Books:

We read tw0-three books each morning after breakfast. This seems to be the best time to get him to sit without wiggling and stay engaged. Here are the books that I got:

• My “P” Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncore, illustrated by Rebecca McKillip Thornburgh (there are a series of these for lots of letters and sounds so you will be seeing them frequently on my list)

• Peggy Pig’s Dirty Day by Debbie Rivers-Moore – This is by far my son’s favorite book over the course of the last 11 months. He loves Peggy and all her messy fun. I loves touching all of the objects in the book as well.
• Old Macdonald Had A Farm by Jane Cabrera – This could be my sons NEW all-time favorite book. The words are basically teh words to the song. I know it shows a cow but there are definitely pigs in this book. Whenever my son sees this book he immediately starts dancing! He knows it is a song and loves all of the pictures. I originally got it from the library but am now buying it because eventually they want it back.
• The Three Little Pigs by Patricia Seibert

Activities:

• We have pulled the “P” magnet off of the refrigerator and played with it many times. Also kept it within his grasp on the refrigerator.
• I have a set of letters and number bath toys and we have placed the “P” in the bathtub for playtime.
• At Blogher I received some great Land of Nod wooden blocks. We will pull out the “P” block and play with it a bit and focus on the animals and words on the block.
• Crystal at Money Saving Mom has a great post on making pudding paint for your kids. If you children are old enough this would be a great activity to do while learning the letter “P”. You can even have them practice writing the letter “P” in the pudding.
• Mr. or Mrs. Potato Head – play with them and talk to them about the food but also emphasizes putting on the parts of the face and body that we have been talking about for the last few weeks.

Sounds:

• “Oink, Oink” – I know it doesn’t have the “p” sound but it sure does match up with a pig. I really wish I could video tape for you my sons current “oink”. It is amazing. I really don’t know where he learned it. It is way better than my and is a full out nasal squeal.

Songs:

Looking for some songs to teach your child? Here are some that we will be singing this week:

• Pig Rap – my son is only 11 months old and I am guessing that this song is going to make him “squeal” with delight. Really, all kidding aside, this one is sure to make him laugh.
• This Little Pig Went to Market – this is a great one to reinforce those “toes”.
• Hot Potato – let’s be honest here. Four grown men running around in near leotards is a little scary to me. However, my niece LOVES her some Wiggles. I turned a You Tube video of them on one day and sure enough, my son did too. Something about them just gets you “wigglin’” I can’t explain it, I just report it.

Foods:

• Peaches
• Pears
• Potatoes
• Pasta
• Popcorn – older children, not my son

What Else?

What else would you do when focusing on the letter “P”? Any activities or games that you have done in the past? No matter the age of the child, feel free to add your favorite books, songs, foods, activities, and more below in the comments section. We would love to hear them and share them with others.

Permission from Flickr, Creative Commons, Xurble

I decided on the letter “D” for the next few weeks because we seem to have an obsession around here for “ducks” and “dogs” lately. And you know how I love to fuel obsessions. At any rate, I have found lots of fun resources lately that go with this letter that I wanted to share with you. I hope you enjoy.

Books:

We read tw0-three books each morning after breakfast. This seems to be the best time to get him to sit without wiggling and stay engaged. Here are the books that I got:

• My “D” Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncore (there are a series of these for lots of letters and sounds so you will be seeing them frequently on my list)
• My son LOVES flap books. Pair that with his love for dogs and I have a winning combination with the “Spot” series by Eric Hill. Here are a few for this week:
  • Spot Goes to the Park by Eric Hill
  • Spot’s Big Lift-the-Flap Book by Eric Hill
• How Much Is That Doggie in the Window? by Iza Trapani
• In light of my upcoming visit with the peeps at Playskool at BlogHer I thought I would research some of their relevant resources/books. Here are a few that caught my eye:
  • Baby Farm Animals
  • Playing with Pets: Tab Board Book (Tab Board Books)

Activities:

• We’re going to DISNEY!!!! . . .Just kidding. I WISH! (hint, hint Disney). Wouldn’t that be great though? Isn’t Disney the greatest “D” word ever? Oh well, maybe one day I will get there with my kids. Until then, a girl can dream.
• This week isn’t so much about a body part as animals. My little guy just loves animals! And he is especially fond of “ducks” and “dogs”. So i am incredibly excited for these two weeks of focus on the letter “d”.
• We have pulled the “D” magnet off of the refrigerator and played with it many times. Also kept it within his grasp on the refrigerator.
• I have a set of letters and number bath toys and we have placed the “D” in the bathtub for playtime.
• We will make an extra special trip to the park the next two weeks to see the “ducks” and the “dogs”. I am guaranteed to always see both when there.
• My guy can already say “duck” and “dog” and even knows how to bark when we ask him what a dog says. However, we will work on this a little more and see if he can’t learn to point them out in books too.

