preschool aged | Hear Mum Roar

Advertisers’ Review

Written on July 15th, 2011 by Hear Mum Roar in Cognitive, Gross motor, Music, Organisation, Preschool aged, Reviews, Saving money, School aged, Toddler

I’ve been lucky enough to have awesome advertisers at Hear Mum Roar. I always choose companies that sell products I would actually buy and use myself. If you only saw some of the rubbish I’m asked to advertise and actually knock back.. Anyway, some of my advertisers have been lovely enough to send out some samples of their wares, so I felt it was time to shine the spotlight upon them.

Little Dance Invitations are a fantastic place to go for everything party related. They have the cutest themes for kids, ranging from tv characters, to cute little Kokeshi Doll lollipops and everything else that interests children. They also do invitations and party supplies for adult parties. What I also love about this online store is that they can customise party goods with the birthday person’s photo.Next time we have a birthday party, I’ll be definitely going through Little Dance.

Bright Star Kids sell cute kids labels, wall stickers, bag tags, and all sorts of other cool stuff. I recently was sent some small name labels for all of my three kids…

I’ve blocked out parts of their names privacy reasons, but I left part of the lettering there so you can see the different fonts used. Missy 3 loves the fairy on her labels and always tells me it’s going to fly away! So cute.. I also love that if I put a name label on anything of hers, she’ll drink it, for example, water. She wasn’t keen on water for a while, but now she has a label on her water bottle, she’s drinking lots of water and is much healthier for it.

I’m also pleased to find these labels as Mr 5 is starting school next year, and it’ll be much easier with two kids at school if I can be prepared with labels now. It’s helping to build the excitement in him, also.

Forever Clover sells a new range of school-aged girls’ swap cards.

When I first saw these, I fell in love with them instantly! These cards were created as an antidote to the sexualisation of girls in our society. Your daughter can join the free Forever Clover Club online. Missy 10 has joined and loves it! You can read their Forever Clover girls’ blog with stories of their adventures. If your daughter is a member of the club, she can even comment!

The cards and packaging are made from renewable resources and starting a collection is very wallet-friendly, so anyone can start collecting and swapping! All three of my kids have been given some, and they absolutely love them.

KelliOne is the home of handmade toys. Simple concepts that kids will love and very cute too! Kelli was kind enough to send out three ribbon wands for the kids to play with.

Here, you can see Mr 5 happily fishing with his. This is a brilliant, open-ended toy for toddlers, preschoolers and school aged kids alike. They can get exercise as they twirl around in or outdoors, dance to music, draw shapes in the air, pretend they’re walking a dog on a leash, in short, they can do whatever they can imagine! KelliOne also can make these wands for weddings, and I’m thinking when we get married one of these days, I’ll order some for the guests! I can imagine how beautiful the wedding photos would be with ribbons swirls from happy guests, in our custom colours.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading about these companies. They all have such great stuff and are lovely people to deal with.

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Happy Birthday to Missy now 3

Written on April 26th, 2011 by Hear Mum Roar in April 2011, Good times, Handmade, Preschool aged, Projects

Can you believe it?? It feels like we only just celebrated her 2nd birthday, and yet here is our youngest daughter, growing up on us and turning three. I tell you, you can’t afford to blink with this parenting gig, can you?

I feel so guilty. I know she would’ve loved her very own birthday party, just like Missy 10 had last year. We were genuinely going to have one, then, argh! Life happened. I hadn’t gotten around to taking her to playgroup yet, so although we know some other little kids around her age, there wouldn’t be too many kids to invite, as we still settle into this town. Also, time really has gotten away on us. I’ve been weighing up my options with regard to visiting my mother, who as some of you would know, has recently had a stroke. She’s now in rehab, and doing much better than was originally expected. I’ve not been able to visit her yet, but want to as soon as I can.

Then, there’s the issue of my partner’s treatment. Would you believe he will be getting admitted to hospital after all, even after my recent announcement that he wouldn’t be? We’ve been making plans for that time, stepping up his appointments, getting extra workers, and so on. It’s basically been consuming all the time we’ve got, lately.

