Moose Muffins Math Game

This month the Virtual Book Club for Kids Author is Laura Numeroff. Last time she was the author of the month we enjoyed creating our own sibling book based on What Brothers Do Best.

Although she has a wide range of books she has written, she's best known for her "If You Give . . ." books.  One of our favorites is If You Give a Moose a Muffin. Last week Big Brother and I enjoyed reading the book and creating an extended math game.

As I've mentioned in a few other posts the last few months, recently Big Brother has been really interested in math and all things number related. 

Buttons Come and Buttons Go (A Pete the Cat Game)

We were excited when we discovered that this month's Virtual Book Club for Kids author was Eric Litwin as it meant focusing on his Pete the Cat books. We discovered Pete the Cat a few years ago and love Litwin's easygoing, rhythmic style. (Scroll down to the bottom of the post for links to a few of our favorites.) The boys love his stories and I love the messages they convey about not sweating the small stuff.

Buttons Come and Buttons Go Math Game

For this month's activity we decided to focus on the book Pete the Cat and his Four Groovy Buttons. Not only does it convey a great message about not getting upset over the loss of some buttons and finding positives in the outcome, it also builds early math skills right into the storyline. We extended the book into our "Buttons Come and Buttons Go" math game.

Busy Bags for School Aged Children

This week we've been participating in the Virtual Busy Bag Exchange. Big Cousin was at our house for a few days this week and as the all the kiddos would be partaking in quiet time, I created a few busy bags for her as well.

Big Cousin is headed into second grade in the fall so her bags needed to work on different skill sets than the ones I usually create for Big Brother. I know she is enjoying to learn how to sew with her grandmother, so the first bag I created encouraged her to practice her sewing skills.

Sewing also helps kids develop fine motor skills, and in her case, strengthen her fine motor muscles even more so as she already is an active writer and used to manipulating small objects.