I was thrilled to hear that Mariah Bruehl of Playful Learning was writing a book. I have read her blog regularly for quite some time. I admire her gentle, encouraging voice and the lovely assortment of playful, accessible learning experiences she shares on her blog.

I’m so happy to share this book with you as part of the Playful Learning blog tour! When my girls and I finally got our hands on Playful Learning: Develop Your Child’s Sense of Joy and Wonder, we were definitely not disappointed. From the back cover:

“Playful learning is the magic that takes place when we meld a child’s sense of joy and wonder with thoughtfully planned learning experiences.”

Our copy of Playful Learning is already marked with many projects for the to-do list. The book contains developmental information and engaging experiences in writing, reading, math, science, art, global awareness, and social-emotional skills, geared toward ages 4 to 8.

My favorite aspect of the book is the experience philosophy. Rather than just a collection of activities, the experiences in this book truly provide opportunities for conversation, connection, and discovery. It is a wonderful book to enjoy side-by-side with your kids, following their interests and having fun learning together.

We couldn’t wait to dive in and try something!

Who Lives Here? Adventures in Longitude and Latitude

My girls’ current love of maps, paired with a recent obsession with secret codes, made the Who Lives There? experience a perfect fit. One of the learning experiences in the Growing Globally chapter, this activity introduces longitude and latitude coordinates. After a quick vocabulary discussion (using Mariah’s age-appropriate definitions), the girls were ready to find some secret locations using coordinates.

Mariah recommends using Google Earth to get coordinates for the places where friends and family live. Since our friends and family all live pretty close, I picked 10 cities around the world that the girls are familiar with and filled in the activity sheet. I love that Mariah provides so many kid-friendly printables in the back of the book – such a time-saver!

The girls took turns reading the coordinates and working at the map. Every time they correctly identified a city, they were so excited! By the end of their list, they were reading degrees, using the word coordinates, and basically having a lot of fun finding the secret locations.

They have already asked to do it again, which we will soon. We are also planning to check our library for the titles from the Books to Inspire list. From prep hints that help you be a “one-step ahead” parent to ways to extend the learning, the experiences in Playful Learning are inspiring and do-able.

The girls are already planning which activity they will try next – wire leaves, Jackson Pollock painting, or flower dissection?  Moon journals are a must!

For more Playful Learning fun, I hope you will check out the rest of the stops on the blog tour in the upcoming weeks:

• 8/16 Two Straight Lines
• 8/17 Sew Liberated
• 8/18 The Artful Parent
• 8/19 Ohdeedoh
• 8/22 Let the Children Play
• 8/23 Simple Kids
• 8/24 Spell Outloud
• 8/25 Not Just Cute
• 8/26 Make and Takes
• 8/29 ABC 123
• 8/30 Modern Parents Messy Kids
• 8/31 A Bit of This and a Bit of That
• 9/1 Adventures in Mommydom
• 9/2 Inspiration Surrounds, Creativity Abounds
• 9/5 Happy Healthy Hip Parenting
• 9/6 Tinker Lab
• 9/7 Helping Little Hands

Playful Learning Book Give Away!

Wouldn’t Playful Learning be a great addition to your home library? Mariah has generously offered a copy of her new book to one lucky reader – leave a comment on this post to be entered in a random drawing for your very own copy of Playful Learning: Develop Your Child’s Sense of Joy and Wonder. Please be sure to link or leave an e-mail so I can contact you! (One comment per person, please…)

Comments will close Wednesday, 8/17 at 9:00 pm PST.

Comments closed! Random Number Generator says the winner is….

Bianca – August 15, 2011 at 3:54 pm

this book looks wonderful!! would love to have it in my home.

Congrats!

I’ve been blogging in secret this week so I can show you some sneak peeks of the girls’ Christmas gifts. We often do at least one joint or family gift, and this year the girls are getting a beginner microscope. We are definitely ready to move beyond magnifying glasses around here. And, after spending a few minutes (secretly) playing with our new microscope, I am sure we are all going to have tons of fun using our microscope to explore all kinds of things!