So yeah, not only do I feel guilt about so many things these days (and obviously, wanting to fix my blog back to its former glory or better), but I’m trying so hard to fight the feelings of guilt about giving Missy 3 a great birthday. I’ve been floundering under the pressure of everything going on lately, to the point where the time immediately after my mother’s stroke is just this blur that I don’t remember very well. I do know, though, that I wasn’t much help to anyone. I wasn’t writing down my partner’s appointments, or helping to ensure he was getting to them. It really felt that my brain had packed up and gone elsewhere. It still feels a little like that, but less so.

So, no party this year, and we managed to bugger up the cake as well! Because her birthday was on Sunday and all the shops were closed from Friday onward, we ended up giving her her birthday cake days earlier, because we had to buy a cake, due to not yet having an oven at this house. I was worried about confusing her, but she and the other two kids were happy, so that’s all that matters, and no amount of self-flagellation will make a difference.

Missy 3 and my mother actually share a birthday, too. I’m normally not able to talk to my mother on the phone, because the rehab doesn’t allow it, but they made an exception for her birthday. This was the first time I’d spoken to her since her stroke, so it was good to be able to catch up. Of course, it re-ignited the guilt about not having visited her and round and round we go… But hey, it was good for both of us, and made the day even better.

I made these two cute toys for Missy 3:

A knitted gingerbread man and snake. I know how much she adores the story, and she loves handmade things. I had been working on this toy for a while, and was pleasantly surprised to see how big and cuddly it ended up! As for the snake, I discovered a knitted rectangle in my sewing drawer the day before her birthday. It was for a door snake for blocking drafts that I started making a long time before I had our last two children. Knowing how crazy my daughter is for snakes (she likes to get pieces of wool and make believe they’re slithering all through the house), I quickly fashioned it into a cheerful snake toy.

Well. She hated the gingerbread man! (Keep in mind, I’d shown her the pattern months before, and she’d said she liked it) So, we talked about being polite when getting birthday presents, then gave it to Missy 10 who’s besotted with it. Missy 10 agreed that if fickle Missy 3 changed her mind later down the track, that she’d give it back (she knew I was planning to make one for her in future, also). Missy 3 has since teetered from loving the toy to loathing it. I think she’s just getting used to it…

She really loves the snake, which I find hilarious, given its simplicity and how little time it took to make it!

All in all, despite an insane amount of mummy guilt this year, it was a great day. I just keep reminding myself of the important things in all of this: the five of us got to spend time together as a family (we were expecting my partner to go to hospital before this, so we felt very lucky) and no matter what’s going on, how buggered up our plans have been this year, and how scrambled mummy’s brains are these days, is that she knows she’s loved. Everyday Missy 3 tells me, ‘I love you Mummy, I make you happy. You love me, and you make me happy’. In all of this craziness, I just have to hang onto the stuff that matters the most with both hands and know that that’s what will get us all through this. And you know what? Despite everything that (in my mind) went ‘wrong’, we all had a truly lovely day.

Now, please make me feel better by regaling me with your stories of birthday guilt!

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Consequences of Anger

Written on February 13th, 2011 by Hear Mum Roar in Behaviour, February 2011, Parenting

In my last post of the anger in children series, I talked about mine and my families’ definition of what harmful expressions of anger are. Now, I’m talking about challenging our kids to consider the consequences of their anger. Obviously, children are individual people with little experience in stopping themselves from doing harm. Chances are they will act out inappropriately many, many times before they master the skill of managing their anger.

