Slow Week, but then She Surprises Me

This week has been slow.  We've all been tired.  David is working long hours and Rachel hasn't been sleeping well, so neither have I.

Needless to say, we've still done some fun activities.

We played Concentration with the images from the Corduroy book.  She quickly decided that a linear search was more efficient then turning over two at a time to see if they matched.  She would turn one over and then, holding it in one hand, flip the rest over looking for the match. :)  I think her parents are programmers and have rubbed off on her.

We also finally got around four days ago to coloring the pattern bears.  I colored the words on the first two bears and then she had to pattern match the words to figure out what color the other three bears on a line should be.

Today, we actually made a map using the images from last week's book, We're Going on a Bear Hunt.   After we made the first one, she wanted to make another map, so I drew pictures of our favorite places at the mall.  She drew lines between the different stores as I told her where we were going next.

I also succumbed to letting her have the flat mosaic tiles I had bought her for Christmas.  She has way too much coming for Christmas, so I'm going to space some of them out a bit.

She did a couple of the mosaic patterns, matching the tiles to the shapes, and then wanted me to play with her.  We took turns ("sharing" as she says).  However, she got bored with the patterns and started playing with the shapes and making her own patterns.  Fine by me.  The only thing I think she can still gain from the printed patterns is combining basic shapes to make more complex shapes.  (Which she figured out tonight after dinner and then told David, "You're good at this game" after he successfully combined two tiles to form a larger shape.)

Sitara, one of her playschool teachers, gave me a copy of a "Early Learning for Every Child Today: A Framework for Ontario Early Childhood Settings" today.  It is supposed to be the basis of all preschools by 2012.  It outlines, in a very detailed manner, all the skills they look for at specific levels.  It is like the milestones you find on dozens of websites, but much more detailed and lists indicators of the skill.  After I review the document, she will sit down with me and we'll go through it and do some assessments of Rachel.  She thinks Rachel is advanced in some areas and this should help me figure out what types of activities would be both helpful and fun for her.

Then, the surprise of the day.  At dinner tonight, she was messing around because she was tired.  She kept taking her carrots and breaking them in half.  So, if she wasn't going to eat them, we played counting games with them.  Then, we did the basic math problems:
1 + 1 = 2
1 + 2  = 3
3 + 1 = 4
6 + 1 = 7 (She came up with this one. Not my idea.)
2 + 2 = 4

We'd make pile of carrots and then count them.  When we were done, she took the pen and paper and started playing "math" explaining how to add things to someone that I couldn't see.

Then, she ate them all.  Yay for eating vegetables.