Teaching Toddlers to Cut

I took these pictures quite a few weeks back now but felt compelled to write about them today due to the incredible difference in Idris's cutting skills in such a short time. I can remember sitting with Faith for hours at a time whilst she mastered scissors and it was a pleasure to be able to replicate that for Idris! I had noticed that he was becoming more interested in the tools that the girls were using and was naming things like 'sizzies'. I picked up a pack of coloured electrical tape in the pound shop when I was in town ready for him..... and off we went as soon as he said 'sizzies, me'

I love the concentration on his face and his opening and closing mouth as he cuts. He started out using one hand on each scissor handle. I gave him proper craft scissors that were sharp enough to cut well but without pointed ends. Blunt toddler scissors simply frustrate children when they are learning to cut and do them no favours as in struggling to cut with them they could hurt themselves more. I have two pairs of scissors with looped handles that spring back open when released and only need squeezing to cut with, without having to worry about which fingers go in which holes. I have left and right handed pairs as you never know which way a little one is going to go! Faith loved cutting with them but Idris eschewed them in favour of a pair the girls were using! I also have a pair that has a small plastic spring on one handle that when folded down helps the blades to spring open easily again..... they came in useful later on.... for the first stage, just let your child hold and move the scissors how they feel comfortable.

It is useful to hold the paper up for them, at right angles to where they are cutting so that they only have to concentrate on moving the scissor blades, not on manipulating them to get them round the paper. You will sense when is the right time to start letting them do both. You can see from the picture that Idris quickly moved on to attempting to use the scissors with one hand only. It wasn't very successful but I said nothing and let him guide his own progress!I also avoid saying too much about which way up to hold the hand...... words get in the way of a concentrating toddler and they will find their own way! Faith was 16 months when she started cutting, Idris is about 22 months here. The first step with learning to cut is usually 'fringing' around the edge of a piece of paper, making a single cut then opening the scissors and making another cut.

With the electrical tape I held that out tight so that they scissors would cut first time and then Idris either showed me where to stick it or put it down for himself. It is nice to use the coloured tape as they can see where it has gone better than clear tape and allows choice of colour too.... Idris was keen to pull out the tape by himself, another reason why electrical tape is good for toddlers as finding and keeping the end is easy and it doesn't wrap itself up quite so much as clear tape!! It also has the benefit of strengthening fingers and increasing co-ordination and control!

After about an hour cutting and sticking, Idris stopped, looked up, gave a huge sigh then jumped down from the table and took his card with him to show Daddy what he had done with the sizzies.... the picture was ceremoniously pinned to the kitchen door with his big sister's pictures and he was so thrilled, he kept coming back to look at it and say 'me, sizzies'!!!!

Roll on a few weeks and he has asked to use scissors quite often. He likes to carry them with him and although I balked at this to start with I then decided to allow it within the parameters of it being a blunt-ended pair and of him carrying them properly with the blades in his hand and pointing down. He forgets a lot but if I say 'carry your scissors properly please' he immediately turns them round again! He has tried cutting all sorts of things and has developed really good cutting skills, so much so that he now cuts one handed, in straight lines across a piece of paper and at a furious pace! Under the table is littered with pieces of snipped paper several times a day at the moment! 

Today's interest was in cutting boxes, it was fascinating to watch him try different techniques and angles until he found one that worked. The recycling bin is a great source of materials to practise cutting skills on - catalogues, thin cardboard boxes, plastic fruit boxes, wax paper cups..... all provide a new experience! Other things to give your toddler to cut up are play dough, drinking straws, vegetable peelings and leaves and thin twigs from the garden!

Toddlers and Tools!!

Idris's latest passion is tools, more specifically hammers, or 'am' as he calls them. It has been sparked by the cabin building that went on in our garden a couple of weeks ago. It made a huge impression on him as not only was his Daddy wielding tools but his Grandpa (bomp bom) and Dadcu (dee) also. Idris is very much a man's boy..... most female relatives he can take or leave, he will even abandon his Granny's knee if preference for bomp bom!

