General Conference in Peace

I saw this idea on a friend's Facebook page and it was a hit! This idea honestly allowed me to get more out of General Conference than I ever have since I've had children.

I put a picture of each apostle and the prophet on a brown bag. Then when that apostle was speaking, my children could open the bag with their picture on it. My kids were so excited for conference and they wanted to know who each speaker was. The bags were filled with various surprises. For example: one had play dough, another a coloring sheet, another had a bag of chips, another had an apostle matching game (you get the idea). I'd highly recommend it.

The Sock Bun

The sock bun is my new favorite hairstyle. I do it on myself and on Lucy and I always feel so cute when my hair is done this way. The best part is that you can have a great hairstyle in about 60 seconds! This link has been the best link I have found on how to do it. Enjoy!

Best Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

I thought I had no hope of ever making a great chocolate chip cookie like the ones you buy from delicious bakeries. You know the kind: fluffy, perfect amount of chocolate chips, not flat, etc. Well, THIS recipe has made me an expert chocolate chip cookie maker. Only trouble is, they're gone before you know it! (FYI: 3 pts each for Weight Watchers)

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Teach your child to read

I have been teaching a course at BYU on how to teach children to read since before I even knew my husband, and this book has always been a piece of this course. I even used it for three years when I taught in the public schools and I saw so much success with my students there.

Now that I have my own 4 year-old, we have begun to use this book to teach her how to read and it has been my most exciting experience yet with this text.

The book is designed as short daily lessons for a parent to use to teach their child to read. The instructions are all contained within the text on how to teach it (it is a scripted format so anyone can do it) and you need not be an expert to use it. I highly recommend it as a tool to use to help build a strong foundation of phonemic awareness and phonics in your child before they begin school.

I would caution you though that children will be ready to read on differing levels, so if your child does not seem to enjoy the lessons or gets easily frustrated with them, I would back off and try again another time.

Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons by: Siegfried Engelmann

Adorable wall art

The nursery is my most favorite room in my home. I didn't intentionally mean for it to have a bird theme, but it does and I love it. This wall art is actually a vinyl sticker I ordered off of Amazon for about $10! It is so beautiful and it comes off with ease after you're done and it doesn't leave any marks. They have all kinds of great stickers on the site. You should check it out. Just search under "vinyl wall stickers." Have fun.

Preschool Lesson Plan: Shapes

Opening:

-Welcome Song

-prayer

-pledge, weather, calendar

-Nursery rhyme book

-Dance to nursery rhyme music

-Show & Tell

-Read some Shape Books

-Have each child find a shape in the room and tell the class about it.

-Music: -Get instrument triangles for kids to play

-Create : Shape finding spy glass out of tp roll. Decorate with shape stickers.

-Play: Using spy glass, go on a scavenger hunt for shapes. Take pictures of shapes children find (e.g.: door is a rectangle, window is a square, etc) that we will make into our own shape book they will get later.

 

-Using shape foam stickers do shape sort worksheet where kids put all the circles on one side and all the other shapes on the other side.

 

Play Free play outside

 

Preschool Lesson Plan: Colors

Opening:

-Welcome Song

-prayer

-pledge, weather, calendar

-Nursery rhyme book

-Dance to nursery rhyme music

-Show & Tell

-Read some books about Colors: A Color of My Own, color books, etc

-Have each child share their favorite color

-Music: -Give each child a musical instrument 

Hold up a colored piece of paper 

Have them play how the color makes them feel

-sing: Sing/learn The Rainbow song

-Play: Color mixing activities in stations: 1) with ice cube trays mixing basic colors 2) with Ziploc bags (red, yellow & blue) 3) color wheel activity with clothespins

-Create Paint the venn diagram color mixing worksheet to see how it works, then just free time to paint

 

Play time-play house in the playhouse if warm enough