365 TV-Free Activities: Final Episode

It seems like just yesterday, but yesterday marked one whole year since we took up the gauntlet. We began our challenge to work our way through the book, 365 TV-Free Activities, by Steve and Ruth Bennett. We had highs! We had lows. We were running a week or more behind for most of the year, but darn it, we finished a few days early.

For those of you who have no idea what I am talking about: Hi, nice to meet you. I have a blog where I attempt to make sense of our loony ways, and we've been doing an activity per day, from the same battered little book, all year. Read more about the introduction of this idea here.

There were times when it felt a little grueling to come up with supplies, energy, and the technical wherewithal to accomplish, document, and publish each activity, but we rose to the challenge and are better for it. The younger two kids were greatly enriched by all of the hands-on nature and art activities, as well as spending time with the older two, who were in turn enriched by spending time with their younger siblings. It was like a big ole' circle of enrichment.

But, something else happened to make this experience better than anyone could have predicted. Henry and Thomas showed themselves to be budding sketch writers/ directors/ performers. They relished every step of the process, coming up with ideas, gathering props, setting the stage, even storyboarding in some cases. And of course, their filming adventures would always produce a few outtakes, which made me and their dad laugh harder than any other time during the year. I hope it was fun for those following us on Facebook.

Speaking of which, if it weren't for our friends out there in the land of the internet, we'd just look like a bunch of dorks with a beat-up activity book, a camera, and too much time on our hands. So thank you, for reading, posting, encouraging us, and playing along.

I give you, our final submission. Look for the wacky alternative ending version on Facebook.

365 TV-Free Activities: Errands

Today, George had to run some errands. You know how it goes, sometimes you have to go to the library, and then after that, you have to stop by the post office*.

 Thomas would make an excellent librarian someday. He delights in the welcoming of a new patron, 

the crafting of their card, 

  and the use of the machine that goes "beep!

On to the post office! 

 Henry cut a cardboard box so that it could function as a post box, 

and crouched behind it like a Bedouin while George pulled the flap door open and filled it with junk mail. Just like in real life! 

*These ideas, Library Fun (#177) and Post Office (#253) were ripped right out of the always amusing 365 TV-Free Activities, by Steve and Ruth Bennett. They bring us to day 239 & 240 of our year-long project. 

365 TV-Free Activities: Crime Bites

We've been plowing through our year-long commitment  and today, our dining room became a small restaurant.  But first, I whipped up a batch of Play Modeling Clay (advanced, idea #248)

This is 3 cups of flour, 1 1/2 cups of salt, 1 tablespoon of cream of tartar, 3 cups of water, and 2 tablespoons of cooking oil, all colored and cooked up.  After combining the ingredients, I poured the runny results into a series of small containers, so I could color and cook them up separately.  Once I added the desired amount (I tend to double that) of food coloring, I heated up the pasty mixture over medium heat, stirring constantly, until it started to become IMPOSSIBLE to stir.  Plopped it onto a cutting board and let it cool; it was ready to use after a few minutes of kneading.

I chose red, green, yellow, and brown for my modeling clay colors, because I thought they would be the best for making a luscious banquet such as the one you see before you. 

O, the whimsy! We all made a contribution. Tiny fries with tiny ketchup. Pizza! Chips! Fruit! A platter of chocolate chip cookies. A cob of corn, covered with individually sculpted kernels. And, how will somebody eat that crisp healthy salad in the blue bowl? Why, with the tiny red fork, of course.

Okay, so we got our food all set, now time for restauranting (idea #263). Instead of making a menu, Thomas' restaurant offered cafeteria-style dining, with a fun family atmosphere. You like it? Grab it, and pretend to eat it.  But first, you must pay with cash.  So, hit the ATM if all you brought was plastic. 

(Currency Games idea #146)  Yesterday, Henry made this little ATM with our big abacus and paper. He made a card, and money to go with it, all from cardstock. In the Currency Games activity, kids make money, decorate it symbols, and devise a value system. There is the basic unit; Henry went with the dollar. From there, the other bills were quantities of dollars, and the coins were fractions of a dollar, as it goes with the U. S. currency system. It could be switched around or the unit could be called something else. Something silly, like slap.  "That'll be 50 slaps, please." or "Hey buddy, can you spare half a slap?" 

Anyway, back to the restaurant.

Thomas was the proprietor/waiter and was happy to bring George anything that caught his eye, and refill his drinks, of course.

mmmmmmmm

mmmmm?

I wish this story didn't end with a heinous crime, but while George was enjoying his salty supper, a local thug wrecked the ATM and made off with all of the cash.  Thomas needs to hire some security, if he doesn't want to lose customers.  I nominate the pig.  She's strong, has a mean streak, and will accept anything edible as payment.  Even play dough salad.

