and reward each drill that they win with a special evening of fun for the family!

Related product: Overcoming Math Frustration

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Posted in Math | 17 Comments »

How to Make a Pop Bottle Bird Feeder

April 12th, 2013

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This is how to make a pop bottle bird feeder. We made one last night to attract more birds to our yard. For some reason we haven’t seen as many birds ever since we got a cat. But this handy-dandy bird feeder will bring back all those birds that came last time we made this popular feeder, when our boys were in Cub Scouts. These are the supplies you will need:

  • empty pop bottle with lid
  • bird seed mix
  • two wooden spoons (from dollar store)
  • sharp knife or razor blade
  • twine
  • large hook
  • funnel
  • drill (optional)

how-to-make-a-pop-bottle-bird-feeder-2Cut a slit for the wooden spoon, barely big enough to slide the spoon through. Cut a slit on the other side of the bottle, so that the spoon can come out the other side. Do the same with the second spoon, placing it at a right angle so that two birds can eat at the same time.

Fill the bottle with bird seed mix. Now make a hole right above the spoon, about 1/2 inch across, so that some seed will come out onto the spoon. Do the same to the other spoon. My husband said cutting the hole works better with the seeds inside the bottle, because the bottle is more sturdy and won’t collapse when you are trying to cut it.

You can drill two holes in the lid and put some twine through it, tying a knot on the inside so it won’t be seen. Or if you don’t have a drill, just tie the twine around the top of the bottle and hang it up on a hook right outside your window.

“How come the birds aren’t coming yet?” asked my daughter the next morning. She didn’t remember the last time we had a bird feeder. The birds fought over the bird seeds like they were starving, with the squirrels eating all the spilled leftovers.

“They need to find the bird feeder. Once they find it, they’ll come,” I said, trying to reassure her.

“Or maybe it’s because the cat is sitting under it,” I thought to myself…

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Posted in Charlotte Mason, Fun Spring Activities, Science | 10 Comments »

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