Sounds:

• “dog”
• “duck”
• “duh”! – no not really. I think we can skip this one for awhile. I think I will get enough of it in the teenage years.

Songs:

Looking for some songs to teach your child? Here are some that we will be singing this week:

• How Much Is That Doggy In The Window?
• Elmo’s World – Babies, Dogs & More DVD – we LOVE some Elmo around these parts.
• We love to “dance” around these parts! One of my son’s favorite things to do is play with his LeapFrog® Learn & Groove Musical Table and started dancing. We will focus on doing that and making sure that he hears us calling it dancing more these two weeks. We will also do the same with some of the songs.

Foods

• I’m at a loss here – HELP!

What Else?

What else would you do when focusing on the letter “D”? Any activities or games that you have done in the past? No matter the age of the child, feel free to add your favorite books, songs, foods, activities, and more below in the comments section. We would love to hear them and share them with others.

Books:

We read two-three books each morning after breakfast. This seems to be the best time to get him to sit without wiggling and stay engaged. Here are the books that I got:

• My “N” Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncore, illustrated by Colin King (there are a series of these for lots of letters and sounds so you will be seeing them frequently on my list)
• Arthur’s Nose by Marc Brown
• If You Had a Nose Like an Elephant’s Trunk by Marion Dane Bauer
• Whose Nose and Toes? by John Butler

Activities:

• Sometime during the day we sit in front of the mirror and I point out mommy’s nose and Isaac’s nose. I ask him to point to the same. I place his hand on my nose when I am talking about it and on his when we are talking about his nose.
• I have printed out pictures of Isaac’s friends and family members whose name start with N: Aunt Naomi
• We have pulled the “N” magnet off of the refrigerator and played with it many times. Also kept it within his grasp on the refrigerator.
• I have a set of letters and number bath toys and we have placed the “n” and the “9″ in the bathtub for playtime.
• We will be smelling all kinds of things this week. If it can be smelled, we will make a point to smell it.
• Newspaper – No, I’m not going to teach him to read the New York Times! But he does love to play with the paper often. So I am going to spend some time letting him play with it, crinkle it, make balls with it and whatever else we come up with. Then I am going to let his dad bathe him of his black hands.

Sounds:

• nnnnn
• No? – Not sure I want to teach him this yet, I think I will hold off for now.

Songs:

Looking for some songs to teach your child? Here are some that we will be singing this week:

• Not sure – any suggestions?

Foods

• Nectarines
• Nuts – ONLY if your child is past the stage where it is safe to introduce them and you know they are NOT allergic.

What Else?

What else would you do when focusing on the letter “N”? Any activities or games that you have done in the past? No matter the age of the child, feel free to add your favorite books, songs, foods, activities, and more below in the comments section. We would love to hear them and share them with others.

So for this week we are going to still be working on the letter “M”. If you have been working on the letter “M” and you feel like your child needs a change up I would suggest focusing on different “M” words than you did in week one. Come next Friday, I will have the details for you for the letter “N”.

Have a great week and feel free to share your letter “M” ideas and stories.

(And don’t forget to vote for OAMM as the Tastiest Food Blog)

Used from Flcker, Creative Commons, pic taken by milesopie

I’m focusing on “m” this week because I would like us to get the parts of the face down. I am happy to report, when asked he can find my ear (from letter “e” week). Now, when someone is around and I want him to do it for show, no dice. He doesn’t quite get where his ear is yet, but we will continue working. Here are some of the books, activities and more that we will be doing.

(Psst – make sure you vote for Once A Month Mom under Tastiest Food Blog. You can vote once a day. Go here, it’s a big deal!)