Although I discuss the moral reasons for harming others with my kids, morality is not a primary motivator for young children yet. Until they get to that point, I reinforce moral reasoning but also give consequences for both productive and unproductive behaviour. This motivates the child to try harder to be more civil. It establishes good habits and reinforces the rules. (I’m not necessarily talking about run-of-the-mill tantrums here. Although these ideas can help with that, too)

Motivating a child with consequences helps kids to feel good about doing the right thing and more willing to try to behave more appropriately next time. I believe hitting and doing other harmful things in anger does make them feel better in the short term. However, I also feel kids get frightened when they lose control and of the rage they’re feeling. They get torn between their anger and the ones they love. Deep down, they feel regret and may not like themselves much afterward. Having motivation to behave appropriately can set them free from these self-destructive feelings.

Time out as a consequence

I know time out isn’t popular with everyone, but I believe it has its place. When a child puts others in danger, I put them in time out to protect the other people being subject to it. It’s easy to talk about what time-out does for a child’s self esteem and such, but if others are being put in danger, I don’t give a flying fart. That child’s self esteem takes a back seat to the safety of others. I’ve had my kids become so enraged that they’ve thrown heavy items at others, or worse, hit others with them. I refuse to let the situation escalate to a point where someone ends up in hospital, if I can help it.

I’ve mentioned before that my son is at this stage of his anger, lately. We have a gate on our bedroom, with only our bed and bed linen in there. If he’s dangerously mad, I place him on the bed in there. Sometimes I talk to him in there and if he tries to hit me, I stand out of his striking distance. We talk if he’s willing. If my presence makes him madder, I leave him on his own until he’s calmed down a little. I find time alone is helpful to the child, sometimes. With no-one to make them angrier, they can mull things over.

Removal of privileges

This one’s self explanatory; take away something they value for a short time as a consequence of harmful actions.

Making amends

I mentioned this idea in the last post also. I think it’s important that kids be encouraged to be proactive in trying to ‘make things right’ again. Saying sorry is great, but sometimes children come up with more creative ideas. I believe it’s important to make amends in order for the child to take responsibility and ownership of their actions.

Talk with children about how their actions affect others besides themselves

This is where we bring in a little more moral reasoning, which is important for children to be exposed to. Some examples of consequences we might talk about with kids:

- People getting hurt

- Things getting broken.

- Being a role model. I explain to my older children that their actions, positive or not, serve as a way of teaching younger siblings how to behave. If we role model nice behaviour, our younger siblings will copy this and we can teach them right from wrong. Likewise, if we aren’t a good role model, they will copy this too. I also point out here that their younger sibling will probably direct this copied behaviour, right or wrong, at them.

- The idea that when we lose control of our anger, we rarely get what we wanted, if ever.

- If children try hard to manage their anger, they will be praised, or perhaps rewarded in some way.

What about grown-ups?

If there’s one thing kids hate more than anything, it’s being told what to do by grown-ups. In their eyes, we have it so easy and don’t have to be held accountable to anyone for our actions. It helps kids immensely to learn that we are just as accountable for our actions, if not more. It also opens their eyes as to how the real world works, and what they are preparing for in all of this. I like to talk about consequences grown ups face if they let their anger become harmful in the following ways:

- People won’t be their friend.

- They could go to jail for assault.

- They could lose their job.

- They might have to pay money to replace/repair items they damaged.

A consequence of not letting it out

This consequence is, I think, too complex to be discussing with young children, but I think it’s important for us as parents to reflect upon. When people suppress their anger most of the time, (or other emotions) it becomes a painful existence. Sometimes the pain becomes so unbearable that teens and adults may turn to drugs or self-harm to try to numb the pain. This is one consequence that is constantly in the back of my thoughts, reminding me to let my children express their pain. They need to be encouraged to feel it, and know they can and do survive it.

Do you challenge your children to think about the consequences of their anger?

Other reading:

Dealing with anger in children

Finding the source of your child’s anger

Healthy ways children can express their anger

Ground rules for anger

Is it ever ok to lose your cool?

How do I stop tantrums?

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Ground Rules For Anger

Written on February 13th, 2011 by Hear Mum Roar in Behaviour, February 2011, Parenting

Here’s part four of my anger in children series as promised. I’m enjoying talking with all of you about this. Obviously, all our children get angry at some time. It’s frustrating when they take it too far and can mean a lot of hard work for us. I find laying down some boundaries about anger is a great place to start this work.