We have had many conversations about tools since, including a half hour stint sitting on the floor of a certain hardware store comparing the merits of various garden tools and an earnest chat with the man behind the trade counter about the power drills behind the counter and the fact that Bomp bom drank tea too!

Dewi managed to find him a small wooden mallet that seems to satisfy his desperate need to have a hammer in his hand ALL THE TIME!!! I just loved watching him get to work on these wooden off cuts......

Holding them different ways......

Really hitting them as hard as he possibly could, with some fabulous facial expressions to go with it!

Shuffling round and trying it this way.....

..... and this way......

....and this way......

Steadying it with his hand and putting a boot on it just like Daddy does.....

And loving the physical challenge of handling a long piece of wood!

You can't beat the real thing for satisfying toddlers needs and interests...... a toy tool bench just wouldn't have cut it for Idris!! He is still fascinated with the metal hammers though and sidles up to them whenever he can, just touching them with longing in his eyes..... he did sneak one away and as I saw him and was about to ask for it back, he dropped it and split his finger open....... steri strips are a wonderful invention and as usual he was a tough cookie and once he'd stopped being cross about having a bandage around his hand, he was fine and it is healing nicely. Has he learned a lesson from this and now keeps away from the adult tools when Dewi is working? What do you think?? I am watching him like a hawk!!

Baking with Toddlers

I have to confess that baking with a very small child is not top of my list of relaxing activities for a Sunday afternoon.... however I try and bake with Idris (just coming 21 months as much as I can as he really enjoys it! I chose scones to make last week as it's a good, messy hands-on mix to make with lots of processes to try...... He enjoyed rubbing the butter into the flour......

.....stirring the sugar in.......

....cracking eggs with a little assistance......

....rolling out the dough with a lot of assistance, and the most beautifully sensorial marble rolling pin in the world!......

..... and independently cutting out scones from the dough.

Amusingly enough he wasn't very keen on them when they were cooked, even with jam on! Thanks to Eve for the brilliant photographs as photography and toddler baking at the same time really IS a step too far!

More toddler maths

With this activity Idris explored one to one correspondence and capacity as well as some patterning and a touch of probability! This activity was created to build on an interest that Idris showed in this egg box from the recycling pile. I watched him take it out and experiment with putting other objects inside and trying to close the lid. Initially I gave him a box of coloured cotton spools to put in and out of the box, but they didn't seem to interest him too much. Later on in the day I found a tube of Christmas tree decorative bells and they appealed to him much more! There is no picture of this set of equipment all pretty and ready to go as Idris was far too eager to explore it!

 He spent quite a bit of time putting them one at a time into the sections of the egg box. He always built a square of nine, even when he filled them up in a different order!

 He added some of the cotton spools in after a while. The metal tubs that you can see are 3 sets of differently sized sauce and dipping pots that I picked up in the pound shop. They fitted pretty well into the sections on the egg box and Idris experimented with how many bells would fit into each pot and whether he could stack the pots on top of each other.

 If he was really careful he could balance all ten bells in the largest of the pots. His fine motor control, hand strength and finger dexterity got a great workout with these as he was holding two or three at a time in one hand and rolling them through his fingers to place them in a cup.

 He started an impromptu game of hide the bell and was delighted when we hid one under a cup and moved them all around and he had to guess which one the bell was under! He was very good natured about this age old magician's trick and loved the pantomime of looking under each one and shaking his head no when there was nothing there!

After losing interest in hide the bell he concentrated on stacking different combinations of pots on top of each other. This is an enduring interest of his. He likes to try and stack all sorts of things of all shapes and sizes.

Montessori Style Toddler Toys

I have posted before about how I organised my toys whilst Childminding but not what those toys were, so thought it was about time I did! I am Montessori trained but rather than using it to the letter, I apply the philosophy to what we do. I get all of my toddler toys from second hand sales and apply a simple set of rules to buying them. They need to be simple, attractive and show clear cause and effect. That is so that the child can understand that something happens because of the action that they do. Many electronic toys are so complex and have a variety of responses of lights and sounds to combinations of buttons, that they are impossible to make sense of to a small child (or often an adult!) and so have little learning value and do not keep a child occupied for very long. I personally find the cacophony of different lights and sounds very irritating and prefer the calmer environment of toddler made noises! The toy collection is about 50% wooden and 50% plastic, I have nothing against plastic, as long as it meets my criteria!

