Day 3 aka my BIRTHDAY!!

We won't dwell on the fact that it is my 29th birthday. (tee-hee) Instead I will show you what the kids did on day 3 of Delk Summer School.

The first thing we did today was go outside to play. If I had known it was going to be such a nice morning, we would have packed up and gone to the zoo. Maybe tomorrow. Instead, we took out the sidewalk chalk and had some fun.



All just as happy as pigs in slop.



Abby made pictures of giraffes, lions, and bears. Of course you would need a very active imagination to recognize them, but we all "ooohed" and "aahhhed" over them. Andy went behind Abby and Ike and added his own embellishments to their pictures.



Isaac spelled "pop tarts" all by himself!

After we went inside, we started on our project of colors- Matching games!

Preparation for the lesson began last night when Abby and I visited the Lowes and Home Depot. We had to go find some 'colors'. Meaning we had to go find some fabulous paint samples.
*The idea actually came from a blog I read called "Momtessori". You can find the link to it on my information page, I think. She is a stay-at-home mom that used to teach in the Montessori setting. Now she shares her great ideas on her web page.*

So, Abby and I set out to find some great colors for our project today. And boy, did we find some great stuff! And, the best part, THEY ARE FREE!! I love cheap entertainment!



Did you know that Disney made paint? Me neither! Of course, Abby had to have some of these. The key when you are getting paint samples: always get more than one. We turned these "Mickey Mouse colors" (as Abby called them) into a matching game!




Laid out and ready to play. Ike and Abby really enjoyed the game. Andy played twice then went to play with his trains.



Abby made a match with reds.



Andy made a match with oranges. You can't really tell, but trust me.

Here is a video of us playing. I know I probably sound a little uptight in the video, but I'd like to remind you- I'm anal like that.




They had a really good time and I promised them that Daddy would play with them later tonight.

But wait! There's more! I made another matching game that tests to see if the kids can match capital and lower case letters. I started out writing the alphabet on the paint samples like this...



Then I cut them apart like this...



Kids can match the capital letter to the lower case letter and check their work by making sure the colors match.
When I had Isaac play this the first time, I separated the colors- blues, reds, yellows, etc. He only matched a set at a time. Starting slow is good.



Isaac was very proud of his finished product.



So, all in all it was an eventful day. I still have more paint samples that I am waiting to use. I haven't decided how to use them. The Momtessori site suggested using them to teach sequencing; lightest to darkest and so on.

I thought about doing what I did with the alphabet cards, only having them match numbers to the number names. (1 : one) Or colors to color names. (red card to the word 'red') We'll see. As long as the kids are having a good time, that's all that matters.

Oh, and one more thing.... HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!