Books:

We read tw0-three books each morning after breakfast. This seems to be the best time to get him to sit without wiggling and stay engaged. We have a couple of these books around the house, the rest I got at the library. You don’t have to use these. You can just go to your library and search the children’s section for books with “m” subjects like “monkey”, “mouse”, “mouth”, and “milk”. Here are the books that I got:

• My “M” Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncore, illustrated by Rebecca McKillip Thornburgh (there are a series of these for lots of letters and sounds so you will be seeing them frequently on my list)
• Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed
• That’s Not My Monkey (Usborne Touchy-Feely Books)
• Hello Baby!
• Where’s My Mom?
• I Love You, Little Monkey
• A Monkey Among Us
• My Mouth: My Body (Welcome Books)

Activities:

• We are concentrating on the following words this week: monkey, mouth and milk.
• Sometime during the day we sit in front of the mirror and I point out mommy’s mouth and Isaac’s mouth. I ask him to point to the same. I place his hand on my mouth when I am talking about it and on his when we are talking about his mouth.
• I have printed out pictures of Isaac’s friends and family members whose name start with “m”. Mom, of course, uncle Mark and Matt T. from house church.
• We have pulled the “m” magnet off of the refrigerator and played with it many times. Also kept it within his grasp on the refrigerator.
• I have a set of letters and number bath toys and we have placed the “m” in the bathtub for playtime.
• Daddy and grandma have also joined the fun when they are interacting with him at playtime.
• We make sure this week that we are signing the word “milk” when we give him his bottle.

Sounds:

• Mmmm – we seem to have this one down pretty good right now. The boy likes to eat and he gets pretty animated doing so.
• Mamma – he says this well also, but who doesn’t love to hear those words. (At least at first before they start begging for things).

Songs:

Looking for some songs to teach your child? Here are some that we will be singing this week:

• Monkey In The Middle
• Five Little Monkeys

Foods

• milk – we always drink milk, we will make sure we are signing it too.
• mangos – mmm, fruit!
• melons – if your child is old enough. We tried cantaloupe last week, we will try watermelon this week.

What Else?

What else would you do when focusing on the letter “”? Any activities or games that you have done in the past? No matter the age of the child, feel free to add your favorite books, songs, foods, activities, and more below in the comments section. We would love to hear them and share them with others.

For now, the letter is “a”. No facial parts for this letter but plenty of great stuff to teach! We will be focused on “apples” and “alligators” though.

Here is what we are focusing on for the week.

Books:

We read tw0-three books each morning after breakfast. This seems to be the best time to get him to sit without wiggling and stay engaged. Here are the books that I got:

• My “a” Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncore, illustrated by Colin King (there are a series of these for lots of letters and sounds so you will be seeing them frequently on my list)
• Alligators All Around (The Nutshell Library)by Maurice Sendak
• Apples (Harvesttime Welcome Books)by Inez Snyder
• Eating the Alphabet: Fruits & Vegetables from A to Z (Harcourt Brace Big Book)by Lois Ehlert (focus on letter A)

Activities:

• I can’t think of any friends or immediate family members whose names start with “a”. If you have some, print their pictures and place them on a wall or near the changing table and point to them and pronounce their name often.
• We will pull the “a” magnet off of the refrigerator and played with it many times. Also kept it within his grasp on the refrigerator.
• I have a set of letters and number bath toys and we will place the “a” in the bathtub for playtime. We will also place a plastic toy apple in the tub.
• Daddy and grandma have also joined the fun when they are interacting with him at playtime.
• I also got a few books on “alligators” so we will talk a bit about them and touch some cards that have rough surfaces.

Sounds:

• “aaaaaa”
• “arrgghhhh”

Songs:

Looking for some songs to teach your child? Here are some that we will be singing this week:

• Apples And Bananas by Countdown Kids
• Alligator by Jack Alessi

Foods

• Apples – We are starting into eating pieces of fruit so I will make sure there is opportunities for us to talk about apples and for him to eat them. He also likes to eat (while very supervised) chunks of apple off mine when I am eating it. This is a great activity for us to do together.
• Avocados – we have these pureed and might try them as finger foods this week as well.
• Apricots – fresh ones are in season right now so you might try introducing this fruit to your child.
• Asparagus – I won’t be giving this to Isaac but if you have a child that is ready for trying a new vegetable, why not? Just make sure that it is cooked to the desired tenderness depending on their age.

What Else?

What else would you do when focusing on the letter “a”? Any activities or games that you have done in the past? No matter the age of the child, feel free to add your favorite books, songs, foods, activities, and more below in the comments section. We would love to hear them and share them with others.

A few weeks ago, on vacation (I know you are tired of the vacation references already), I realized that my son had become a sponge before my very eyes. I think it helped that he got some boosts of antibiotics (via shots) for his ear infections and was for the first time in many months actually able to hear.