 To start the tour, this Galt toy has a piece of sprung metal inside each of the bases, when the wooden pegs are pressed down and the finger slides off the top, they pop up and out, as you can see the green one doing in the picture.

 This is for hammering the pegs through. I have watched children automatically turning the toy to the next raised peg and they can keep going round and round until they are done.

 This a chicken punch and drop, you can see one of the balls in Idris's hand, but he was experimenting using different implements to push the balls through - a wooden knife from the food basket, the bottle brush that he pinched from the kitchen, his foot and several other things that he found. the balls are pushed through and come rolling out of the front, ringing the little bell on the way.

 This dinosaur pop up is simple to work out for toddlers, each coloured button corresponds with a coloured egg, although they need different actions to make them pop up. The eggs can be bashed back down with a satisfying clump. I used to have an animal version but I quickly realised that because the mouse popped out of a wedge of cheese and it was hinged, it trapped fingers and pinched skin so we upgraded to a safer and less frustrating model!

The click clack track behind is a classic toy, with four small wheeled cars each the colour of one of the slopes and the little cars roll down clicking from slope to slope - endless fascination.

 The chicken stacker is a beautiful version of a stacking toy, I love the harmonious colours and there is a hidden egg under the bottom layer. The roller toy next to it works with a cog movement, when pushed across the floor, the cogs turn and the patterns on the other side turn around. This hasn't been the most popular toy but I'm biding my time until Idris is a bit older to see if he starts using it more, if he doesn't it will probably go back into the next sale!

 This turtle toy, modelled by our lovely one-eyed Poppy dog, is really simple. The child pushed down all five shaped buttons and the head then pings out from the body. Push the head back in and the buttons pop back up again!

 This wooden clock is one of the toys that has never been put away or rotated, children of all ages love taking the numbers in and out, stacking them up with the magnetic buttons in them, trying to swap the shapes around etc.

I also have a wooden peg puzzle which isn't getting much use at the moment but that will come, and some magnetic vehicles that can be pulled apart (these were a gift, not from the sale).

I find that there are usually several permutations of the same toy around, so have a close look and see which you think is most robust, the most well-designed and the most attractive! The only downside to these toys versus electronic ones is that you tend to spend a lot of time collecting pieces back up to return to the box, but I much prefer them and think that the children get so much from them!

Nature loving Toddler!

I wanted to post this collection of photos from the Summer months. They show Idris exploring the natural world in his own way. When Eve was this age, I didn't know enough to let her do this, I thought it was bad to let her climb into a stream fully dressed and spend half an hour moving rocks around. Over the years since I have learned so much and realised just how important and valuable it is to let toddlers explore in this way when the mood takes them. I had a towel and a change of clothes handy, and the girls were hill climbing with Dewi so we sat in the stream in Carding Mill Valley in Shropshire in the remnants of early September evening sunshine and he shifted rocks and I sat quietly and let him be!

This picture was in the overflow stream at Wightwick Manor which is our magical place to spend time. It has everything a child could wish for - ponds, running water, streams, woods, fallen trees, long grass to roll in, apple trees to scrump from, a long tunnel hidden in a clipped box hedge, little secret seating areas dotted around, a hut thatched with heather, soft fruit bushes, pine cones, flowers, and a tearoom that sells tiny tubs of handmade ice cream!!

This is Idris at the foot of an enormous Beech tree at Northycote - the girls love this Beech tree as the roots curl over each other and form hollows that hold water and potions to be mixed! the branches droop right down to the floor and in full leaf hide us from passing dog walkers (until our dog ambushes them from the leafy cover and the peace is shattered for a few minutes!). Despite the crunchy beech cases underneath, Idris goes barefoot here and was happy to stir the cauldren whilst the girls fetched supplies from the surrounding plants!

These are a couple more of Idris at Wightwick on the rocks of ages, practising his balancing skills.....

......... and bonding with our dog Poppy!!

