Free Titantic education guide: Learn at home and away at the Titantic Musuem

free titanic education guide

We had an amazing time at the Titanic Museum in Branson.   We spent several hours there enjoying the interactive exhibits, beautiful recreations and learning more about the stories behind the people on board.   It is an amazing place for both children and kids, and honestly one of our favorite attractions while in Branson, MO with the grandparents during spring break.

Read our full reviews here — one from mom and one from dad.

But what we didn’t know until we got home was that the Titanic Museum also offers a free education guide online!   Using the Titanic Guide you can study the topics of language arts and social studies, science, geography, math, and religion.  There is even a special section for homeschooling as well as resources for teachers and parents.  Each one of them offers facts and figures as well as prompts to help you make learning these topics using the Titantic as a base.   For specific learning activities Continue Reading …

Pre-K: Three activities to help learn telephone numbers & addresses

If your pre-K (er) doesn’t already have their address and telephone number down “pat”  here are a few tips to make sure they do know them before they head off next year to Kindergarten.

Memorization:  We practice memorizing our address and telephone number in the car.  When you pull onto your street point out the street sign and repeat the name of your street.  When you pull into your driveway or park show your child the house or apartment number.

Making it fun:  Is there a little story you and your child can make up using your address and telephone number?  For example,

Once upon a time there was a boy named Scott who lived at _______________.  He loved dinosaurs. He loved them so much that one day while he was missing them because he was grocery shopping with mom he asked to call them.  He carefully dialed ________________ and . . . . . then you can go from there.

You can even print it up, making a book on the computer so your child can read their best seller over and over again.

Making it a game:  Those playing cards are good for so many things.  Place playing cards on the table and have your child “match” to their telephone number.  The first few times write your telephone number down on a piece of paper and have them arrange the playing cards in order to match it.  After awhile have them line the cards up without a prompt.

Reminders: 

Teach your child the area code with their telephone number.  Unfortunately you never know when the area code will be needed.

Talk to  your child about 911 during these learning sessions and remind them it is only for emergencies.

Include City and State (zip code can wait) when learning an address – but get the house number and street first.  Don’t be surprised if your child learns the street before the house number.

Celebrate your child’s achievement with this free printable award certificate!

 

Learning to cut exercise: Clipping coupons

Do you have a preschooler who is working on their skills using scissors?  I had one child absolutely determined to learn how to cut because for her it was a sign of being a big kid.  As parents and teachers we also know that learning to cut teaches hand eye coordination as well as some basic pre-writing skills (graphing, holding, following lines etc.)

There is one exercise at home that really helped out daughter learn how to cut using scissors.  Each Sunday afternoon we look through the coupons and clip them to use for our grocery and other shopping.  These are perfect for helping your child learn how to cut too.  Those dotted lines around the coupon images help your child learn to cut in a straight line as well as to follow directions. I recommend giving them the sheets of items you don’t plan on buying, that way if the scissors get carried away, it doesn’t matter what happens to the coupons.

My daughters think it’s great fun and it is absolutely helping with cutting skills.

Find out what you can do with those coupons that they have clipped here.

Review: Snip it, by Mead

Mead’s Early Snip It Stage 1 is a workbook containing sheets of paper with outline drawings for your child to use to learn to cut and practice their cutting skills.

Learning to cut is an important skill for children to master, but what I really like about this workbook is that it also teaches:

  • eye – hand coordination (as they learn to cut straight on the lines as well as assemble to “crafts)
  • fine motor skills including prewriting skills
  • learning visual boundaries
  • and learning or enforcing shape recognition

To be honest, the first couple of time I used the Snip it workbook I didn’t really appreciate it.  Since then I have had some more time to explore it and there are several different ways to use the book.

  1. Choose a sheet (say a rainbow).
  2. Have your child cut the picture out.
  3. Then cut some strips of colored paper from the back of the book. Cut them into tiny squares (more practice)
  4. Peel from the original picture and you will discover a sticky sheet. Fill in the sticky sheet with colored squares.
Other activities include cutting shapes out to assembly a picture (such as a caterpillar, boat or train) or cutting out shapes and finding where they belong in other scenes.
There are 34 activity sheets.
Now that I have spent some more time with the Snip it workbook by Mead I actually do better appreciate exactly what it can teach your child to do as well as reinforce some basic skills.  Because it’s in a nice workbook and some project require no glue we can even take it on the go to use at Grandma’s or at a restaurant while we wait for dinner and it makes a nice distraction that doesn’t make a great big mess.