As the Weather Cool Down, We are Warming up with Mother Goose Time

As the orange leaves crunch beneath our feet, we have been exploring the green canopied rain forest with Mother Goose Time.  It is kind of a nice escape to be discussing a warm, vibrant environment as we brave the ever cooling air in Chicago. We  spent the entire weekend in the house, so I used it as an opportunity to focus on fostering a sense of responsibility toward caring for our triangle family and our home.

I went ahead and set up our invitation to create station and math lessons at the kitchen table. Together, Mr. Personality and I loved decorating our J for Jaguar cutouts, transforming the simple letter into a tree climbing cat. After we set our creations aside to dry, my son pointed out the amount of glue and paint that now decorated our table. We took pause. My son and I had both participated in the creative, messy time. So instead of jumping down, washing his hands and taking off, I suggested that we both clean up the mess. He obviously picked using the bottle of spray cleaner and wiping the table, and I was more than fine with that.

While we were cleaning, the washing machine beeped. My son paused. I said, "Hey your laundry is finished washing." I suggested he open the machine, transfer the clothing to the dryer and start the dryer. He then suggest, " I do my share." I may have rolled my eyes, but I did. I told him to find the words power and start and press them. He looked for a P word and a St words and we were rolling.

After snack, I set up mushroom math. This Mother Goose Time concept was a hit. My son popped out the paper mushroom cap shapes and decorated then with letters, because my son is in a phase where he wants to write his name on everything. Also, its worthwhile to mention that any opportunity you get to have your child pop out shapes in paper, I recommend you take it. There might be some rips, which is partially why I order two sets of crafts from Mother Goose Time, but it is a great lesson in patience and refines fine motor skills.

We then created a rain forest floor-like surface from play dough and played a game that had us select number cards and plant each of our personally created fungi. All the while, I utilized points and facts provided in the Mother Goose Time Lesson Plan book. My son then invited daddy to come play and informed him mushrooms can grow on the rain forest floor because they don't need a lot of light. He also has been informing friends and neighbors alike to not eat mushrooms they find outside, no matter "how awesome they look."

Finally, on a chilly Sunday afternoon, I opened my son's bedroom door to reveal a Mission Impossible style maze. With a 30 cent roll of streamer paper I created a web of craziness and placed a stuffed worm, bird, snake and other animals that we pretended were indigenous to the rain forest throughout the room for him to rescue. He seriously spent an hour doing this and making new changes and ideas for the game. That was a real win for me, as you know attention is not easy to come by in this house.

Overall, it was a fun first week exploring a more tropical world than our own with Mother Goose Time. We are grateful that Mother Goose Time has share this month's curriculum box with us in exchange for our honest experiences. I recommend this company to any parent trying to supplement their child's education and fill rainy, cold weekends with indoor fun.