.......and running away from me as fast as little legs will carry him whilst giggling all the time!

And here is one of many shots I have from this rainy Summer that has passed of our little rain baby who made a beeline for the patio every time it rained and pottered around, looking up at the sky, holding his hands out for the drops to fall onto, stamping in the puddles that formed and having a wonderful time! Like the stream at CArding Mill, we never stopped him, just dried him off when he was done......as you can see he thoroughly enjoys it - a slightly photo but he is rarely still long enough for crisp ones!!!

Keeping Toddlers Happy Whilst Home-Schooling

I have been cruising around the net looking for ideas to keep Idris busy whilst I do things with the girls. I was waiting until he went to sleep (around 10.30) to really get stuck in, but I have found that by then the girls are ensconced in a game or activity that they are not willingly extracted from, and also that it is too early in the day for a sleep for Idris as then he is so tired by four that making dinner is really tricky! So I have switched to trying to keep him going until after lunch, which we often have at 11.45 round here as a knock on from how early we have breakfast! He will happily go until after lunch - as long as he is entertained constantly! He is not a 'sitter and doer' as the girls used to be, he likes a playmate, or to climb onto the table and join in or to demand milk in a loud voice every five minutes if my attention is elsewhere! My goal is for him to be absorbed in something for about ten minutes, just long enough to explain and get the girls going with something before turning my attention (well half of it!) back to him! I want to intersperse these with blocks of full on fun and games just for him, which gives the girls some breathing space too.

So far I have come up with the following:

• Give them your attention first so that they aren't trying to compete - we do this every day as we are up first and have some time together before the others are up.
• Snacks - sit them down with a drink and something to nibble - Iddy isn't that motivated by snacks really but I could try some new ideas once his molars have finished coming through!
• Sensory boxes/trays - Idris loves his metal treasure basket still and water pouring would keep him busy for a long time - wide splash zone needed as Idris has definite ideas of what water play entails!
• Play dough and tools - this kept him happily occupied for ten minutes today, the end was signalled by a few pieces of blue dough being launched very accurately onto our game board!
• Have one child play with your toddler whilst you focus with another child - Faith sat and looked at board books with him today on the sofa and he loved it!

Another tip that I read was to get the older children to get started on something by themselves at the start of your day whilst you are spending ten minutes with your toddler. They suggest making it the same thing every day to start the day off in a nice routine, I don't tend to do the same thing every day so I will think on this idea a little more!

Many of the activity ideas that I found were for older toddlers of 2 -3years and I am confident that I can sort  those activities when the time comes thanks to my Montessori training, I am off to trawl Pinterest now for some busy bag ideas that can be scaled up to engage him. The idea behind those would be that they only come out for a short time and are not on 'general release' so he won't get fed up with them so quickly. I am only thinking that I will need this level of input into keeping him busy during the Winter as when he is outside he is perfectly content, just too young to be out there on his own, all-in-one Winter suit or not!

And if you just need a little perspective, and a good laugh, then read this post from Confessions of a Homeschooler! I recognised many of these activities!

Toddler Maths

Idris stunned me yesterday by easily building this huge tower!! He confidently placed one unit block on top of another, using his other hand to steady the tower when needed. I helped with a few balance adjustments as it got higher but he wasn't upset when it fell over, he laughed and rolled around on the blocks then built another. I digress....... about halfway up, I handed him a longer block and he put it on and turned for the next one - I handed him the original size and he turned to put it on........ then stopped, frowned, said 'na' and took the long one off, dropped it on the floor, did a happy wiggle then put the same sized one on top and turned for the next. It made me think back to some Penny Tassoni training I did recently where she had put a blue duck with yellow ones and noted that a toddler took it out of the bucket, showing that toddlers take notice of groupings - an early mathematical observation. It got me thinking what else I have seen Idris do that comes under the 'early maths' heading.

Here he is sitting with a metal teapot from his metallic treasure basket and he went straight for the tin that would fit inside it and popped it in and out, opening and shutting the lid - he seems to be very accurate when he chooses things to fir inside something else. He knows what will fit and what won't without using trial and error - showing that he can accurately judge size/capacity at a very young age!

