Science week

This week we have had a week of science.

Sounds a little sophisticated but really all we have done is played with things like magnets and magnifying glasses and carried out some cool experiments!

So here's how we did it.

I got the boys some simple and cheap magnifying glasses which they both instantly adored! They took them everywhere for two entire days and looked at everything through them. It's been fun and they have definitely learned about magnifying. They especially liked to magnify eyes!!!

I also got a pair of small binoculars but they were not that interested in them! I think it has something to do with the two eye coordination that makes it a harder process to see things. We still used them a few times and I spoke to them about distance and a little about perspective while they watched aeroplanes coming into land.

We looked at magnets. Mainly playing a fishing game I made for them but also talking about the positive and negative forces when they try to connect the wrong ends of the trains. This is an advanced concept which I don't expect them to take on board but it's helping my eldest to be less frustrated when the trains won't connect! So much easier when you can 'blame' science!

We have also done several experiments. Our first was with milk, food colouring and washing up liquid. This was really simple and fast so great for small children. We put a small amount of milk in a dish and added a couple of drops of two different coloured food colouring to the middle of the milk. I chose primary colours so that they would mix to make a different colour and my eldest son loved this as he has just realised how mixing two colours makes another. Finally we added a drop of washing up liquid and watched as the reaction from the milk with the washing up liquid drove the colours in a swirling motion around the dish. They finally mixed together, to the delight of my son, who required us to do the experiment four times before he was finished! Luckily it is a very small amount of milk needed for each go, so not too wasteful. Watch our video below

Our second experiment was a volcano! It was a much longer process to get to the actual experiment but one which was thoroughly enjoyed. First our son was watching a BBC documentary on earth and volcanoes and was really into it, so we decided to make a clay volcano. While it was drying we made grass using a mixture of blue and yellow playdough. We made a river with some of the blue playdough and he put some of his dinosaurs around. All of this was set up on cardboard.

Once the volcano was hard we added bicarbonate of soda, washing up liquid and red and yellow food colouring. Then, camera ready, we added vinegar to make the eruption.....

Watch the video here

Our final experiment was some foaming eggs. This idea came from funathomewithkids.com and although tricky to create, was great fun for the boys to watch. We even added some star sequins to make them sparkly inside! 

Watch our video here

Number week

Sometimes I like to focus our activities around a theme. We have had colour days where we use one colour in as many ways as possible - green paint, playdough, duplo blocks etc. This week I decided to up this idea and have a week completely focused on the number 1-10. It has been lots of fun so far and we're only half way through. And the bonus of this is that my 17 month old is wandering around saying 'two, two' and my 3 year old is learning to recognise all the numbers both in quantities and in figures, and counting 1-10 and 10-1. For me it makes the activities even more interesting as i'm consciously thinking of ways to adapt our routine to include numbers!

So here's how we've been doing it.

On Monday I saw a blog which had number monsters and thought they looked great so we set off to make them. The boys had a great time sticking bits on the monsters and then posting numbers through as I counted. We have progressed to putting odd numbers written on one colour and even numbers on another but there are so many variations we will be able to play with them for a long time.

We had some sponge letters and numbers so our painting this week has involved the number one and seeing if they can identify which number they are using. 

Our baking has incorporated number bread which we formed ourselves. The boys rolled out long sausage shapes and I showed them how to make them into numbers. They were both really happy to able to make number 1 themselves and the eldest did try a few others by folding his sausage shape. Next we moved on to number cookies. I have cake cutter numbers which are a great size to make the little cookies (as they want to eat one of each number). When they were ready I got the eldest to match the cookies with the written number and we counted them. He loved that he could then eat all of them and has asked to repeat this activity again and again (I'm looking into what I can substitute to make this a slightly healthier game). The final number activity we did with food was to cut out the numbers from ham and cheese. In the end they had a plate full of bread ham and cheese numbers and we used sweetcorn and carrot stick to put under each number. The whole lunch was number madness finished off with the cookies!

We have also looked at dice (both with dots and numbers up to 12) playing simple games of how many steps they can take to reach a finish line by throwing the dice. I had some math counters so the eldest enjoyed looking at these and learning about one's, ten's and hundred's although this is just to get him familiar with the material and vocabulary as the concept is much more advanced. He enjoyed building mini towers with them and we did some counting and placing them next to numbers.

I also made some number rods. these are a material used by the Montessori method. Mine were very simply made of cardboard and paint but as a first contact they worked out ok and my son was excited to get the longest ones and leave me the shortest ones. Again he counted the colours and discussed the length so lots of mathematical language happening. There is a tutorial on how to use number rods here.

Overall it's been so much fun and the boys have enjoyed all the activities. My 3 year old even managed to write some numbers using lines for 1's and o for 0's. He was really into doing this and spent a while using different coloured paper and pencils. 

At no point am I forcing them to learn just letting it happen through fun games and activities. Even if they don't learn much it's been a great week and one we are sure to repeat :)