After doing some research on beginner microscopes, I settled on the My First Lab Duo-Scope Microscope. These are some of the qualities I was looking for in a microscope:

• sturdy and well-made, but lightweight enough for the kids to move around
• good quality glass optics, not plastic lenses
• LED lighting (it stays cool to the touch)
• kid-friendly controls and knobs
• affordable!

The My First Lab Duo-Scope Microscope is a great fit for what I was looking for. First of all, the microscope comes packaged in a fun yellow box, which is a nice touch for gift-giving. I was initially planning to unpack the scope from its box, but this box is too cute!

Main Features:

-10X eyepiece and 4X, 10X, 40X objectives – which means you have 40X, 100X, and 400X magnification. (Note: You cannot use the 40X objective when viewing solid objects with the upper light.)

-Dual light sources: Use the lower light to shine up and view slides or use the upper light to shine down on solid objects for viewing. There is a simple switch on the back of the microscope that turns on each of the LED lights independently.

-Focusing knobs that are chunky and super-easy for kids to grip. I also found that the knobs operate very smoothly and it is easy to make small adjustments.

-Real glass optics

-6-hole diaphragm for controlling the amount of light that reaches the stage.

What You Get:

In addition to the microscope, the box contains an accessory pack that includes:

• 5 plain slides and 1 concavity (well) slide
• 4 prepared slides
• cover glass
• plastic dropper
• 2 bottles of stain
• slide labels
• lens paper
• forceps
• plastic test tube
• plastic Petri dish
• straight teasing needle (this is sharp!)
• instruction manual with tips and activities

Great Features for Kids:

• Large focusing knobs – again, I think this is going to make the microscope very kid-friendly
• Lightweight, but sturdy – the microscope didn’t tip or wiggle around while I was using it, and it’s light enough for the girls to pick up and move around
• Ability to look at solid objects, like leaves, coins, rocks, and stamps – my dad and I had fun looking at the words and details on coins, so I know the girls are going to love being able to do that, too!

Add-Ons:

3 AA batteries (Don’t forget the batteries – they are not included!)

The Usborne Complete Book of the Microscope – It’s been a long time since I’ve used a microscope, so I thought a microscope book might be helpful. This book is amazing! It is filled with colorful illustrations and photographs, plus tons of activities to do using a microscope. I’m sure this book will be a great resource to us for many years!

Prepared Slides – I decided to start us off with a collection of prepared slides.  I went with the Learning Resources Prepared Slides Combination Set. For beginners like us, these slides are a great place to start. I took a peek at them and the quality looks good.

There are many excellent, detailed reviews of the My First Lab Duo-Scope Microscope on Amazon if you want to research this beginner microscope further. After Christmas, I’m sure I will be sharing some of our exciting microscope adventures!

Disclosure: I researched, chose, and purchased this product on my own and am sharing it with you because I think its great! This post includes affiliate links – thanks for supporting Let’s Explore!

I had the opportunity to read a review copy of Angie Kauffman’s new eBook, Finding Educational Activities in the Most Unexpected Places.  If you are looking for simple and fun ways to enhance your young child’s everyday play, this book will be a great resource for your family!  It is filled with more than 200 activities using common items found around the house, such as paper bags, cookie cutters, blankets, laundry, and lots more.

What I like most about Angie’s eBook is that it combines two of my favorite things – learning through play and using things we have around the house.  It doesn’t take fancy toys to give our kids quality play opportunities!

While the book is geared toward toddlers and preschoolers, my daughters (ages 5 and 7) would love many, many of the activities as well.  That’s one of the great things about activities that encourage open-ended play – they’re multilevel!

When your little ones need something engaging to do and you are having a “brain freeze,” you could turn to any page in this book and find something easy to set-up and fun to do.  You can see sample activities and read more about this eBook at Angie’s lovely blog, Many Little Blessings.

Angie has graciously offered Let’s Explore readers a discount on her eBook, Finding Educational Activities in the Most Unexpected Places.  Use the code LE20 for 20% off your eBook purchase (regular price is $7.50).  Discount expires June 15th, 2010.  Thanks, Angie!

Happy Playing!

Disclosure: I was provided with a free review copy of this eBook.  I was not compensated for my review and my opinions are all my own!