Category Archives: parenting

early education & play, parenting, Uncategorized

Love to Learn on CBeebies

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I don’t generally recommend young children learn by watching television but I am human and like the rest of us appreciate a bit of respite from time to time.  Now that my 3 year old no longer naps during the day, after a busy  morning at playgroup an hour watching television helps her to relax.  I don’t agree with young children watching commercial channels so always put my trust in CBeebies.

The quality of the early learning programming is generally of a high standard and well researched, we particularly like Something Special and Driver Dan’s Storytrain (especially as we are on the lookout for the episodes featuring her big sister).

At the end of February CBeebies are launching a new cluster of programming entitled  Love to Learn. This will bring together a number of programmes, which are designed to give the younger members of the CBeebies audience an introduction to literacy and numeracy. Programmes will include the new shows, Numtums and The Lingo Show, alongside new episodes of established favourites Alphablocks and Abadas. These programmes will be scheduled together allowing children to have fun while they learn their letters and get to know their numbers.
The Numtums  are cuddly Numbats (rare marsupial, native to Western Australia) each with a number on their tummy. Combining a troop of animated Numtums, children, sing-along songs and a distinctive, mixed-media style, the programme introduces the basics of number recognition and then gently moves on to counting objects and identifying amounts in a variety of fun scenarios. The series is reminiscent of the animated snippets that were a key feature of my favourite children’s programme, Sesame Street. I’m sure these will keep the children engaged and make learning fun.
I’m really looking forward to The Lingo Show .  This began life a year ago as an online brand to introduce children to a variety of languages.  It is a long time since I visited the CBeebies website, so I wasn’t aware it existed but I was very excited to see that the languages featured include Welsh. Growing up in Wales I have a very basic knowledge  of the Welsh language, but my children were captivated.  My 7 year old even wrote down a list of words to remember ( we looked at the food section). The variety of languages featured include Polish, Somali and Punjabi and this could be a really useful resource for nursery workers to learn basic vocabulary when teaching children with an additional language. The TV series will continue to introduce children to words in different languages – specifically French, Spanish and Mandarin .
The episodes see host bug Lingo send Mandarin bug Wei, Spanish bug Queso and French bug Jargonaise off into the real world to choose everyday objects and props to include in their grand finale – The Big Bug Show. Each episode focuses on one language, introducing children to six key words, plus examples of everyday vocabulary like ‘hello’, ‘thank you’ and ‘well done’. There are opportunities for children to develop both speaking and listening skills as they are encouraged to repeat words with the bugs, voiced by native speakers of the target language.  I’m  definitely    going to make time to  watch  this with the kids.

The new episodes of Alphablocks are in a slighter longer  format than in the past and will continue to use best-practice phonics teaching to help young children develop engagement and confidence with reading and making words.  For those unfamiliar with the series  Alphablocks are 26 living letters who fall out of the sky and discover that if they hold hands and make a word, it comes to life.

Abadas  aims  to help children to learn new vocabulary that corresponds to objects they come across in their everyday lives.
The new episodes feature the familiar fun faces of Hari the hippo, Ela the fox and Seren the bat (all with Welsh accents) who come to life when a pop-up book is opened. Once the book is opened, the Abadas’ world comes alive and it’s playtime for the three adventurers. Through these adventures the Abadas encourage the young audience to re-tell a story and be able to ask questions and tell others what they have learned.
The season of programming will also include repeats of the popular numbers series Numberjacks.

I hope that by scheduling these programmes together, children will become naturally inquisitive  about letters and numbers. The 5 minute programmes are perfect for young children’s attention spans and this short concentrated burst of literacy and numeracy programmes could serve as a great introduction to other hands on activities. Pre-school children do not need to learn to read, write and count but the programmes could introduce the concepts without any pressure. Take the lead from your child, if they are showing an interest you can develop it further.  The Grown Ups section of the CBeebies website has excellent articles about how to support your child’s early learning including phonics , numeracy, story telling and mark making and includes many additional activities. Over the next few weeks I will also be sharing literacy and numeracy ideas here. If there are any particular areas you would like inspiration for add a comment and I will follow it up.

The Love to Learn programmes will be on air from 27th February every weekday on CBeebies. The scheduling is 09:00 Numtums

09:05 Numberjacks

09:20 Alphablocks

09:25 Abadas .

The Lingo Show will air sometime during March.

