Memory Books

Something I love about taking pictures.....lots and lots of pictures.....is being able to kind of "freeze" moments in time.  I thoroughly enjoy watching my son play and discover.  I find I have many, many "kairos moments" throughout my day and I often marvel at the simplest things when it comes to my child - 'look at the joy on his face', 'I love the way his little calf muscles are defined as he runs through the puddles', 'wow, I'm so amazed at his coordination and abilities', 'look at that adorable "wing" of hair that's flopping around as he runs', etc.  Is that weird?  I can even recall smells in certain moments that we spend together - like the salty, beach air.

We recently went on a mini vacation to the North Carolina coast - thanks to some dear friends.  Creating memory books is something I attempted with him when he was younger, but he showed no interest.  This time, he was so excited to make a book.  There are so many ways to create a memory book, but I wanted him to be a part of the entire process - picking the pictures, printing them, laminating, cutting, pasting, punching holes, sequencing, and most importantly - narrating.  (For the record, he declined on the cutting part.  I think it looked a bit overwhelming - all of that cutting that needed to be done.)

Here are the things you need (or things I used, anyway).....

pictures

construction paper

scissors

glue stick

laminate

laminator

comb binding machine

comb binders

My son chose the pictures he wanted to use for his book.  He printed them and then we sat down together and I asked him to tell me about each picture as I wrote what he was saying.  I typed/printed his words and cut everything out.  Then we worked together to paste all of the pictures onto orange construction paper - his choice.  Once the pictures were on, I read him his words and he matched them to the corresponding picture.  He laminated each page and then we sat and sequenced the events of our trip together (with very little help from me - I basically asked questions to assist him in the sequencing).  Once the pages were in order, he used the comb binding machine to punch the holes and then thread the pages.  

I didn't get to take a lot of pictures of the process, but if there was one picture I wish I had, it would be a picture of his face the first time we read the book together when it was complete.....priceless!!  He told me - "Mommy, I made that book, and it makes me happy.  It makes me want to laugh".

printed pictures

Proof reading is always a good idea - as I have misspelled a word on this page!  ARGH!!!

He titled the book "Jellyfish Adventures" and drew a jellyfish for the cover.  He only wanted the picture, no title.

His book now has a home on the book "shelf" in his bedroom.

- AK (MESE, MECD)

Audio Basket

Reading is one of our favorite things to do.  Since having my 3rd child I feel like we get less day time reading.  Something we used to do often.  My youngest is at that "I am crawling, and I want to see and play with everything you are doing" stage.  It's sometimes very frustrating for my older two when we are sitting down reading, and she comes along and wants to pull at the book, etc.  I wanted to give them another outlet for something that they love to do so much.  

My oldest has a CD player in her bedroom but she hasn't been using it too much lately.  I think she may feel a little alienated in there.  I originally had planned on buying another CD player for our sunroom or the living room.  While I was looking for CD players I noticed the portable ones.  To be honest, I didn't even know they made these anymore!  I thought they would be perfect for us.  The girls can use them wherever they want in the house, in the car.... why didn't I think of this earlier!  They were so happy when I showed them how it worked... "It doesn't have to be plugged into a wall?! I can go anywhere!"  

I created this basket for them.  It has books, a CD case,  and two portable CD players with headphones.  I purchased children's headphones.  They fit better on their head and the volume control is better.  

I purchased alphabet stickers from Michaels and placed one letter on the book, the CD sleeve, and the CD. 

First they find the book they want.  It has the letter "G" on it.  

Then they go into their CD case and find the corresponding CD.  Yes I know this does not match!  LOL  I tried to place the stickers in the same place on all three things.  This worked wonders for my girls to independently set up and put away the stories.

My oldest "reading" her first story.  

They loved this!  

We purchased our Audio books at all different places.  

Barnes and Noble (Curious George, Griaffe's Can't Dance)

Amazon ("I can read" series)

We have quite a few Hawaiian ones that my girls love (My sister lives on Kauai). 

RL 

The Little Blue Truck - Playing with Literature

I love bringing our stories to life.  We often tell stories with STICKERS and OBJECTS.  We've brought Three Little Pigs to life.... Click HERE, and also made MOUSE PAINT come alive on the light panel.  Here is yet another extension off our "playing with literature".

Little Blue Truck Invitation

For those of you that do not have this book I would highly recommend it.  You can see it HERE

The animals are THESE

The toad and dump truck we just happened to have around the house.

AK purchased the blue truck (as well as the book) for my 27M old first birthday.  She got it at Learning Express.  

The white board on the floor is often used in our play.  It is just a piece of plywood painted white, with trim around the edges.  We use this ALL the time.  

Sometimes they ask me to tell the story and sometimes they tell the story.  Invitations like this usually stay up in our house for quite a while.  

Here is a short video clip of my 27th month old telling her favorite part of the story.  

