Playful Props

We found a new favourite place in Doha - visiting the skate park at the Corniche where our friends just recently showed us where kids (and adults) can have so, so much fun sliding down the concrete bowl. (Yes, we are limited here for free and outdoor play ideas). I delighted in seeing my normally girly girls throwing themselves down this steep concrete incline head first, backwards and linking arms. We have already been three times this week so once we took our ball to introduce a new playful idea and we set up a somewhat successfully game of tunnel ball. I've always found it to be a good idea to introduce a new "prop" to old play ideas to help inspire, stir or extend children in their play. My friend K then discovered the random little kiosk which sells fairy floss and popcorn all day every day also sold irresistible masquerade masks for 10 riyal each (about $2). So we all had to try them on. And we discovered dress ups are fun anywhere, anytime and sparked our imagination and childish delight. K and I ended up with one each for ourselves they were so enticing.

Sculpture Play

I've probably mentioned it before - Doha's scenery is desert - dull and dreary. But, someone here in the ruling aristocracy has a grand vision for Doha. And it is evident in small places with an investment in public art and sculpture. Although it is one of the richest countries in the world (some lists put it at number one), they have already recognised that they don't want to rely on oil wealth and recognise the need to invest in knowledge. Living here it is clear that they have a long path ahead with many (many) challenges - for offline commentary!
I love these giant, canary yellow words strewn across the city such as "inspire", "think", "create" and "achieve" which cheerfully invite you to play and interact with them. The older girls delighted in finding their favourite letters. I love to provide as many opportunities for the girls to connect with what they observe through play and so later at home, the girls then played around with making their own playdough sculpture words and letters and then experimented with pipecleaners. Then they couldn't resist putting all the materials together and they made their own little people.

All I want for Christmas is a Black Abaya...

Anyone who knows the girls knows how much they have always loved dress ups. We went New Year's Eve to the souqs and after months of pleading let the girls choose a black abaya, which of course they wore for the rest of our outing. As if enough people don't stare at us already! :) The local abaya draped women all seemed to think it was particularly charming though so at least that helped. Of course G had ripped hers off in the shop before purchase but they have all had fun wearing them around the house. E adores her abaya and would wear it everywhere if we let her. It provides a great opportunity for her to experiment with a culture that is in many ways vastly different from our own. She also keeps nagging me to get one. We hoped that living in the Middle East at such a young age would help our girls to foster a deep sense of cultural appreciation - not quite sure we wanted them to take it this far though...

Rainbow Day

It was time for another special day of learning. The girls seem to love special days and after a difficult day together and a little too much yelling, I decided to turn it around and spent the evening planning and ensuring that the next day would be filled with joy. So, considering our shared love of rainbows and the potential for fun, science and art... we began. We started with learning about the colour wheel and primary and secondary colours. E knew most of this already so she became the teacher instructing the little ones. Then we took our broken, old and seemingly useless crayons and put them in muffin trays to melt and create new ones - another science lesson as E observed that they set at a low temperature and didn't require freezing. This included a small environmental lesson about considering how we can reuse and recyle items before simply tossing them away. And, a far more valuable lesson about how God takes our brokeness and ugliness and transforms it into something beautiful - a promise which has been tied with rainbows since ancient times. We followed up with clay sculpture birds decorated with rainbow feathers. Rainbow juice, frozen in layers. The girls were delighted with our rainbow apple pancakes although the cooked product wasn't quite as colourful. Eventually, the sun came out and we created our own rainbows with a glass of water, a piece of white paper and the sun shining through the window. Amazingly easy. And, finally we filled our glasses with coloured milk and experimented with sound and music - considering pitch and whether plastic or metal, depth etc altered the pitch. We finished by listening to Andrew Chin's delightful "Rainbow song" a favourite of E's (and mine) from school.

Around the Christmas Tree

One of the highlights of Christmas is always decorating the tree. This year we did it in November so my parents, well mum mostly, could be here to do it with the girls. It has always been a family affair in our house - mum still has us back, and now grandchildren to decorate her tree. This year was simple with our humble, donated tree which had been given to a friend who was leaving Doha and then passed on to us when they left. This year was memorable though as some of the children in our compound knocked on our door to see if our girls could play and saw us decorating the tree. They were amazed at even this humble tree and in broken English and Arabic asked many, many questions. Is the story real? Does he leave presents? They were also excited and proud to share the small pieces of the story they had picked up from television.

