Joy School

BBJ has started attending Joy School with a few other girls from church. (Can I just take a moment to say that I adore Joy School? I'm sure the curriculum is lovely and inspiring and yadda yadda yadda. What I love about it is that, for two days a morning, BBJ is at my friends' houses. I don't need to worry about anything...I don't need to worry about bad habits being picked up, and I don't need to worry about her getting lost in a pack of children. Do you know what I can accomplish, toddler free, in a morning? It's STAGGERING.)

This past week was my turn to teach. Because of schedules, we didn't end up starting our school year until September 22. This left us several weeks behind the Joy School schedule. Not a big deal, but it would mean that our Halloween lesson would happen sometime around Thanksgiving.
Not good.

So, I - being the nice person that I am - decided to go through all of the lessons in the first Unit (Joy of the Body) and find the funnest, easiest parts of all 6 lessons, and did only those parts.

Yup. I'm a regular martyr. Heh.

The girls got to get in a little finger painting action. It was hilarious to watch the girls, and their personalities, come out on the paper. BBJ used broad strokes, knowing that she couldn't have a new sheet of paper until the first one was "done." Another little girl picked up as much paint as she could and mixed it on her paper, in a puddle. She spread it out, adding more paint as she went, completely covering the original paper. The last girl picked up a few drops at a time and put them in a small 3" blob at the bottom of her page. The rest of her page was spotless.

I usually put BBJ's paints onto small plastic plates, because this washable paint is fabulous and really is completely washable. However, for three girls, I decided to go the disposable route and use small plastic baby food containers that I had laying around.

For another "tactile activity" we made bodies out of edible cookie sculpture dough. I know my sister and I used to make cookie sculptures when we were kids. I looked online, and could only find one recipe. That recipe called for 1/4 cup of salt. I'm no genius, but I had my doubts about the claims of this dough being "edible." However, as I couldn't find any other recipes to compare it to, I decided to go for it. I tasted the dough while we were making our "bodies". It definitely tasted savory, but edible. After we baked it? That's another matter. It reminded me of licking pretzels. Lots and lots of pretzels. Heh. One mother said that this might actually be preferable to a tasty dough, as the girls would be much less likely to eat their 1 pound cookies!

For another quick, easy activity, I traced each girl's feet and hands onto construction paper. While they had their free-play time, I cut out the hands and feet and then sewed them into mini-garlands, letting the machine "air stitch" for a few inches between the paper pieces. The next day, I brought my scale down from the bathroom and weighed and measured all of the girls. I wrote those measurements onto their garlands before sending the girls home for the week. (Funny fact - all three girls were within 1/2" of each other, and 1/2 pound - 40 inches, and 34 pounds. BBJ was the shortest, at 39 inches. Heh.)