08 December 2008

Tot School

For Tot School this week, I decided to continue with A and Red, since last week was short with Thanksgiving and all.

Monday, however, was Russian day.  Isaiah's nanny Julia was able to come again at last!  She doesn't speak English, and we're hoping that Isaiah is picking up his Russian from her and our other Russian friends so that he doesn't learn our mistakes or our accents!  I joined them for snack time after their walk (this gives me some great practice, too!), and I was excited to see them interacting so well.  Julia would tell Isaiah to do something very specific, and he would obey perfectly!  What a smart boy I have--already becoming bilingual!

Tuesday we again combined therapy and school.  We (I) named things with "A".  Isaiah liked the pictures that I had prepared for him to color, he pointed to them and said "all done" very clearly after he wore them as hats.  
He still likes to color on his clothes more than any paper, so thankfully the crayons wash out very well. :)

We tried something new to help work on his fine motor skills since coloring isn't too interesting, apparently.  We have some colorful plastic cups that are great for stacking, or for talking into to make your voice sound funny, which is obviously the more important thing to do!

Wednesday we had a shopping date!  We bought Daddy a Christmas present, and Isaiah was a big help as we wheeled through the store.  He helped soften up the cashiers so that they were nicer to me.  We strolled through IKEA (gotta love it!) and pointed out all the "A" things like alligators and armchairs and art supplies and some other things that I forget now.  But, we scored a major find--the closest thing to construction paper that I've seen in Russia!  Woohoo!  Pretty colors and everything!  I snatched that package of paper up in my hands as if it were a bag of gold!

Never one to be put off quickly (just a nice way of saying that I can be pretty stubborn), we tried coloring again after his nap.  He had been using a mandarin like a crayon, so I asked him if he wanted to color.  He said, "Uh-huh" (which he says to everything like other toddlers say "no" to everything). He did actually color on paper a little bit--progress, perhaps?  Then I decided that we needed to practice for opening up Christmas presents, so we ripped and ripped and ripped paper--finally something he was much more interested in!  But I was so busy "helping" him that I forgot to get some pictures.

Thursday was my Russian lesson day (and a migraine, sadly), so no Tot School really took place that I remember.

Friday we had fun preparing for friends to come and play.  Isaiah had a blast playing with his little friend Slava who can crawl now.  Isaiah was so excited that he didn't even want to eat his pizza!  As soon as Slava was done, Isaiah quickly declared "all done" so that he could go and play.  I think Isaiah learned pretty quickly that he could roll a ball for Slava to chase!  Lots of laughter and good Russian practice for me with Slava's patient mother Oksana.

I'm so pumped about starting B next week because I have some fun ideas for ways to use my new colorful paper!  I even found some glue!  And I think that Isaiah and I might practice some of the craft projects that I want to try for the camp in January (and yes, please give more ideas!).

Check out what else is going on in Tot Schools around the world!

9 comments:

Unknown said...

Mitchell wasn't interested in coloring until a few months ago. It was odd because so many kids LOVE to color but he was so uninterested. I dropped it and figured he'd color when he was ready. It's frustrating because so many learning activities are centered around coloring.

My friend Morgan has cut out shapes and items from felt and made her own felt board. Her son Owen loves the felt board.

CristyLynn said...

A felt board would be something we could put low enough for him, too. I'm sometimes at a loss for some activities that require sitting or standing or more independent stability than Isaiah has. I just have to be more creative!

Amy said...

When my son was little, he HATED to color. It was like pulling teeth! Which was actually quite disappointing to me since I secretly still love to color! LOL! He grew out of it last year, though. Now he loves it (he's 9 and quite the little artist now).

I also like the felt board idea, but have no idea how to make one. Maybe we should try it out and compare notes! :) Have a great week!

CristyLynn said...

I love to color, too! I'm hoping that Isaiah will grow into it.

I'm not entirely sure how to do the felt board, either, but next time I'm in the material store, I'm going to look for felt, so I'll let you know what happens!

Thanks for stopping by!

Gidget Girl Reading said...

great nesting and stacking toy! sometimes the best teaching stuff are stuff we already have in our house!

glad you got my email glad i could help!

we do the letter Seek and hunts too! its fun, easy and free! 3 great things!!!:)

CristyLynn said...

Thanks for the encouragement!

e said...

three things -
i love your little russian clock on here b/c i never remember the time right.
it is so nice that Isaiah says "uh-huh" to everything...we have entered the "no" to everything phase
i want to be on your blog roll...you can use theschwantfamily blog since it isn't private :-)

love you.
you are a great mama!

CristyLynn said...

E-
3 things back to you:
I'm glad you like the clock, it's fulfilling it's purpose. :)
Isaiah does so no, but it's only after we've said it, then he gets stuck on it and says, "no, no, no, no" over and over and over again; but thankfully it's not in response to everything.
You're on the blog roll! Putting that other site on there didn't even occur to me since I check your private blog, oh 30 times a day or something. :)

Love you, too!
You're a great mama, too!

Toni said...

Hi Cristy!

Thanks for your comment. I enjoy reading your blog, too. I particularly like hearing about your Little Man, and Tot School. I had never heard of Tot School before, but I love the idea! I have been a nanny for a sweet almost 5 year old for 2.5 years now. She has Spina Bifida, too. :)

Toni