The boundaries I’m covering here are the ones we use in our family. They are very basic and common sense. Your family might come up with more, or tweak these ideas:

Anger has been taken too far when:

- Anyone is hurt or at risk of getting hurt. This includes people and animals. It includes but isn’t limited to hitting, kicking, scratching, pinching, hair-pulling or throwing things. I also include screaming that hurts our ears.

- Anyone’s belongings are damaged or at risk of being damaged. Our children are taught to look after their belongings and those of others’.

- If someone does/says hurtful or disrespectful things to others. Apart from nasty words, I also include spitting and rude gestures under this rule. If you’re not saying/doing something as part of a solution, chances are you’re being disrespectful.

- If someone makes us angry, it doesn’t give us the right to break any of the above rules in retaliation. This is an important rule, as often kids feel justified in doing this, for example if a child hits them. They feel it’s more than fair that they hit back. I teach them early on that this isn’t the case. I encourage them to tell a grown up and let them deal with the other person.

- Disrupting public peace. If we’re down the street or in a shop, I make it clear that other people do not want or like to hear you screaming or see you hitting things. It’s expected that they show consideration to everyone.

- We try to end our discussions about anger with this mantra: ‘I expect you to be loving, gentle and kind’. We can do this and still get our anger out in a healthy way. It just takes time and practice.

- If our children break any of the above rules, they are expected to make amends. Or, as we put it more simply with kids, make it right. This could be an apology, a hug or kiss, giving the person a drawing or a written note (if they’re old enough), helping to fix a broken toy and so on.

Do you have some ground rules for your childrens’ anger? What are they?

Other reading:

Dealing with anger in children

Finding the source of your child’s anger

Healthy ways children can express their anger

Consequences of anger

Is it ever ok to lose your cool?

How do I stop tantrums?

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Learning to Use Buttons

Written on February 12th, 2011 by Hear Mum Roar in Cognitive, Emotional, February 2011, Fine motor, Preschool aged, Social

Mr 4′s been practicing opening and closing the buttons on his shirt, lately. This is an exciting time for me, as it shows a willingness to learn some self-help skills. Every new skill brings him and I more autonomy. It’s also an exciting stage for Mr 4, as he gains self confidence at being able to do things for himself.

Lately, he’s been regressing in his behaviour due to stresses and changes in his family. A major way this manifested itself was his unwillingness to dress himself anymore. Yes, he’s perfectly capable. I’m hoping that learning this new skill signals a move away from his regression.

Learning to fasten and unfasten buttons involves a lot of problem-solving skills. First, the child tries to roughly pull the two front halves of the shirt open, almost ripping buttons and fabric away. When I see this happening, I explain to my kids that this damages their clothes. Then, I offer to show them how to do it without ripping anything. At first, my kids usually refuse, and keep ripping at it, then give up and ask me to do it for them. Over time, curiosity gets the better of them and they become more willing to be shown how.

After this, it takes a lot of practice, but they get there! Oh my god, the pride that spreads across their faces when this happens is priceless. Performing this task does wonders for their eye-hand coordination and it strengthens the muscles in their hands. I find it’s a great lead-up to learning to tie their shoelaces later on, a more complex task.

This is Mr 4′s last year before he starts school, and I’ve worked hard on preparing him for it. His mastery of this skill is another stepping stone on the path to school readiness.

If kids are interested, or are finding learning this skill too difficult, they can always practise on doll’s clothes or dress up clothes. Often, it’s easier to learn how to use buttons if you’re not wearing the clothing, and looking down at what you’re doing. Dress-up clothes are often over sized items from parents, which give more generous movement.

What self-help skills are your children learning at the moment?

