My Baby’s First Tooth Gel

The first toothpaste I bought for my little one was this Koala Pals apple flavour training tooth gel… TRAINING tooth gel for children under 2 years old. We bought a tooth brush for her since she was age of 1 year old, and she did like to use (or play) it sometimes. After some understanding of toothbrush is used for cleaning the teeth, I thought it is the time for her to start using toothpaste to brush her teeth.

I used to buy household products from Melaleuca company, and from there I found this tooth gel for Baby Debo. Why is using training tooth gel? From their introduction, it showed that normal toothpaste that we are usually using contain Fluoride that can be harmful to children below 2. Thus, the American Dental Association recommends that children under 2 not ingest fluoride to lower their risks in permanent teeth discolouration. Furthermore, this Koala Pals training tooth gel is also sugar free, to prevent tooth decay for the children.

Is Baby Debo like it? Well, she just put the toothbrush into her mouth for few seconds without brushing her teeth, and when she took out the toothbrush, the tooth gel gone. I think she treat it like a sweet instead of toothpaste…headache… but at least it showed that she do like the taste of it.

Would like to share with you a video introducing this tooth gel :

First Book from Book Depository – Kumon Let’s Color!

Finally… waiting nearly a month after I had made my order, finally got my Kumon Let’s Color Book. As from Book Depository website, it said country like Malaysia only need two weeks time for delivery. But after two weeks time I still haven’t received the order, so I thought maybe there was any delay or probably because I am staying in East Malaysia. At the end of 3 weeks time, I send an email to their customer service. What I appreciated was their kind customer service and prompt replies.

They provide alternative solutions for me in case I didn’t get my book: refund or resending another copy. After waiting for few more days, still no news on my order, the Daddy was wondering whether the website was trustable (with little blaming on me >_<)… so I decided request for another copy from them..just a day after I send my email… Ding Dong… here was the postman!! Yes, my book… finally… So I sending another email to them and luckily they able to stop the second copy sending out.



I just can’t wait to let Baby Debo use the book..so do she ^_^ … she was excited and curious what Mama buy for her. So here is it… our first lesson – Breakfast Time !!



Is that looks good? Well, according to the book, kids scribbling before they know how to colour (fill colours in the blank area)… so I would say her drawing was AWESOME !!   ^_^

DIY – The Very Hungry Caterpillar Wall Collage with Letters

As we were having “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” as this week theme, I had made some nice wall collage as decoration and words learning.

What we’ll need:

• colourful lowercase alphabets printout for the words of “the very hungry caterpillar”
• green, red, and purple colour construction paper
• unused box or cardboard
• yellow and brown foam paper (or construction paper)

How to make it:
1. Cut out the alphabets printout
2. Cut the green construction paper into circle shape. You may cut few circles at once. I made six circles in one piece of paper, you may have different size, depending on how big the caterpillar you want.
3. Cut the red construction paper as the caterpillar head, also cut out two antenna shape from brown colour paper and six feet shape from purple paper.
4. Paste the green circles and on circles shape cardboard to make it more firm. Do the same to the caterpillar head. I also made three green oval shape as divider for the words.
5. Paste the alphabets on the green circle.
6. Stick the antenna on the head, and make the eyes and nose by using green construction paper, yellow and brown foam paper.
6. Now you can stick it on the wall. I use Tack It to stick it on, clean and easy to remove.



May spend some time in cutting out the alphabets, but it is worth as my little princess do like it so much. Every time I ask her “where is the caterpillar"?”, she will point this big caterpillar on the wall instead of the one in the book.

DIY Dot Paint

Been searching for dot paint online for past few weeks, the brand that fascinated me are the Do a Dot Paint and Alex Dot and Dashes Paint. I had been searching for these two brands around the shops and through online, but can’t find any besides purchase from overseas. However, the postage fee is higher than the product price itself, making the total price of dot paint roughly RM 100 for Alex and RM 120 above for Do a Dot. I really feel not worth paying so much for postage and most important was … Papa also commented “NO!!” …so I decided to DIY a dot paint at home, idea from here.



What I need was a big coarse glue and paint (I was using Crayola Fingerpaint..). I poured out some glue into empty glue bottle as I will need to add in lots of paint into the big glue. After adding in the paints, shake the glue bottle and that’s about it. How was the result?



The colour was still a bit light and need to have much more paint pouring in, but I do feel satisfied with the result… I will use this dot paint for our next week theme – The Very Hungry Caterpillar… hope Baby Debo like it…

Will still have the impulse to buy the Do-a-Dot paint.. hope I can find it in local shop… with reasonable price !!

No Theme Week for 8th ~ 14th April 2013

Baby Debo sick and having fever for past two days, so I decided to have some break for this whole week.. hoho…. Well, actually I still haven’t get my sensory bin ready for letter D, so perhaps I can have more times to think of how to make the sensory bin.

Baby Debo was having free play for this week, playing with her toys especially her “Masak masak”, reading books and watching her favourite songs and stories.

And I do think I still need some more times for letter D, so I get another idea to have a special theme next week --- “THE VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLAR” .. since we had just finished our letter C week.

I am sure that Baby Debo will like this theme as I bought her the book of The Very Hungry Caterpillar and she likes to read and play the hole inside the book, pretending her little finger as the caterpillar eating its fruits. This will be the first story based theme week we have, and hope Baby Debo will like it ~

Tot School – Letter C for Cat

Tot School Week 3 (1st – 7th April 2013) @ Debo 20 months
Alphabet: C for Cat
Theme: Pets
Colour: Yellow



LETTER BOX



Seems the box was a bit heaped, too many stuff but the box a bit small… hah…Ok, What we had for our letter box this weeks were: Candle, Cat, Cow, Corn, Cup, Chicken, Caterpillar, Clown, paper cut from magazine and sandpaper letter C.  