Needless to say, one afternoon Cortney and I were playing with our little ones, I with Carter, she with Isaac. She was trying to entertain and keep still the ever wiggling Isaac. To get his attention she started clicking her tongue. He sat, brow furrowed, studying her mouth. He watched for nearly five minutes before wiggling away. We thought nothing of it. Until the next morning at breakfast when out of nowhere he started clicking his tongue at me. He looked at me with the biggest grin that said, “Look what I learned!” He was so proud of himself.

There were several more scenarios like this one in the last week or so which got me motivated to start being more intentional with him. So I am starting a bit of a series (and maybe even a whole new section of Once A Month Mom) about learning. It is nothing fancy. I am trained in Early Childhood Education but I am by no means going to research the best methods and systems.

I am simply going to put together the “themes” or “focus” for the week and share what we are doing with you. If you want to participate, awesome! If you could care less, that is fine too. I will publish on Fridays (for the most part – I reserve the right to be lazy now and then) what we are focusing on for the week and the materials that we are using. If you have additional suggestions you can leave them in the comments section. If I start having lots of others participants I’ll even throw up a Mr. Linky for each one. I will also work on a way to organize an archive so that old lessons are easy to find.

Confused about what I am doing? Well, I am going to start with a “focus” for the week. My son is almost 9 months old and LOVES sounds. I also know that he is ready to start being able to at least identify where a body part is or certain objects. BUT my main focus in teaching him is to make sure that it is FUN and that we integrate learning into the various things that we are doing. Each week I will pick a letter, a sound, a few objects to go along with the letter to focus on and “teach” to him. If he gets it, great! If not, we will move on to something else the next week.

I do not have expectations that my son will be Einstein. I just have a desire to be intentional about some of our time during the week. I hope if you have little kids (no matter the age) you will consider joining us. I will post the first one, the letter “e”, today (5/15) so you can see what I mean.

used with permission from Flickr, Creative Commons. Photo property of TooFarNorth.

I decided to start with the letter “e” because my little guy was getting tubes put in his ears this week. (The procedure went fine and he seems to be hearing much better.) But since he seems to already have a knack for pulling on those pieces of skin on the side of his head I thought we might try giving them a name.

Last week I went to the library and looked up books with the subject “ears” and “elephants”. There was nothing scientific about this; I just got books that were available at my library. I didn’t have time to wait around for ordering books from other branches, but I may do so in the future, we will see. I also found a couple other great “e” books along the way. I also went around the house rounding up things that I had that started with “e”, and that are kid friendly.

Here is what we are focusing on for the week.

Books:

We read tw0-three books each morning after breakfast. This seems to be the best time to get him to sit without wiggling and stay engaged. Here are the books that I got:

• My “e” Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncore, illustrated by Colin King (there are a series of these for lots of letters and sounds so you will be seeing them frequently on my list)
• Dog Eared: Starring Otis by Amanda Harvey
• Taking Care of My Ears by Sarah L. Schuette
• Elephants by Marianne Johnston

Activities:

• Sometime during the day we sit in front of the mirror and I point out mommy’s ears and Isaac’s ears. I ask him to point to the same. I place his hand on my ear when I am talking about it and on his when we are talking about his ear.
• I have printed out pictures of Isaac’s friends and family members whose name start with E. Like Evan and Uncle Eric. I have placed these pictures on the wall near Isaac’s play toys.
• We have pulled the “e” magnet off of the refrigerator and played with it many times. Also kept it within his grasp on the refrigerator.
• I have a set of letters and number bath toys and we have placed the “e” and the “8″ in the bathtub for playtime.
• Daddy and grandma have also joined the fun when they are interacting with him at playtime.
• You could focus on “eyes” as well but I didn’t want to overwhelm my son. We will do that another week.

Sounds:

My son LOVES making noises. So I am trying to get him to say “eeeeeee” or “eeeewwww”. I don’t know if he will, but we try.

Songs:

Looking for some songs to teach your child? Here are some that we will be singing this week:

• Do Your Ears Hang Low?

Foods

• Eggs – Isaac can’t have eggs yet, so I will skip this one. But I encourage you to serve eggs this week if you child is able to eat them. You might even try reading Green Eggs and Ham and cooking up some green eggs!

What Else?

What else would you do when focusing on the letter “e”? Any activities or games that you have done in the past? No matter the age of the child, feel free to add your favorite books, songs, foods, activities, and more below in the comments section. We would love to hear them and share them with others.