This is him again exploring a similar concept to the one above with the teapot...... this is the treasure tub that came about after my post on him threading beads into plastic bottles - my parents put together a collection of plastic plumbing pipes and different threads of beads, a funnel, a few jars and bottles and a denture pot! This treasure tub is fab as it's in a round plastic bird seed tub and is easy to carry around - it has been to the bathroom many evenings at bath time! It was in the bath that I first noticed that Idris was selecting exactly the right tube to create a 'nest' of tubes with each one getting smaller. I was fascinated!

Idris finds plenty of opportunities to explore maths outdoors as well, as he carries all sorts of objects, heavy and light, and plays with his beloved collection of balls of all shapes and sizes! When you think about it, there are so many ways for toddlers to explore mathematical concepts, have a close look next time your toddlers are exploring things and see what maths they are applying without even knowing it!

All the things you can do with a slide......

Idris was being a tad grumpy and wanted to play on the slide outdoors but with the door open - and it was far too cold and gas is far too expensive to let that happen so while he was stamping his little feet and shouting about it, I took the slide inside and he was intrigued - and came along in to see what was happening! It wasn't long before he was having a brilliant time, testing out what would go down the slide and waiting while I said ready, steady........ go, then he pushed the cars down and laughed and laughed!!!

The bump balls went down it, the beads from the latest treasure tub went down it..... and of course, Idris went down it, in as many different configurations as he could conjure up.... forwards sitting, forwards lying, forwards stepping off it, sideways with one leg up, one leg down, backwards, headfirst - you name it, he did it, as well as practising going up and down the steps, each step with the next foot on it then turning around and climbing down again! Faith then joined in and got him to lie on his tummy and shouted, ready steady blast off and as she shouted blast off, she fired him down the slide with a good shove of his feet and he flew across the floor at the end.... he LOVED it!!!!

I'm sure lots of parents would be cringing at what I let him do, but he's a tough little cookie and laughs when he takes a tumble, as well as being very well co-ordinated and well developed with his physical and motor skills, so within reason, I let him explore his physical limits and satisfy his very obvious need to climb, roll, slide, jump, push, pull etc etc etc!!!

Idris at 15 months......

........is NEVER still!!!!

 He walks everywhere that he can, last week he discovered that he walk on his toes and spent the day walking on his toes everywhere! At the pool one day he learnt to 'jump' (that is he says 'du' and steps out from the edge with a big grin and tightly shut eyes!)..... so now he climbs onto things, says 'du' and steps off the edge with his eyes shut!!!! There is no physical challenge that this boy won't take on! He still loves to be outdoors in all weathers - I love it!

 He had his first fair ground ride at Wonderland last week - and loved it! He especially liked the Alice in Wonderland rabbit cars with steering wheels - so much so that he howled when he had to come out and let someone else have a go! He's just stopped crying when it was his turn again and yes, you guessed it, he howled again when he had to come out!!!

 He loves shoes now!! He will wear anyones shoes as you can see and is very adept at getting around in even the largest of pairs - he pinched my wedding shoes from the wardrobe too (red kitten heels) and clomped around in those! He found a pair of bumper shoes in our shoe box and brings them to us, thrusts them in our hands and lifts a foot with an expectant expression on his earnest little face! He wears socks with shoes, and they have to go on in a certain order thank you very much!!!! When his shoes come off, so do his socks! We need to get him some properly fitted shoes really as I don't think the bumpers are the best fit, but considering that I thought he'd never want to wear shoes, at least he has warm toes on chilly days now! He climbs on lots of things, liking to just be off the floor!

 This is a slightly blurry photo (I told you he was never still!) of Idris with a micro-bead cushion on his head - I have no idea how this started but he thinks it is really funny to run around with this on his head!

He is fascinated with play dough as well but eats a fair amount of it so we have to be careful - a reputable source told me that blue play dough puts children off from eating it so I'll have to test that theory next time I make some!! He is going through the stages that the girls did with play dough - pushing things into it, pulling pieces off when we roll a big sausage of it.... Eve discovered he likes the dough whilst trying to distract him one day!

And he is ADORED by his big sisters!!!!