WORDS LEARNING


I wrote the words of the objects on the whiteboard and called it out one by one. Baby Debo able to recognize and called out some objects names: Cow, Cat, Corn, Cup (she called this as “BEI”.. Chinese pronunciation for cup). She recognize the object of chicken when I called out, but unable to pronounce it..I guess she only able to speak single sound words clearly for this very moment.



These were the objects that I had use for words spelling.


Resource: Moving Alphabet from Montessori Materials;

MATCHING CARDS



ELC Matching cards for letter C. Baby Debo able to point all the pictures correctly when I called the name but still unable to put the puzzle together.




We done the flash cards in both English and Chinese language, in separated days before we played the matching cards. Thumbs up for Baby Debo, as she did a very good job in matching the cards !! Although she still unable to read the words but she able to put all the words cards to the correct picture after I read out for her. She really likes animals !!

LETTERS MAZE

Resource: Letter Maze game from 1plus1plus1equals1 website

We initially using Crayola Washable Marker to play this game. She tried to look for letter C when I called it out (She can't really find by herself) and marked on the letter when I pointed to her, but able to find letter A and B by herself..a good improvement to her.. Good job!



We then changed to use colourful magnets to trace the letter C. Well, she tend to play with the magnets by arranging it in her own ways instead of tracing the letter. 

TRACING EXERCISE

Resource: Confessionofahomeschooler Website

We used Crayola Washable Marker to trace the line. The photo above was done under my guidance.. looks pretty good, right?… After this, Baby Debo requested to do it by herself and here how was her work done (photo below)… She was trying to colour the flowers and butterflies instead of tracing it!!!  (~_~)




RIGHT BRAIN EXERCISE


Bought it some times ago during Sogo Sales (well, in fact Sogo having Sales everyday) at a price of RM 5 each!! I saw some other place selling these for RM18 above… really glad I had bought it.




So, we play the “How’s it Different” for this week. I just picked out two sets of cards which were dog and cats set in relevant to our this week theme “PET”. Baby Debo enjoying looking and playing the cards since she was interested on animals… So, where is the difference of the cards? She not responding for what i was asking….. should be ok for first attempt in playing these cards, will try to get her “actively” involved later on.



Hape Shake and Match Shape Sorter. The wood blocks are filled with colourful beads, making some sounds that really attract kids.  I thought this was a bit heavy for Baby Debo but she likes to carry this around, like carrying a handbag.. hah, funny. She able to match all the blocks to the hole, but sometimes for the difficult blocks like half circle and trapezoid, she felt having problem to putting it in then she will insist me to put it in for her. Not a good problem solver? Or too good to be problem solver (delegate the difficult tasks to others)? (~_~)
 
 

I used three colour baskets for her to practise colour matching. What she need to do was to put the covers on the baskets according to the colours. No problem for her.. all correct, well done!!

PHYSICAL PRACTISE


We were doing alphabets letter peg board puzzle, which she always like to took out and play by herself. Mostly she was pulling out all the letters without putting it back, leaving it on the floor and will only “help” to putting some of it back when she saw me cleaning it up…



Baby Debo enjoying stacking few blocks up then PUSH it down… laugh loudly!! I really don’t understand what so funny about, but glad that she was enjoying her finger grasp practise.

BIBLE STUDY

Resource: 1plus1plus1equal1 website

Since we had miss out the Bible study lesson for letter B, so we had done it this week together with letter C. I wrote the verses on the whiteboard, reading and explaining to her before we started to sing songs from the Songs of Saplings.

COLOURING

Resource: 1plus1plus1equal1 website

I showed her example way of colouring by coloured the carrot but she seems not showing any interest on what I had said and insisted to DRAW on her own way instead of COLOURING…


Resource: 1plus1plus1equal1 website
 

Resource: 1plus1plus1equal1 website

Baby Debo keep asking for colouring, so I gave her another piece of worksheet. Is this better than the first one?

HANDCRAFT



Craft work for letter C for Cat. Is this cat looks cute? Well, need to be careful in doing this because the craft was a bit soft and easy broken.

ABC EXERCISE
C for Clap, and we were doing clapping our hands by singing song “IF YOU ARE HAPPY”. This shouldn’t be difficult for Baby Debo as she likes to clap hand and step her feet. Here is one cute lovely video I found from youtube would like to share.. well, we also did similar as this video, haha.
www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=Z3lmDMQ4hk4&feature=endscreen

TECHNOLOGY
What I meant for technology are the software and apps that I had use for teaching Baby Debo. In this week, I had show her Little Reader and Little Musician from Brillkids. She likes both, especially for Little Reader, she following what the actions showing in the screen, example like waving and pointing. A very interesting and useful software for kids because it make learning fun and easy for them.

BOOKS

Books we had for this week:

ENGLISH BOOKS: The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Animal Life Cycle Series – Crab, Domestic Animals

CHINESE BOOKS: 小鸡学游泳， 戏弄大海的螃蟹， 小猫钓鱼， 小卡咪， 大肚子蝈蝈， 小鸡和小鸭

Sensory Bin – Pets (Letter C for Cat)

What I can find for this week sensory bin was two doggie, two rabbits, a cat and bird. Thought to make some sawdust as the base for the sensory bin but unable to find any, so just use a fine linen as the base. A basket was used as bird nest and toilet paper roll as house for the two little rabbit and a fabric basket with ribbon inside as cat’s bed. As I saw the sensory bin was a bit sparse, so I put in the pink flower inside the bin…look nice hor??

I had DIY a doggie house, using a box and felt paper as the roof. I named the doggie house as BEN because I remember there is a nursery song name “My Dog Ben”.. I like the house’s name board, it was a bone shape… using the foam paper to make it…