Papier Mache Globe

When we first arrived here and we were housebound because of the heat I did not know where to begin with the girls so I spent countless hours researching various options, theories and philosphies about learning at home. I knew I loved the freedom of "unschooling" and the opportunites it provides to learn and explore real life experiences and concepts in context and based on what interested or was relevant for the moment. So, based on the girls endless questions trying to understand why it is nightime in Melbourne and daytime on this side of the world and Winter in Melbourne and Summer in Doha, we decided to explore the earth and the sun and moon. We made papier mache glue, ripped up piles of newspapers and got to work. This was one of the messiest activities I have ever done so there isn't any pictures of the process as the girls stripped down to their underpants as they slided and rolled around our tiled floor. A and I also both love maps so we loved introducing the girls to the continents - which suddenly makes more sense when you have moved to the other side of the world.

Moon

Children love the moon don't they? They seem fascinated by it. I'm growing in my understanding and appreciation too. Living here where it has such spiritual significance means I pay far more attention to it too. Here, where the lunar calendar and not the solar calendar of the Western world holds precedence - so the moon dictates what precise time to pray throughout the day (and night) and even on which day to celebrate or participate in religious rites. We have waited at home in the evening wondering whether the moon's phase would mean it was a working day or a public holiday. It always makes me smile as the time and organisation obsessed world I'm from cannot fathom how such important things could be left to the sighting of the moon. Things are changing now though as science proves what people have known for centuries - that the moon is powerful. So ideas such as planting by the moon is gaining in recognition and no longer dismissed by many as superstition. The girls had such fun mixing shaving cream and PVA glue together which forms a sensory delight and upon drying gives a perfect foamy texture reminiscent of the moon's surface. We made full moons, half moons and crescent moons as we discussed the different phases of the moon.

The fabric ideas

This is a follow on from our souq trip to buy fabric months ago. I knew the girls would love it but I have loved watching how our material inspired new play ideas. It was used as costumes for a little sun and moon play to music. It was a baby's blanket. Scarves for ballet and contemporary dance. As a toga style dress which Ella wore to the shops today. And as an Arabian princess. And it has been used like "play silks" or scarves, to be the desert, sand dunes, the ocean etc. I can't believe I haven't thought of such a fun activity earlier. The girls can't wait for another opportunity to choose another piece of fabric.

We play - shapes

Inspired by some ideas from E's classmates who were studying 3 dimensional forms as part of their maths curriculum I decided to introduce this idea to the girls. To start we made playdough. Reviewing the photos, I see that rainbow or bright colours would have looked far more appealing, but this playdough was made with cocoa and designed to appeal to the senses. It smelled divine. Anyway, we rolled the playdough in tiny balls and used toothpicks as the lines to make our geometric shapes. We made cubes, pyramids and rectangular and triangular prisms and explored how geometric forms as opposed to organic forms follow specific rules. (That's the great thing about learning at home - I'm learning all the time too). E conveyed her enthusiasm for the task when she suggested that I tell the other homeschooling mums we know about this activity. To complement our study of 2 D shapes for our kinder and grade one girls - we played with A's childhood tangrams (kindly sent in one of the many parcels from my mum) we made shape pictures with coloured paper shape cut outs, made a powerpoint about shapes in the everyday world and played a shapes' computer game on cbeebies. They are still playing it. Your little ones can find it at - http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/#/lb/misc/shapestore

M&Ms Maths

It's clear from the photos how much fun the girls had with this activity. They were each given their own small box of lollies (big M&Ms, mini ones and smarties to make it interesting for comparison) and they didn’t even eat one lolly for at least an hour. The little ones sorted them by colour, tried to make their own patterns, and then we placed them on graph paper for counting. I then suggested they draw a bar graph with my help. This gave them a good idea of how visual images are used to represent various objects and concepts. A would not let me help. I had envisaged I would rule the lines for the bar graph and she would colour it in the correct colours. Instead she did it herself and drew lines in different colours to represent that each colour and a different amount. Although it wasn’t an accurate representation she demonstrated that she understood the concepts involved – far more important than having an accurate graph with beautiful colours (which was my original objective). E was able to do the graph properly and loved it so much she was asking what other graphs she could do. This is such a great activity as it involves many different skills and processes - even the ruling accurately was a challenge and it inspired them of course because it involved bright coloured little objects and candy coated chocolate! I suggested a birthday graph so she did a bar graph with all our friend’s and families birthdays and both big girls were able to “read” the graph and ascertain which month/colour had the most, the least, less than or greater than. When I finally told the girls they could finally eat they didn’t want too and asked to do more activities with them! They didn't take much convincing though. We had started this activity with our kitchen scales and began to look at measurement - we compared the weights and number of m&m’s and estimated how much each one might weigh. It was a good introduction to measurement but I think we will follow this up soon with some heavier and more contrasting items which will be easier for comparison.