365 TV-Free Activities: Treasure Map

Day 141: I decided we'd do activity # 335 today.  Henry was my ally, but you shall see, alliances among pirates were made to be broken!  

I'll take a little break from cackling madly and explain.  Henry was my loyal little henchman,following my orders to take a mysterious metal box to our local playground, hide it there, draw a map of its whereabouts, tear the map to pieces, and hide the shreds.  Meanwhile, I got Thomas, Mae, and George ready, and we headed down to the playground.  When we rejoined him, Henry played a little game of Warmer and Cooler (idea # 135: Hide It: extra credit!) to help Thomas find the map pieces, which were hidden here and there.  

 In no time, Thomas pieced the map together and figured out where to find the treasure.  X marks the spot!

 To the tree!

 He found the metal box, hidden under a weed-blocking fabric, under bark mulch.  Inside, treasures galore!  Chocolate!  Jewels!  Magic rocks! And a basket.  It made an exhilarating metal jingle when shaken.  Could it be?  Real treasure inside?

Drat!  Metal buttons!  And a cryptic note, mocking their trusting foolish ways.

And, with a loud pocketful of clanging coins, I broke out in a mad run.  Freaking out townspeople at the local playground,  Just another day in the BU.  That's Henry, hot on my heels.

He caught me!  (surprise, surprise), and managed to fish the treacherous booty out of my pocket.  He and Thomas then took it to the local grocery store and spent it on snacks and beverages.  Just like real pirates.

365 TV-Free Activities: 100 Days of This!

Here we are at Day 100, and I have for you dueling tales, depicting two brothers' dealings with a mysterious creature. First Henry came to me with his story of the The Chickenfish King:

Last night, Thomas and I were down in Nehalem Falls Creek. It was then that Thomas learned about the mythical Chickenfish. The Chickenfish is a bright white fish that has feathers instead of scales. It swims the way a penguin does; its feathers are good swimming feathers.

Thomas announced that he did not believe in the Chickenfish. All of a sudden, the water rippled and we knew that Thomas had angered the Chickenfish King. I told Thomas that we had to go down to the Chickenfish King's lair, and give offerings so that he would not disrupt our picnic. We ran across the rocks and jumped over logs. We climbed mountains and slid down into ravines, until finally, we reached the pond of the Chickenfish King.

We saw a little plant growing beside the pool. We decided the leaves of this plant would be enough of an offering for the Chickenfish King. We weren't sure if he was happy or not, but we saw in a ripple in the water again and we started to run. It was when were running across the rocks that Thomas slipped. Luckily, he caught himself, but hurt his hand. I carried him back to our picnic and lay him down. I saw another ripple in the water. The Chickenfish King was happy after all.

by Henry Laszlo

I was incredulous, and as I transcribed his words, I thought, Thomas will not like this. I said so, but I was instructed to type and remember my place. Thomas was not to hear about Henry's version of the tale of their quest. I pled with Henry to allow me to record Thomas' version. I was granted my wish and Thomas came to see me. When Henry wasn't looking, I said, "Now's your chance to tell your side of this story, which Henry has done, and he's carrying you at the end." So, Thomas gave his side of the story:

It was a gloomy day in summer. Fall was coming up, and me and Henry were just running around on the rocks. We heard a high pitched squeal and a ripple in the water. Me and Henry said, "It's just a pigletfish." But then, a bigger ripple and Henry said, "Oh no! Chickenfish" And I said, "No way! Run!"

And we came to a small creek with water and huge ripple and the water splashed up at us and the Chickenfish King arrived and we ran for our lives. We thought of an idea and we made an offering to the Chickenfish king, we ran away, I fell and hurt my hand. Henry fell and hit his head on a rock, so I had to drag him all the way back the site.

by Thomas Laszlo

The emergence of The Chickenfish King made me think of one of The Activities, from The Book, so here's idea #101: Fantastical Creatures

Introduce your kids to the mythical creatures in reverse. Instead of showing them a picture of a sphinx or a unicorn and saying "That is a sphinx or unicorn", describe the attributes of a sphinx or unicorn and ask your child to draw what they think that would look like. Unfortunately, Henry and Thomas are well-versed in their mythical creatures and their results are pretty spot-on. I need to check that chimera.

The above picture is Thomas' satyr and centaur, and the chimera (lion head, goat body, snake tail) below is Henry's work.

