Muddle and Match

It is finally starting to feel like fall around here! I am loving and hating that. I love the weather changing but I also hate that it is getting colder. Spencer LOVES to play outside. He doesn't care what the weather is like, he wants to be outside. It is nice that he wants to be outdoors but this mamma gets cold after awhile and wants to come inside. I have been thinking of some fun things to do inside for when I when I need to warm up. We of course have been reading TONS of books, playing with play dough, coloring, etc. The other day we were reading Muddle and Match and I realized what great books those are! These books are great for children of all ages. There are an abundance of possibilities for learning with these books. Here are a few ideas:

Babies and toddlers

• Let them flip through the pages. Spencer loves to just turn the pages in these books. The pages are a little different then his normal books. He loves seeing his creations that he makes.
• Talk about body parts.

Preschoolers

• These books are fantastic for building phonemic awareness! Have your child clap, stomp, shake when they hear a certain beginning sound. This is an activity that my preschoolers loved to do and it really helped them to be able to hear the differences in sounds.
• Introduce top, middle, and bottom. The pages on these books are separated into thirds. While reading the story tell your child to turn a certain section (top, middle, or bottom).

Elementary

• Have them create their own version of Muddle and Match. They can create their own creatures, animals, or people and then come up with the story. This activity will promote creativity and alliteration.
• Have a competition to see who can come up with the most creations in the book.

There are 4 different titles in this series: Adventure, Imagine, Jungle Animals, and Monsters. You can see the entire collection here.

That's Not My...

Spencer absolutely LOVES That's not my dinosaur by Fiona Watt. It is such an engaging book. It has simple repetitive text and fun touchy-feely patches. This boy just really loves dinosaurs. Every time he sees a dinosaur book he starts growling. It's hilarious.

Skills learned from this book:

• Language development
• Vocabulary
• Sensory development

Activities to extend from this book:

• Pull out an assortment of objects with different textures and allow baby or toddler to experience touching these. With toddlers you can help build their vocabulary by introducing new words like bumpy, soft, prickly, crunchy, etc.

These are the objects I pulled out for Spencer to experiment with.

He wasn't super interested in playing with these. I only got this picture because I put the string and twine on his lap. He immediately pulled them off. He just wanted to play with mommy's camera.

• For preschoolers you could have them sort different textures or make a creature using different textures. Make sure to introduce the vocabulary words to them.
• Older children could make their own That's not my... book! This would be such a fun activity to inspire creativity and thinking outside of the box.

The That's not my... series has around 30 different books. There is sure to be something that your child would enjoy. You can find all of them here.