Sharing a book - A squash and a squeeze

Julia Donaldson in my opinion is a wonderful author.  There are so many of her books in our library.  A Squash and a Squeeze is based around a lady who is not happy with her house being too small a wise man then tells her to take in animals then she realises that she was happier with what she used to have .  I feel that the moral of it is to be happy with what you have, kind of like the "grass is greener on the other side" but obviously it is not. 

The book incorporates elements of number recognition up to five so can be effectively used for learning numbers in a fun way.  Interesting to find out was that this was Julia Donaldson's first published picture book in 1993.  Goodreads have given the book 4 and a lot of people have commented on how the book has a good use of rhythm.  When considering the text there are many different size words "tiny for two" "titchy for three" this could make for interesting discussion.

When it came to sharing the story together I thought of some activities related to squashing and squeezing.  I think it is really important that the books can also become a sensory experience and will endeavour to do this more often. I decided  to make sensory balloons (this is something that I have wanted to do for ages) it worked really well.  This would be a great activity for siblings to make the balloons for each other.

This is how to fill the balloon as it took me ages to realise!

Items used to make the sensory balloons

 The items that we used for the balloons were

• Water
• Sequins
• rice (had some that I had dyed)
• gravy granules (make a good crunch noise)
• spiral pasta
• ready brek
• Rice Krispies (again crunchy)
• raisins
• flour
• Golden syrup (My favourite)

I put little face on them with permanent marker to make them more interesting.  All this was done whilst Little Boo was at Nannies with her Daddy that way when she came back it was a complete surprise and she was intrigued what was in them.

Crunch, crunch!

"This one does not crunch Mommy"

Some squashing and squeezing of the balloons.  Then Little Boo said "I want to look  inside, get my scissors Mommy" so we did.

Cutting open the balloon

squeeze to get it all out.

The squashing and squeezing was a great hit! I then wanted to make an activity in which Little Boo could use a sequencing activity having looked at this story stick and realising I had no painting sticks, I had a look around and saw a box file, perfect! this can contain all the images and be used to sequence the images as I put Velcro strip inside.  It was decorated using one of Little Boos contact pictures

Inside the folder Little Boo could stick the images on the Velcro in order.Then peeled them off in the order they left the house

 We have loads of items that we are going to use including our alphabet, numbers, images that are different sizes and colour sorting.  Hope that you have enjoyed this review I wanted to do something a bit "out the box"! 

Sharing a book- Shirley Hughes Dogger.

I love Shirley Hughes and Dogger is one of my favourites! This is probably because I remember reading it as a child.  I went on line to find resources and found a great movable dogger.  All you need to do is subscribe to TES which is free .  We found the movable Dogger to colour in and make and a sequencing printable.  Both of which Little Boo enjoyed doing.

Colouring in Dogger

After being laminated and some split pins added! Apparently the dog wanted to sit on Little Boos chair.

Looking at the sequencing cards. I am going to add a few more cards to this.

Dogger then went for a little walk

The school fair began and poor little Dogger was at the back of our stall. 

Little Boo brought Dogger.

There are other activities that may be suitable for older children.  Me and Little Boo did a market stall with loads of toys we used this as role play but for older children you could extend the activity further to incorporate money. There was also plenty of opportunity to play fancy dress as there is a fancy dress competition at the school fayre

The book has scored 4.11 out of 5 on Goodreads and has brilliant reviews from most people on there.  I feel that it is fantastic that even though it was written a long time ago it still has relevance today.  I like the way that the book displays positive behaviour as Bella gave away her toy so her brother could have Dogger back. 

I hope that this has provided you all with other ways to enjoy the book Dogger together. Next week  we will be looking at We're Going on a bear Hunt.

A day in the den

Over the weekend I wanted to try and encourage a few quite hours. So decided to make a reading den for me and Little Boo to enjoy.  I went into her room armed with the clothes airier and a few blankets and a chair and the den was created. I got a load of books and spread them all over the floor inside the den so we could easily pick out books.

It was fantastic as Little Boo concentrated for an hour and a half just reading and looking at books together. Recently, I was lucky enough to go to a lovely wedding in which a friend had loads of glow sticks left over which she was kind enough to give to Little Boo.  So I decided to decorate the den with them!

Our reading Den which is still  there now Little Boo will not let me take it down.

Glow sticks in the den.

Sharing a book together.