Afterward, you can look up real pictures of the mythical creatures and everyone can have a laugh, I guess. Just don't be hurtful. I couldn't draw a decent unicorn until I was well into my teens, and I even knew what they were supposed to look like. If you say, "A unicorn is like a horse with a horn sticking out of its head!" and your child draws what looks like a trombone with hooves, you know you're doing something right. My unicorns always resembled long-haired pigs who had recently suffered a head injury, sometimes with wings

365 TV-Free Activities: Mazzazines

I forget which kid couldn't pronounce "magazine" correctly when he was learning to talk, but ever since, we have called them "mazzazines" in this house. Obviously, we modeled the correct pronunciation of the word, to help the little one along. But, when it is just us, the superior word-pronouncers of the house, talking amongst ourselves, we call them "mazzazines" and cannot stop.

Okay, I'll stop for this one post, but please know, up here (pointing to head), I'm still calling them "mazzazines".

My guide for this year-long project, the book of 365 TV-Free Activities, has more than one activity involving pictures cut out of magazines, mailers; anything with big bright photos, letters, numbers, and scenery. As a matter of fact, it makes a nice project just to go through magazines with the kids and cut stuff out. I set out containers to sort the pictures and symbols we excised. They ended up in the following categories: food, animals, household items, human faces, vehicles, and body parts, numbers.

One of the activities we were shooting for is called Food Face (#112). In it you arrange pictures of food, or any other themed item. Here's one I made, but I like Henry's better.

He went for color as a theme, rather than images.

It looks simple, but coming up with that much solid dark and white in magazines selling everything with sumptuous bright colors can be a challenge.

I'm kind of embarrassed about our take on idea #10, Animal Puppet Stage. This is such an excellent opportunity to tie in information about science, specifically ecosystems, and we just went and made it weird. I give you, Cheetah Mountain:

In this activity a child is given a large piece of posterboard weight paper. We cut up a pizza box. Then, the child is given a variety of colorful art supplies, so that they may color an elaborate little world; perhaps a jungle scene, or underwater. We used photos of scenes from magazines.

Next, the child is given the instructions to glue pictures to cardboard, and then cut them out, leaving a little tab of cardboard sticking off of the bottom. Make corresponding slits in the scenery board and slide the tabs through them, creating a bewitching little theater of animals, wiggling about in their proper environment! Doesn't that sound delightful and educational?

Here's what Henry said after I suggested this activity and read the description to him, "Put a polar bear on an iceberg? Sounds boring." So,

Does it count if the animals have a sense that they are in the wrong place, as evidenced by their shared question mark? Can it be considered educational if it's aware of its inaccuracy?

And,

Run! She's growing her permanent teeth and she means to use them!

Finally,

I'm sure the authors, Steve and Ruth Bennet, would prefer we watch really bad TV instead of mangle their wonderful ideas like this. Where can I stream some Speed Racer?

365 TV-Free Activities: Catching Up

We've enjoyed tackling one task after another in our 365 TV-Free Activities Project. Let's be clear, TV was watched last week, this week, and will be all year. It's the activities themselves that supposedly involve no television. (I'm looking at you, #365 Zany Television.)

The week started strong, with pancakes, naturally. We had fun tossing cards and weighing toys, as illustrated here. It was mostly wordy small projects for days 5-9, so they're going to be consolidated and presented thusly.

Thursday, June 2, aka Day 5. We chose writing a letter to the President. (project # 363 for those reading along)

Thomas, George and I participated, but I feel Thomas' is the worthiest one to share, and send:

Hello Obama,

I am Thomas Laszlo, from the Laszlo Family. There are four kids in our family. I am one. I hope you're fixing up how much we screwed up Iraq. I wish there was a new law in the government where absolutely everyone had to wear a helmet. Absolutely, so it would be safe for all the kids. No one would just die that fast. Even for people over 18. Because right now, people over 18 or 18 don't have to wear their helmets. My mom treats me good and makes sure I wear a helmet everyday. Keep up the good work, Obama.

From,

Thomas

He may have absorbed some of my opinions over the years, but he goes his own way with this one. His stance on helmets is his own, and he feels strongly about it, as he wears one daily, and rides with friends who are not compelled to wear them, by their parents or anyone else. As you can imagine, this inequity bothers Thomas greatly, as he is concerned, most of all, with the safety of his bike pack comrades. Will Barack Obama be inspired? Will he send troops to Tillamook to enforce the already existing bike helmet law for minors? Will he "fix" "Iraq"? We can only hope.

Day 6, #350 Weird Words

You're supposed to say the names of nearby items, substituting the first letter in the word with another letter. (Pable, instead of table, is given as an example in the book.) For a kid around kindergarten age/development level, it should be a little bit of a challenge at first, but they should figure out the pattern and be able to do their own versions.

For George, it was opportunity to forgive his family for momentarily losing their minds and forgetting how to speak. At first he corrected me, then he started to get mad, then he smiled patronizingly when I explained the whole thing was a game, then he continued correcting me, and started asking me to get a board game out of the cabinet. Games are fun things that makes sense, not self-impressed parents and siblings giggling at their inaccuracies.

