Links

Dear friends,

could you please drop your blog links in my comments. I have changed the templates yet I lost some of my precious links in my previous templates. After received the comments, I will link it back to my blog. Thank you.

Painting ..painting..and more painting...

Every morning when he wakes up from his slumber, he will show himself out from the bedroom and straight away heading to his learning space. He will rummage in the toy's basket to find something that he can play with. Though, it only lasts for about half an hour or so before he returns to the bedroom to wake me up. What I love about this is, he will say ' mama wake please'. He keeps saying that over and over again to my ears just like the buzzing bees ;-p.

Well, there is time when I feel like not entertaining himself but I could not help listening to his demands too frequently, so I will wake up and play with him.

Today, he asked for painting activity, thus I set up the board to resemble an easel. Perhaps, I am going to buy the easel for him soon, InsyaAllah.

So, those are the pictures of him when he 'engrossed' in his painting world.

Working on shape recognition and hand-eye coordination

I was thinking to continue  teaching Haris about the shapes and the colors for a couple of weeks before moving to the next activities. Learning about the shapes and colors are part of the Montessori activities and I should have introduced these activities to him before he reached one year milestones. Actually I did  but I never taught him properly due to lack of patience in me, sigh! Though,  I think it is better  late than never. Furthermore, the first child is like an experiment time for a parent, like me. Whatever is bad InsyaAllah I will improve myself if I had a chance to have another kids in the future.

Nevertheless I read somewhere ,the writer said something like this 'Toddlers start recognizing the difference in colors and shapes at around 18 months. When an interest in shapes and colors begins, it is time to start teaching and practicing with them.'  . So I guess I am not that late ;-p 

Back to the title of this notes, to gain knowledge about the shapes and colors means my boy needs to do more activities which related to the shapes and the colors.

Hesitate not, this afternoon off I went to the toys' shop to buy the wooden blocks shapes for Haris. 

                                        The adorable pieces of the shapes

These wooden blocks are not just simply 'a block', They allow the kids to create and build anything from them based on their imagination.  In other words, this activity generates the kids inner creativity. This set also helps the kids to work on shape recognition and hand-eye coordination considering that, this adorable set available in all sorts of different shapes and sizes and trust me, they attract my son to play with them ;-))

                                           The view from the top of the container

What he needed to do was choosing the right shapes and inserting them into the hole on the lid of the container. While he was playing with the blocks , I kept mentioning to him about the shapes together with the colors i.e-the orange triangle , the blue circle, the pink square and etc to make sure him understood better and if he did, I can beam widely ;-).

                                              He said 'x-engle' means rectangle.

                                                Watching the block drops

Montessori skills life basic-spooning, pouring and picking

The two years old toddler in my house is eager to explore everything. He is really fond of spooning any foods to the plate. Seeing of his interest in this life skills, ending up in me putting the beans in the container, laying a plastic mat on the floor, placing the cone on the glass vase and asking him to scoop the beans and pouring them into the cone.

From this activities, he learnt to master his skills in spooning, pouring, dropping and picking. I said spooning because he used the spoon and spooning the beans carefully before pouring them into the cone and watching the beans to drop, hitting the bottom of the vase. At the same time, he learnt how to pick the beans which scattered all over the mat even though I did not ask him to do so.  He only used the spoon for a couple of minutes and then 100% used the hands instead ;-p

Picking a big items are easier for the toddler but for the tiny miny beans are tricky ;-). I am happy seeing him occupied for about an hour or so doing this activities. Good job boy!

Earlier, he used the spoon

picking

pouring

Watching the beans hitting the bottom and perhaps he's thinking and wondering ;-)

Quotes

People love quotes, so do I. Lately, my mind keeps creating the quotes and I think it is better for me to compile all the quotes here for myself. Pardon the grammar etc because it just for my personal only.

Two faced  quotes

You can smile and you can pretend but you will never knew that people are actually know the real you. It just the matter of they keep it quite or they just watch how you  are going to play your role.~nurul~

Friendship quotes

The same wavelength is important in friendship, or otherwise we could never be closed and the friendship is not going to work~nurul~

Life quotes

Age is not just a number, age is telling how near you are with the death~nurul~

Learning about the shapes

I was inspired by one of the mums' blog about teaching our kids about the shapes. I was running out of the colors so I just used the yellow color instead. I am going to stock up the colors soon since Haris keeps asking for painting.

The yellow color, a tissue holder and a potato were used to do the art work about the shapes. After done with the painting, I showed him the shapes around us in the living room and he answered them just right. For today, he has already known the shapes of circle, star, square, crescent and triangle. Rectangle is quite tricky shape for him :-). Does not matter, I am pleased though...

When a best friend says something, It means a lot...

Best friend does not mean we have to stay closed of each others physically, at least for my opinion. The best buddy is the one who always gives you support, being there when you need them and always knows even though you say nothing at all.

Yesterday I received this message from one of my best buddies. She wrote this to me when she read my notes about the message from my father after he's leaving on a jet plane.

• • nurul sweetie, the message from your beloved parents was indeed full of emotions, genuinely from the heart. It makes me realize that sometimes I hurt my parents. Thank you for this sweet reminder my friend. My do'a to pakcik and makcik, may your haj will get full blessing from Allah. Amin. Take care my beloved friend nurul, I love u so much .

• Trust me, this message means a lot to me. That was a very thoughtful of her to send me those sweet words. I love you too dear...

• •