January 2008
Large gap here due to new year and Deruni's birthday. Not that we didn't do anything, just that I didn't have time to write any of it up. I can't remember much of what we did either so I can't write it now.
23-01-2008: Added the flag of Madagascar to our world map. Read "Mission to Madagascar" by... . Related activities would be to watch the movie "Madagascar" or go to the zoo to see the lemurs. We've done both of these things so many times that extra work on Madagascar seems futile. Coloured an Aye-Aye lemur. Painted a b'day card for Denali's friend Sarah. Wrote the number "5" by joining dots.
25-01-2008:
28-01-2008: Used scrabble tiles to spell "Denali", "Deruni", "Vinita", and "Sen". Denali can now recognise a capital "D", "E", and "A" without a problem. (Noticed on 29th that she could recognise an "S" too). Denali practised her motor skills cutting out pictures from magazines. She's getting very good with the sissors. Wrote the letter "J" first on dotted lines and then free hand. Coloured in a Jet. Denali did some drawing.
29-01-2008: Denali drew a picture of the family. Now her people have noses and hair, some have something that looks like glasses. Coloured a picture of an ink bottle and wrote "i" first on dotted lines and then free hand. Read science book about amphibians (went to see the elephant seals at Ano Nuevo SP on Saturday so this was great) and mammals and the life cycle of frogs.
30-01-2008: Cut out pictures from magazines. Did a science lesson from the third book in the series. It was on clothes, when we wear what and what materials they are made of. Tied in the wool to a bob the builder episode we had recently watched where the sheep get shorn and to a puppet play they watched (in German) "Rumplestiltskin" where he spins straw to gold. Used the activity book that comes with the newer version of the science book. It was a hit. No colours in the book just black and white outlines and lots of small pictures to colour. Perfect for Denali. Matched clothes to the places on the body that they are worn and completed a puzzle where we had to figure out what a little boy would wear to the playground. Read a book. Talked about names that begin with "S". Came up with quite a few and then moved on to objects. Looked up "S" in the alphabet book and coloured a sun. Denali joined dots to make the "s"s and then wrote one free hand. Was pretty good. Cut out and coloured the flag of Sri Lanka for our map.