Day 7, #147. Improbable cuisine: Invent zany recipe items, the likes of which nobody would ever attempt to prepare or eat.

Henry, take it away:

1. Whole wheat monkey giblets with ranch (ew ranch).

2. Fried slug with toast.

3. Overcooked clown (it's funny!).

Thanks, Henry.

I'm at a loss for how to document Day 8, #28 and Day 9 #29. They are both "brainstorming" activities in which the adult is supposed to engage the child(ren) in conversations, pushing them to imagine new uses for nearby items, and strategies to solve imaginary problems. When I try to instigate such conversations with my kids, they get suspicious, but eventually open up and say all kinds of great stuff I can't really try to type and keep up with. Let's just say, if anyone ever broke into our house, he would be receiving a spatula and wouldn't need to use hands to hold it. My kids are inventive and their brainstorms might bring a little hail.

Today is day 10 and we're doing that whole thing with the flashlight and the globe and talking about Why There Are Time Zones. Look for it soon on our Facebook page.

365 TV-free Activities: Day 1, Bas Relief Pancakes (#18)

Today we began our year-long project with Bas Relief Pancakes, suggestion #18 from 365 TV-Free Activities You Can Do With Your Child. These pancake are more of an example of inlay than bas relief. When I think of bas relief art, I think of a coin. These pancakes have a smooth surface.

First, you pour* your "shape". I won't say what Henry was trying to make this resemble, but let's all be relieved it didn't work out as he planned.

Then, defeat all invisible foes with high-flying helicopter kicks.

After the edges of your "shape" firm up a little, add a new ladle of pancake batter over the "design".

Then, chill on the floor while your brother hovers with a spatula.

Flip the whole thing when the bubbles have risen to the surface and popped, if you can wait that long. Here, Henry is mad a bas relief for inadequately conveying his vision.

Just call it an eight, champ.

My "star" and "flower"

look more like an amoeba with a cape, and a sand dollar.

George wants his dad's help with

Pancake Zero!

Thomas made a leaf, and you know what? Yes! I see it.

Wearing out the shift key today. My "whale".

R(?) is for(?) Rebekah(?)

*Our pancake batter recipe was pretty basic, from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything. 2 c. flour, 1 T. baking powder, 1/2 tsp. salt, 1 T. sugar, 2 eggs, 2 c. milk, 2 T. vegetable oil.

Brainstorms: Flipping the Script

Ah, (late) Spring! When we dust off everything that got all dusty during winter, rub our crusty eyes, yawn and stretch and start school.* Yep. Backyard University is flipping the script. We see no reason to commence in fall and break in late spring. That's just when we're getting started! There's more light. The weather is nicer. The adults are more energetic. The garden is exciting. It feels like a beginning, which is why saying good-bye to teachers and learning activities at this point in years past always seemed strange to me. After many long dark months in which leaving the house is a painful chore, we are suddenly on our own when the sun is out and everyone finally feels like going here and there? No. This is the new time, and for us here at the BU, ~Spring is the new Fall!~

And, while we're at it, ~Saturday is the new Monday!~

Real Talk: Most of the week is less than productive. When you factor in every daily obligation, there's little time to do lots of prolonged active learning projects. There's one adult here, and she's just trying to scrape up the usual chaos sprinkles of daily life most of the time. The weekend holds more promise. The mathematician is home, and the conversations and projects can go on uninterrupted, for the most part.

Speaking of projects, we're happy to announce the initiation of the launching of an idea. We're going to blog our way through this book.

You'd think blogging your way through something would require hipwaders, but no. I might still wear mine, but that's beside the point. This book requires just a few basic craft supplies, time, bored kids of a variety of ages, and grown-ups. We have all of that (and so much more), and are going to give it our best shot.

We're going to go for an average of one activity per day for a whole year, starting this Sunday, with the Bas-Relief Pancakes (#18). The activities range from simple to very involved, so rather than do them in order, we'll choose them according to the seasons, weather, and our needs. We reserve the right to double up and and do two or more simple activities one day, if we need to make up a day. Not all of them will be discussed here on the blog. Sometimes, we'll just post a photo or status update on the Backyard University facebook page. You "liked" that already, right? Good.

*We practice a rare form of unschooling called Secretly Maniuplated Living, and it really goes on 24/7/52. It is powered by the superfuel that is a kid's internal motivation, and somewhat supported by attending grown-up masterminds who put said kids into situations where they can pick up grade-level skills and concepts said grown-ups looked up on the Oregon Department of Education Common Core State Standards page. Shh! Don't tell the little ones. They just love to cut and glue. They don't know they mastered key fine motor skills.