The timings are perfectly placed just after the school run , before we go out and explore  numeracy and literacy in everyday situations.

parenting

Mums and Part-Time Work

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I was interested to read today about the latest Netmums survey and campaign regarding mums and part-time work.

Netmums surveyed 1600 mums who work part-time. 70% of the women surveyed chose freely to work part-time and 93% of those had worked full-time before having children.

However, half of the women reported that they had taken lower skilled jobs when returning to work part-time.

Part-time work tends to be concentrated in low paid and low skilled jobs, where opportunities for progression may be limited. Many mums complained about being held back by working part-time:

This certainly matches my own experience.  I was fortunate after my first child to be able to return to work part-time on a freelance consultancy basis.  I worked as part of a senior advisory teaching team for the local authority, the pay was good and I had the opportunity to spend time with my daughter.  However, it was not without its pitfalls.  The other members of my team worked full-time and on permanent contracts.  This meant that many of the perks were not offered to me (including much coveted trips to Reggio and the Forest Schools in Denmark).  I didn’t get a local authority email address meaning my emails often didn’t reach the people I needed to contact and no mobile phone or laptop like the rest of my team. The biggest drawback however was the lack of maternity pay – as a freelancer I was only entitled to statutory maternity pay.

Okay, so many of these disadvantages were because I was a freelancer but I see my desire to remain part-time as a big disadvantage. Since having my 2 youngest children I haven’t returned to work.  The freelance work dried up with the budget cuts and I find myself in a difficult position.  I could take up a part-time classroom teachers post or become a supply teacher but I would see this as a step backwards. With my experience and qualifications I would expect at the very least to be a Foundation Stage Co-ordinator or a Children’s Centre Lead Teacher.  The difficulty is that once you begin to look at senior/management positions it becomes difficult to share that job with someone else and work on a part-time basis.

I don’t think this is uncommon.  I meet talented, well qualified women all the time who work on the checkout at Waitrose. Those that try to work full-time or cram 5 days work into 4, only to end up feeling like inadequate mums.  Some even give up altogether. I met a mother  who had  recently achieved a 1st Class  Law Degree.  When looking for jobs she was told that as a single mum she really needed to question whether this was the right profession for her because of the long unpredictable hours.

I find myself in a position of frustration that all my experience and knowledge is not being put to good use. I chose to be a mum, but I would like to strike a balance between being there for my children and having something fulfilling for me, without feeling like my years of study and experience have been wasted.  If I didn’t feel this way I could get a low skilled, low paid job but it would be difficult to pay the childcare for 2 under 5’s .

Am I being unrealistic in my expectations? Do I need to bite the bullet and make a decision to return to work full-time or work part-time in a less fulfilling job?

I’d be interested to hear what other mums think.

parenting

The Happiness Project

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mother kissing babyThis week Kate at Kate Takes 5 has been asking the question

What makes you happy?

As adults this is often a difficult question to answer so Kate asked her children.  She has requested that other bloggers do likewise and share their responses over on her blog.

I asked my 7 year old and 3 year old.  I would have deliberated over this question for some time, analysing the true nature of happiness.  When I asked the girls their immediate responses surprised me .

My 7 year old replied

I’m happy when I know that there is someone there who loves me .

My 3 year olds response was

I’m happy when someone kisses me.

Appropriately there seems to be a bit of a Valentine’s theme to my girls measure of happiness.  No mention of material possessions or fun things to do; happiness is about being loved.  They are probably right – life without love is a pretty miserable existence.

I’ll be interested to read what other children think, perhaps it will make us take a step back to re-evaluate what is important in life.

early education & play, parenting, Uncategorized

Monsters and Imaginary Friends – Back with a Vengeance.

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imaginary friends

A while ago I wrote about my middle daughter’s pre-occupation with monsters in Monsters and Imaginary Friends.

The monsters haven’t gone away.  In fact we have more monsters now, her sister has her own monsters that sometimes come out at night to steal her things.  There are monsters that come if we can’t leave the big light on in her bedroom.  Sometimes there are nice monsters who help people , they are called names like fluffy and softy.

The imaginary friends have also developed to become a permanent fixture in our house.  It began with Emily.  Emily would regularly come for a sleepover and often it is Emily’s birthday. Emily’s story has become more elaborate, she now has a brother called Jack who often visits too and today we were introduced to a host of pets (3 dogs and 5 cats).  In the car a few days ago I was told that Emily’s mum and dad were dead and so she lives with her nanny and grandad.