Other reading:

Helping kids to make choices

Learn by doing – laundry

Emotional development – initiative

Kids growing mushrooms

Mr Three makes pea and ham soup

Slow down

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Coloured Window Art

Written on February 1st, 2011 by Hear Mum Roar in Art, Cognitive, Craft, Experiences, February 2011, Fine motor, Preschool aged, Toddler

I love doing coloured window art with young kids. It’s easy, yet something out of the ordinary for them. I find it holds their interest for ages. As you can see, all I’ve done is cut up some collage-type materials for the children; today it was fabric scraps. Other times, I’ve given the children flattened cup cake cases, confetti from the hole punch, chopped wool scraps, chopped streamers, basically whatever I’ve had lying around. It’s also important to make sure nothing would be a choking hazard for your kids. I’m lucky in that my kids are past the stage of putting craft/art items in their mouths, but if you know yours will (it’s the under 3′s we need to be careful with, generally), simply use bigger, safer pieces and supervise.

Then, I provide the kids with a sheet of clear contact with the adhesive side facing upward. I turn each corner underneath to stick it to the table. Now all the kids need to is to stick their collage pieces on to their hearts’ content. Once they finished each masterpiece, I stuck it to the window for them.

…Until the kids decided to do it for themselves.

I love that this is an open-ended activity that doesn’t add any pressure to look like anything in particular. However, if you keep the backing sheet from the contact you’ve cut for your child, you can stick the finished piece back onto the backing paper. This lets a child take their art work home, or give it to their grandparents as a very special gift. Once it’s in its new home, it can still be proudly displayed on a window.

This is a great time of year to be doing this activity too, because I find after doing back to school shopping, I have loads of contact to spare.

Other reading:

The useful box

Kids’ craft: lacing

Ten ‘clean’ craft ideas your kids will love

Kids craft ideas for non-crafty mums

Art for children who hate mess

Our art gallery

Canvas painting for kids

Playdough, homemade

Flower play

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Learn by doing – laundry

Written on October 14th, 2010 by Hear Mum Roar in Cognitive, Fine motor, Language, Messy play, October 2010, Preschool aged, Social

Tell me and I’ll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I’ll understand.

- Ancient proverb

Following on from my recent post about initiative, I involved Mr 4 and Missy 2 in washing some clothes. I had lots of laundry to catch up on and hang out to dry. So I set up a plastic tub with warm water and Ecostore laundry powder (nice and gentle for little hands) and some laundry that had minimal soiling. Being a water activity, of course it’s important to always supervise young children.

Doing household chores together is a great learning opportunity for kids. They learnt/talked about:

- the different names of clothing: ‘what type of clothing is this?’ Eg, shirt, dress, undies, etc.

- the concept of people having a place in the family, and their own possessions: ‘who’s shirt is this?’

- colours: ‘what colour is this shirt?’

- cause and effect: ‘why is the water becoming so brown?’

- the sequence of events: first the children used soapy water, then scrubbed the clothing, then we rinsed with clear water, squeezed the excess liquid out and finally we hung them out to dry.

- how to play together. Missy 2 and Mr 4 had a few disagreements during this activity. This gave us a chance to talk about their feelings and listen to each other.

- sensory awareness: children can learn about concepts such as wet/dry, warm/cold, etc.

The children also got a huge amount of exercise for their little muscles! Picking up wet clothing can be heavy work…

It also puts their fine motor skills through their paces as they squeeze… squeeeze… squeeeeeeeeze! the water out of the clothes.

You can also let them help with pegging the clothes out to dry on a small, child-height clothesline. I didn’t, only because we had two puppies with very dirty feet hanging around! But at least this kept my kids busy whilst I hung out all the wet clothes.

What household chores do your children like to help with?

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Preschooler play – taking photos

Written on August 24th, 2010 by Hear Mum Roar in Art, August 2010, Emotional, Good times, Preschool aged, Social

Sometimes, when my fiance goes out shopping or anywhere else, he likes to take one or two of our kids with him and leave me behind with just one child. At these times, I make the most of some rare one-on-one time with the child who stays with me.

