shopping for christmas

Nov 23, 2006

—

In the car on the way to school this morning, the children were telling me what they want for Christmas. Big wants a bike and a camera, while Small wants a car and a camera. That’s a toy car, apparently 🙂

So I’m planning shopping lists, and then I decided to just go to my favourite store, and get this: BRIO 34531 Builder System: Road Diggers Set (71 Pieces) What do you reckon, will he like it?

Resolved a couple of issues at school this week – anyone got any tips on working on assertiveness with a 6 year old? Assertiveness is so not a problem at home, or only in that we need to work back towards it from extreme stroppiness and attitude. At school though, she is so quiet that she isn’t making herself heard, and I’m pretty sure it’s not because they aren’t listening. Big is very shy with other grownups, I’m sure that some of you will have seen that too. Is it just something she’ll grow out of?

I seem to be asking a lot of questions of you all tonight 🙂

It’s where it is

Home Ed Inspiration, Ideas, and Activities

Click the links below and scroll through my collection of ideas, workshops, excursions, and more to discover practical everyday activities you can do together in and around your home classroom.

Home Education Inspiration

Home Ed: Ideas and Activities

Home Ed: Topics and Discussion

Exploring Neurodivergence in Children

Comments

12 responses to “shopping for christmas”

rosie
23 November 2006
I think you can’t go wrong with a build-your own digger. Fergus had a similar set and was thrilled- we now have a few and you can make up your own vehicles- even better 🙂
I think maybe they need to try harder to listen to Big at school, but not make too much of a fuss, (which can make it worse). This is only from my own experience as a very shy child- It was from self-consciousness and I just couldn’t bear loud people (which is how I saw teachers, Lol!)
Reply
Kath
23 November 2006
Mark has the Brio builder Scoop set and played with it loads making robots and allsorts and still plays with it sometimes now, so I don’t think you can go wrong with those sets. That’s partly what I bought from Tim’s Brio sale link.
I thought Montessori was all the child choosing what to work on, so I didn’t really understand your previous comment about having to finish the writing first. Although when M was in Montessori he often didn’t get his first choices because he took too long choosing and others got in first. I suppose assertiveness comes with confidence that you have the right to an opinion, it’s not wrong and that you will be taken seriously? What does Big say about it – is she clear on what she is allowed to assert herself about at school?
Reply
Jax
23 November 2006
I *think* that there’s quite a lot about finishing the chosen activity. I’m not entirely clear on the writing either atm, but we’re working on it all. Big is very quiet on the speaking to other adults bit, I think we will probably talk about it all much more over the coming days.
Reply
Alison
23 November 2006
We’ve got that exact one (and a few others!) and I’m sure he’ll love it. I can’t remember quite when Violet got it – she was probably just 4. It is hard though – obviously he’ll need a lot of help putting it together atm. We had the racing car (from Tim’s link below) already (got it when V was 2 I guesss?) and that was easy. Got Buttercup the tractor and trailer set a couple of years ago, that’s a pretty good one, she still needs guidance to follow the instructions. We’ve got Muck too 🙂 I do love that stuff, I was thinking of getting the helicopter from those discontinued ones.
Reply
Tim
24 November 2006
Small would love the helicopter.
Reply
Ron
24 November 2006
I think it would be a hit 🙂
Reply
Jax
24 November 2006
I thought I’d seen some at your house Alison!
Agonising over whether to just get Scoop from that series, I know he’d love it, but just wondered how much point to that there was – once you’d built it was that pretty much it? I didn’t want to get him something that he did once and then left alone, but from what Kath was saying that may well not be the case.
Reply
Kath
24 November 2006
I was surprised how many different things M turned it into but it was rarely Scoop as on the box. He got it when he was about 3, maybe a little bit older, but he didn’t find it hard to manipulate. I think he got more imaginative with it over time. The way L fiddles with things I’m anticipating him being interested even younger than that, just so long as he doesn’t eat the connectors LOL.
Reply
tbird
24 November 2006
re finishing work at M. yes, they are supposed to see things through to the end, they have the right to choose an activity but once it’s chosen they have to work it trhough properly. Thre is an option for the staff to “assist” a child to choose if they feel that the child is avoiding one particular area. As for confidence etc, I suspect that may come with time so long as she feels confortable with the people she is with. Some people are just that way by nature after all and maybe Big will just be quietly confident?
Reply
HelenHaricot
25 November 2006
hmm, you see i think she is confident and assertive, and she doesn’t see me all that often. is it because i am a friends mum, and treat her like my own as it were?
maybe she is being talked to as a child – and that would be a novelty for her really.
i’m not that keen on frocing to write till the end. writing is a difficult skill, and making it a chore is counter productive. [only my opinion though]
Reply
rosie
25 November 2006
Jax, I had the same fears about Scoop, which Fergus got when he was about 3 or 4, (and personally I dislike vehicles with funny faces! but they love ’em) but TBH he no longer knows or cares what Scoop is supposed to look like as it has morphed and been taken apart and rebuilt into different things so many times. If he likes it you could always add to it with other bits/kits. And they get more advanced, with different fixing bits, etc (i think!). I think some of our stuff isn’t even Brio.(It’s now in a big basket, no boxes)
O! that’s what that bit of yellow plastic under the coffee table is….
Reply
Tim
25 November 2006
Helen, maybe there is an element of friends’ mums being more approachable, but I think she just clicks with you.
Reply