YOU TUBE VIDEO

RL

Story Jars

After  a recent trip to the toy store I saw THESE.  I couldn't believe the price!   We've done something similar on a larger scale HERE.  My girls LOVE this sort of thing so I decided to create my own.... Free of charge!  I searched the house for random small objects and grabbed a couple baby food jars.  I decided to do 15 objects per jar but you do not need to use that many.  I'm sure 10 would work just fine.  These are wonderful for telling stories on the go.  Place them in your bag/purse or leave one handy in the car.  They also would be great to take out to a restaurant or give away as gifts.  I'm sure you could also come up with some other fun games other than telling stories.  

I did 2 sets... One each for my older girls.

Close-up

Close-up

Ready to go!  

RL  

Story Time

We've been telling a lot of stories lately.  My girls loved the

STICKER STORY

invitation and revisit it over and over and over again.  I wanted to give them yet another way to put their creative thoughts out there.  It led me to this..

Story invitation

I placed random objects out with a few play people and animals.  

A few empty clear containers, bark, play people/animals, acorn tops, feathers,  and painted corn kernels.  

Play dough, empty jewelry box, blue gems, small skewers, random bottle tops, and bingo chips.  

I had no idea where this was going to take them but it sure was fun watching!  Here is my 26 month old telling her story.

She only used a couple of the objects in her play.  She was very literal with them (LOL).  "The man is jumping off the blue block.... weeeeee."  

Then it was my oldest's turn.  She played with this ALL day today.  :-)  

When she tells stories she often acts/plays out what is going on in her every day life.  

"Zookeeper feeding the animals"

"Balance beam"

"Babysitter taking care of the baby on the feather."  

All of these things represent what has been going on in our lives recently.  

They also ask me to tell stories, which they love listening too.  A wonderful change to sitting down and reading a book!  

RL  

Telling Stories with Stickers

My girls love their books and reading/telling stories is a big part of our day.  I am always trying to incorporate different ways of doing this.  You can see some of those ideas here:

3 Little Pigs

DIY Audio Books

Stories and Light

Here is one AK did on the flannel board

Go Away Big Green Monster

My oldest loves Rory's Story Cubes  She uses them all the time.  This is a great alternative for her to save what she is telling and the options are endless!  After she was done with her "sticker story" she gave it a title and we added it to her "story binder".  I will have to get pictures of these and add it to the post.  

All you need is a piece of paper and some stickers.

The stickers we used can be seen HERE

These are just stickers that we had on hand.  However, it will be great to have my daughters pick out there own stickers next time we are at the store.  :-)  

To see a videos of my girls telling a sticker story click below

Enjoy! 

3.5 Year old STICKER STORY

25 Month old STICKER STORY

RL

3 Little Pigs... Taking it a step further

My 22M old LOVES the story of The Three Little Pigs.  She got the felt board story and book for Christmas.  My oldest was playing with her play pig figures when she asked if we could make houses for the pigs like in the story.  Of course the answer was YES!  

When I asked them what they wanted to use for the straw house my 22 month old ran over and grabbed her straws from her play doh area.  Too funny!  

They used sticks and tree blocks for the stick house and melissa and doug blocks for the brick house.  

I asked my oldest what she wanted to use for the wolf.  "Let's make one out of play-doh!"  

Our wolf.  

He huffed and he puffed and he blew the house down!  

My oldest said we needed to start a fire.  She grabbed some sticks for fire wood and crinkled up some paper.  She then asked to light it!  LOL  Now that was on thing I had to give an alternative too.....

We lit a candle instead. 

Taking it all in.  :-) 

"A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral." -  Antoine de Saint-Exupery

RL

The Teacher In Me (DIY Flanel Board Story)

Im all about child-guided play, but sometimes the teacher in me comes out.  LOL  I never force an activity onto my son, though.  I have tons and tons of DIY materials that I made when I taught children with autism.  This is a fun story we would read during the Halloween season.  We would typically do this during circle time.  It was a great way to learn colors, learn facial features, encourage communication, encourage participation, and encourage socialization.  I set up the invitation for my son and I think we read the book 12 times in one sitting!  Needless to say, he loved it - particularly adding the facial features and then taking them away.  I made this years ago when I was teaching, so I dont have step by step instructions, but its pretty easy.  I just traced from the book, cut out the pieces, laminated them, and then used velcro to put it all together.  Simple and fun!

ENJOY!

-AK (MESE, MECD)

GO AWAY BIG GREEN MONSTER

 The invitation

 starting the story with all the facial features mixed up and off the face

 adding the two big yellow eyes (as I read the story, he added the features)

 adding the nose

putting on the 2 squiggly ears

Stories and Light

My daughter LOVES to read.  She had a love for books from an extremely early age.  Don't get me wrong, I love reading to her (LOL) but.... I wanted to give her some other options other than sitting with me in the big bean chair reading story after story.  We do a lot of felt stories that she loves.  I thought I would bring in another element that was even more interactive.

RL   

Mouse Paint.  A favorite in our house right now. 

I used laminated tissue paper and cut out shapes.  I am not the best artist in the world so bare with me!  What was nice about these was that she could put the mouse directly in a colored puddle and his feet would actually turn color!  :-)  

There were three white mice on a white piece of paper...

Stories can also be made up with all sorts of different shapes. We've done flowers, clouds, houses, and clothing for people that I drew for her.  So many options!