Activities for the last few days..

Alhamdulillaah Ramadhaan is just a couple of weeks away, and we are busy planning for the blessed month. So not done any planned learning. But we have been revising, reading, doing a bit of maths and busy doing some worksheets masha Allaah.

This is the favourite book that Maimoonah keeps asking me to read aloud these days.

Thease are series of books for little children on topics very much related to them based on morals and manners. I borrowed them from a cousin and read them to Maimoonah. Some contents of the book I do not agree due to Islaamic values, so I incorparate Islamic point of views and explain to her. For Example it says in one of the books if you get angry its ok to punch something or hit hard on something to get your anger away. I do not read this to her, instead I read something like, the Messenger of Allaah sallaahu alaihiwasallam has said when you get angry to seek refuge with Allaah from Shaitaan and if you are standing sit down, and if you are sitting down lie down so that the anger will go off Insha Allaah. But other than this these books are nice to read to little children.

I use the Glenn Doman's reading program for Maimoonah and we have come a long way masha Allaah. Many sisters have concerns about this method, but Masha Allaah for us it has worked so far and I hope to continue. So now since we are a bit relaxed we revised the reading on her white board. She enjoys this masha Allaah. Usually I have been writing words and she reads. This time I started writing sentences using the words she already knew and masha Allaah tabarakallaah she read them with no problems whatsoever. She was thrilled too. These are the kind of sentences she reads masha Allaah. As long as the letters are big and clear she can read both the print and hand written words, she already knows.

She shows lot of interest in drawing something and talking about it. So she draws and says this is a sun, this is a river, these are birdies, etc etc... I let her do this and I listen and she enjoys.

Suddenly she writes something like the letter M upside down and says see M. So I draw dots and make her write on top of the dots. Also to enhance pre writing skills I make her draw lines and show me the directions that a butterfly has to take to go to the flower, etc.. She does this well masha Allaah.

Also we do the MEP maths Reception year, so we continued some activities on that too.

I really like this program and we have almost come to lesson 14 out of 20. This is also free masha Allaah and everything is well planned for you to use it. I do not give her any writing on this, so far everything is practical and oral. I intend to repeat the book next year with allowing her to do the activities on the book Insha Allaah. These are few of the activities we did ....counting, sorting taking away or putting them under and counting the remaining items. We did this with my cookery books. she wanted to carry heavy things and do the counting.

So these were the few unplanned activities we do and will continue till Ramadhaan Insha Allaah.

Together We Read - Who Made the Builders?

First of all Jazzakillaah Khayr to Sister Umm An Nu'man for her generosity, thus enabling us to read this book and benefit bi idhnillaah.

This is a very simple book and well fitting for Maimoonah as she is same us Omar these days asking and asking questions masha Allaah. So she liked this book very much.

So we read this book many times and used the files from here, and pasted them on our environmental studies book.

Also we spoke about people who help us in our neighborhood and read once again (a revision I should say) this book which could be downloaded here. Masha Allaah in our Village you can see most of these people who help us, so it was easy for me to teach Maimoonah. She loves the Imaam of our masjid and is waiting for her Abi to take her to him one day and give salaams to the Imaam.

We also practiced the Adhaan and the Iqaamah. I do not have to do anything much on this Masha Allaah because we hear this five times everyday and the Muaddin says it so clearly and slowly Maimoonah has caught them masha Allaah.

Then on the next page we pasted and wrote the things that are in our neighbourhood inside our Village. While doing this I also spoke to her about who neighbours are and how Allaah and His Messenger sallaahu alaihiwasallam has asked us to treat our neighbours kindly. She was very happy about this and she told me "Ummi I am kind to the children at the alligator (play area), so aren't they my neighbours?"

In the evening when we went for a I just took her around all the places that we have pasted on the book. Here are some pics Insha Allaah.

It was pretty hot and humid, when we came back she had a wash and the water was boiling hot. She asked me "Ummi, Why is the water so hot? Is it because the sun is making it hot?" I said "Yes", then she thought for a while and said "Ummi, but now the sun has gone down so the moon is making the water hot, isn't it"? Masha Allaah kids say things so innocently!!!

Parts of the Body - Lapbook

Masha Allaah we finished our lapbook today. Here are the details.

She really loved making this book, she liked cutting, pasting, colouring and finding things, masha Allaah good method to develop motor skills too while having some fun at the same time.

These are pics of we working on the Lapbook. Colouring the organs, while doing that we were discussing the marvelous creation of organs and I indicated to her how Allaah has covered the body with the skin to protect the organs. Then she sequenced the steps of brushing her teeth.

We had to cut things from magazine to find what else would be her eye colour brown. So here she goes..

We had to mueasure some of the parts of the body and record it.

We traced her hands and decorated the cover.

We wrote the actions that could be done with her arms and decorated the stars with gel pens.

Pasting the answers to the Parts of the body riddle...

Then we organized all the contents to lay it out

So here is how the Lapbook looks inside...

Close up..

We had real fun doing the A-Z Exercises, and then we acted out how each creatures move pondered over how Allaah has created each one with a unique difference.

We decided to use sis Umm An Nu'man's hard work to decorate our front cover. How can I forget you my dear sis : ). So this will enable us to keep in mind the Arabic Terms too. Also I added two Aaayahs from the Quraan which talks about How beautifully Allaah has created man and how the parts of the body will bear witness on the Day of Judgment. We spoke a bit about that too, am not sure how much she understood but for sure she knew her legs and hands are going to talk on that Day. Also we added the dua to be said while looking at the mirror to the cover page. So the cover looks like this...

Masha Allaah it was a great learning experience and I enjoyed it more than Maimoonah I guess. I intend to ask her to do this Lapbook on her own when she grows up Insha Allaah. and here she she is exploring ....

One more activity left to finish the Lapbook, but I need a butcher paper or something similar to it which I do not know from where I can get over here lol. So when I do get or come up with some other alternative am hoping to that Insha Allaah : ).

We got the guide and the templates for this Lapbook from here