I love the way that the stories are evolving, it shows how her imagination is developing and that she is beginning to understand the conventions of storytelling. Interestingly she sometimes tells me that Emily is just pretend.

A new study into imaginary friends at the University of Durham cited that children with imaginary friends are usually aware that others can’t see them and it is  the child’s behaviour  that makes other people  aware of their existence.   The imaginary friend  helps children to know that their knowledge is privileged.

The researchers presented children aged 4 -8 years with cards on which they wrote their own name, mum or dad and their teachers name. They then had 3 boxes, a large one labelled knows a lot, medium sized box labelled knows a little and a small box labelled doesn’t know anything.  The children were given questions such as

When you are ill how much does your mum know about you being ill?

When you are ill how much do you know about being ill?

The children with imaginary friends were most likely to describe themselves as having the most knowledge.  Having an imaginary friend gives children opportunities for self-examination.  The children with imaginary friends saw themselves as an authority on interior aspects of self such as dreaming and on those which adults could judge (illness, hunger and having fun). It could be that imaginary friends help children to understand that their internal world is private. (Davis,Paige, Elizabeth 2011).

If this is the case then how much more is going on in her little head that she decides not to share? A wonderful reason to get 3 year olds to start telling and recording stories.

parenting, Uncategorized

Dads Don’t Do Housework

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I have a new post for the Huffington Post Dads Don’t Do Housework.

This is a quote from my 7 year old daughter – I’d like to change her perception of what men and women do so I’d love some comments about dads that do housework.

Comments welcome here or on the Huffington Post site.

early education & play, parenting, Special Educational Needs

How to Encourage your Child to Wear an Eye Patch

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child with eye patchMy 3 year old has been wearing glasses for a couple of months.  She is long sighted and has a turn.  We were told some time ago that she may have to wear an eye patch and at our latest hospital appointment this was confirmed.

Since we were aware that she may have to wear a patch, we have been preparing her by reading the book The Pirate of Kindergarten (Richard Jackson Books (Atheneum Hardcover))

In the book the main character Ginny wears a cool, black Pirate eye patch.  My daughter has taken this book to pre-school and the childminder and liked the idea of being  a Pirate.  When the ophthalmologist put a patch on her eye it wasn’t like this at all, it was white, adhesive backed and she has to wear it under her glasses.

She has to wear it for 2 hours a day but was very scared when I  first tried to encourage her to wear it.

But I don’t like it.  I won’t be able to see properly if I wear an eye patch.

On the first day we managed 15 minutes with a lot of encouragement.  First port of call bribery,

If you wear it for a whole week I will buy you a special treat.

This helped us through the first hurdle of getting it on.

Secondly, reassurance; we sat together watching her favourite programme and had cuddles whilst I told her how brave she was.  After 15 minutes we removed it.

I have a friend whose daughter wears an eye patch, I asked her advice.  She said that she always reinforced the idea that by wearing the eye patch the other eye would get really strong.

I tried this and lo and behold it worked.  On day 2 she managed to wear it for an hour. When she removed it she said

My eye is really strong now.

Other tips 

  • Use a timer or set the duration of an activity or television programme as the point at which the patch is removed.
  • Do something that the child really enjoys when wearing the eye patch.  We have watched favourite programmes whilst having a cuddle, read stories and made a farm from cardboard boxes.  I ask ‘what would you like to do when you have your eye patch on?’
  • Decorate the patch.  The ophthalmologist gave us a book that featured children wearing patterned patches. Our patches are not patterned but they include stickers to decorate them .  Some of these are white for the children to colour in. I suggested my daughter decorate the patch with felt pens when she was colouring the sticker. Next time we are shopping I am going to let her choose stickers for the patch, some sparkly gemstones might go down well.
  • Keep reinforcing how brave they are, we all give her lots of attention when she is wearing it which she loves and constantly remind her that she is making the other eye really strong.
  • Let them choose when they want to wear it.

By day 3 she kept it on for 3 hours and wore it to her friend’s house.  On day 4 she woke up and said

Shall I put my eye patch on?

Do you want to?