Today, Mr 4 stayed at home with me, and we had lots of snuggles. Then, he turned around and asked me to take photos of him. Like many mums, I like to take the child’s lead with their play whenever I can. So, I grabbed the camera, and he, being a little bit precious about the whole thing, moved a chair in front of the fridge, because he felt that was where he wanted to pose.

And so we snapped up one picture after another. He tried to make each face a little bit more ridiculous than the last, and checked how he looked on the digital camera’s display screen. It’s weird, he’s the only boy living with two sisters, and yet he’s the most vain of the three kids!

The great thing about this game was that Mr 4 was given the opportunity to be creative and also engage in some dramatic play with the only prop being a camera. I think it is also a nice thing to do for a child’s self esteem, as they enjoy having the undivided attention of a parent, and being able to make mummy laugh. I know he felt really good about himself after playing this game. He also enjoyed the process of looking at the photos on the computer, and he’s learning a little bit about technology along the way.

My favourite part of the whole experience? The laughter. He thought he was brilliant, and we were both in hysterics.

Come play at the Childhood 101 We Play link up

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Picking our mushrooms

Written on August 15th, 2010 by Hear Mum Roar in August 2010, Cognitive, Fine motor, Food, Going green, Preschool aged, Saving money, School aged

I hope everyone’s had a relaxing weekend. I’ve been trying to soak a lot of water out of the carpet after our flooding. It should be dry soon, fingers crossed!

The kids have been having fun since they discovered we have grown two huge mushrooms! After we started with this kit, I found out that winter isn’t mushroom season. Apparently, every other season is. So normally, we’d expect to get more mushies than this amount, but it was still exciting for the kids, and these were so large, it really bulked up tonight’s dinner. But more on that later…

Missy 9 and Mr 4 enjoyed picking their home grown mushrooms all by themselves.

They gave our mushroom farm another misting of water, which they love to do.

Missy 9 and Missy 2 wanted to help cut the mushrooms up for tonight’s dinner, which is spaghetti bolognaise. I gave them a blunt knife each, and this kept them busy for a long time.

Missy 9 also had fun mincing the garlic to go with it.

Missy 9 watched the mushrooms and garlic saute in the pan, and we talked about all the B vitamins that mushies provide, what sauteing is, and she swooned at the smell of it! She’s really showing an interest in being involved with the cooking lately, and learning as much as she can.

It’s been such a lovely, relaxing, slow Sunday, and I think what better way for the kids to while away the hours than to pick fresh, home grown produce and prepare it for dinner?

Here’s my confession, though: my two older kids don’t like eating mushrooms very much. But they will eat it chopped up finely into a spaghetti bolognaise or beef stroganoff or similar. And they especially love trying it when they’ve helped to grow it. Look at this pic and tell me if you can even notice two gigantic mushrooms chopped through it.

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Cuisenaire rods

Written on June 27th, 2010 by Hear Mum Roar in Cognitive, Constructive, Fine motor, June 2010, Preschool aged, School aged

I hope you’re all enjoying your weekend! Our three here have been having fun playing with these cuisenaire rods. Remember using these for maths at school? I found these at a local discount store a few years ago and snagged them as soon as I saw them.

Cuisenaire rods

They do have small parts in the set, so although I do let Missy 2 occasionally play with small parts with close supervision, this time I simply picked out the smaller blocks so that my fiance and I could let the kids play with these blocks as we rushed around doing other jobs.

Cuisenaire rods are fantastic for teaching maths concepts, as each colour is a different size and represents a different number. The smallest unit represents 1, and the rods go all the way up to 10. If you’re not feeling all teachy, the rods are also a brilliant, simple, open-ended play idea for imaginary play. Children also can experience the cognitive benefits of constructive/destructive play, as my kids are doing above. They also love banging them on the table. Lots.

I’ve done a quick little search on the net to see where you could buy them online, and for Australia I’ve found this site and for America I’ve found this site. (I haven’t purchased from these stores, so can’t vouch for the quality, but it gives anyone interested a starting point)

Does anyone else have these? We love them!

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Tag Archive: preschool aged