Yes

She decorated her patch put it on before the school run and kept it on all morning which included a visit to softplay.  She isn’t worried about other children’s reactions (possibly helped by the book) and hasn’t had a negative reaction yet. I think if we customise it to the limit other children might even be jealous.

parenting, review, Uncategorized

Butlins Minehead Resort

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In my previous post I reviewed Christmas at Butlins.  Our wonderful family break at Butlins involved lots of activities that were not unique to Christmas.  Here I will explain what made Butlins such a great family holiday.

parenting, review, risk taking, UK

Climbing the Walls at Butlins

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On our recent visit to Butlins Minehead Resort, climbing seemed to be a recurrent theme.

My eldest daughter went on the zip wire and climbed the climbing wall with her dad. She had been very excited about climbing the climbing wall since she had seen it in the brochure. This was a real challenge but the instructors were excellent and with a bit of help from dad she made it to the top. The climbing wall, rope course and zip wire incur an additional charge but worth it for adventurous kids.

Not to be outdone by her sister my 3 year old climbed the tree climb.  She had been asking to have a go throughout the whole break and we finally relented.  The children have 3 attempts at reaching the top and ringing the bell and the fastest time of the day wins a cuddly parrot.  My eldest reached the top all 3 times.  We were howevever, disappointed that it didn’t appear that her time was being recorded anywhere. I didn’t think my 3 year old would get very far but I think you’ll agree that she did brilliantly.

In fact I think if she hadn’t have looked down she would have made it to the top.

Butlin’s climbing wall is suitable for children and adults aged 8+, the tree climb located in the Skyline Pavilion is suitable for any age.

parenting

The Tattooed Babies

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Me the Man and the Baby are currently running a competition entitled ‘the messiest kids’.  I couldn’t resist entering knowing that I have this amazing picture.

 This is my entry to the Appliances Online messiest kids competition, check out all the other entries over on Me, The Man & The Baby‘.

My 7 year old likes to draw tattoos on her legs with gel pens, some of them are very intricate and beautiful sketches of flowers, fairies and animals.  One afternoon I had left the 2 youngest alone for 10 minutes whilst I was tidying my bedroom when I heard the baby shouting.  I went downstairs to see what the problem was and was greeted by this.  My 3 year old thought it was a lovely idea to use a blue permanent marker pen to draw tattoos all over herself and her sister.  The baby had scribbles on her head, legs and belly (including colouring in her belly button) and back, and the 3 year old was covered from head to toe.messy baby

They were both scrubbed in the bath but the baby had a blue head for about a week after!

Different ways of mark making are encouraged in our house and I love it when the kids are creative, but this wasn’t quite what I had in mind.

Note to self – don’t leave pens in reach of a 3 year old.

competition, review, Uncategorized

The Land of Sometimes – Review and Competition

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The first thing that struck me when this cd arrived was the beautiful packaging.   The Land of Sometimes moves away from  standard cd casing, instead presenting it as a book  with captivating illustrations. Each song has an illustrated page in the storybook encouraging the children to follow the story. I had high hopes that the songs would also reflect the magical quality of the artwork.

The Land of Sometimes is an audio storybook and the characters are brought to life by original music. The story follows Alfie and Elise in their journey through the seasons.  They meet a number of colourful characters, and each one is brought to life with a song. The narration is simple and clear and the quality of singing and musical production superb.  I’d love to sing on the follow up if there is one. My 3 year old is a big musical theatre fan and she loved the songs dancing around her bedroom and attempting to sing along.

I generally find children’s song cd’s a bit irritating.  I have been playing The Land of Sometimes in the background while I write this post and it is surprisingly relaxing. The songs are well written and very catchy and move away from the simplicity of some children’s songs by introducing them to a number of musical genre including reggae, folk and jazz.

Put this one in your car and I’m sure you will be singing along in no time.

The Land of Sometimes website is also worth a visit. Children can find out more about the characters and places in the story, colour in some of the beautiful illustrations and download lyrics for the songs.

A beautiful gift for any child with a fondness for stories or music and something that can be treasured for a long time.

The Land of Sometimes is released on February 6th at a retail price of  £9.90 from Amazon.

One lucky reader can win a copy of The Land of Sometimes.

Simply post a comment telling me why you would like to win.

A Bonus entry is available if you follow my Facebook page using the link on the right hand side.

Winners will be drawn at random on 6th February.

Congratulations to the winner Sue Willshee

Terms and Conditions

This competition is only open to residents of the UK and Republic of Ireland

Only one entry per person

Winners will be notified by email and  will be posted on this site.

Loquax Competitions