Bright Tomato Learning

Creative ideas for playing with Playdough, Salt dough and Clay

admin — Fri, 18 May 2012 05:52:38 +0000

Recently, I have noticed that a table with home-made salt dough at our local play group has become a source of some anxiety for me and every time I visit it with my 18 months old toddler I leave feeling slightly guilty and a touch inadequate. Like, for instance, during the Easter week, my toddler and I sat across from mums and bubs happily rolling up Easter eggs and placing them into the amazing basket creations next to the gorgeous bunnies and cutest baby chicks made out of salt dough. We, on the other hand, were rolling dough into thick and thin sausages and although managed to roll several Easter eggs unfortunately had no lovely basket to put them in. That’s because I CANNOT MAKE BASKETS out of playdough or anything else for that matter. And consequently neither can my 18 months old toddler. Last week we sat across from a lovely young mum with her toddler and watched them making a phantasmagorical salt dough forest with trees and flowers creation out of different colour dough and toothpicks. I watched with envy which was difficult to conceal whereas my toddler watched with fascination as the sad little thick and thin sausages lay on our side of the table…

I consider myself a fairly creative person and I remember making fun stuff out of play dough when I was little but for some reason, when I handle playdough these days, my brain is just incapable of producing interesting and beautiful little figurines. Refusing to let my toddler suffer from his mother’s unfortunate inadequacy and thanks to google I have found some great resources that I would like to share. Perhaps there are other playdough challenged mums like me out there…

Here are some pages from an amazing book by Rony Oren, called “Secrets of Clay, Pets & Farm Animals 1″

Mouse and Snail

Rooster

Frog

Donkey

And these Playdough Face Mats from SparkleBox are simply amazing – just print out and stick playdough on to make eyes, nose, ears, beards, freckles or anything else to make the faces unique and interesting.

SparkleBox Playdough Mats

I will keep adding resources that I find interesting.

Looking forward to making a snail at the next play group. I am sure other mums will be green with envy.

MULTICULTURAL Ethnic BABY Dolls – Asian and African

admin — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 09:26:31 +0000

Our gorgeous multicultural babies have arrived! It is so difficult to find good quality multicultural ethnic dolls but we believe we have found them. These dolls are of exceptional quality, they look and even smell just like real babies.
Our Asian baby dolls have beautifully smooth and silky black hair and soft, porcelain skin.

Asian Baby Boy - Anatomically Correct MULTICULTURAL Ethnic Doll

Asian Baby Girl - Anatomically Correct MULTICULTURAL Ethnic Doll

Our African baby dolls have chubby cheeks and gorgeous shiny curls.

African Baby Boy - Anatomically Correct MULTICULTURAL Ethnic Doll

African Baby Girl - Anatomically Correct MULTICULTURAL Ethnic Doll

All dolls are anatomically correct and dressed in white cotton underwear.
They are truly an amazing find and we are very proud of them!

Interactive JUMBO Activity CLOTH Books for Babies and Toddlers by Freckled Frog

admin — Fri, 09 Mar 2012 03:47:10 +0000

The I CAN Interactive Cloth book series from The Freckled Frog are so magnificent I wish I was still a little kids so that I could play with them! And they are JUMBO size, super large, just the right size for little hands.
With a multitude of wonderful interactive activities such as lacing a shoe, choosing shapes, counting beads, tying a ribbon and much more these books will provide hours of fun and learning opportunities.

The books are of amazing quality, Australian designed and owned.

New Arrivals – Montessori Materials

admin — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 07:45:10 +0000

Our new Montessori stock is about to arrive which is super exciting!! We have increased our range dramatically so watch this space. New products will include the following:

Montessori Brown Stair
Montessori Cloth Box
Montessori Seed puzzle
Montessori Feet balance exercise
Montessori Infant coin box
Montessori Colour resemblance sorting task
Montessori Bells set
Montessori Land and water form trays

Visit our Montessori Section in a few weeks time to see these items in stock.

Tips and Tricks for keeping Babies Busy at Home with Creative Play

admin — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 12:14:09 +0000

I am pretty sure that a lot of what I am going to say might not be new or original for experienced mums. But I am hoping that some new first-time mums might find these tips helpful.
If your baby is not crawling yet but already quite active and curious about the world around her she may get frustrated with not being able to explore it at her leisure. This can create a lot of crying, whinging and whining and cause severe headaches for poor mums who are already tired and sleep deprived.
Here are a few tips and tricks to keep your babies happy at home:

1. Create “play stations”: Find different spaces around your home where you can place toys and sit or place your baby on her tummy for play. Often toys are placed in one place in the house and it becomes the baby’s play area. But babies get tired of being in the same spot all the time. So changing it up a bit by moving toys to a different room or even to a different corner of the same room can really make a difference.

2. Hide and swap toys: This is an old trick but it works like a charm and often saves you buying new toys when babies get tired of the old ones. Split all of your baby’s toys into 3 – 4 lots. Keep one lot out and hide the other 3. Let the baby play with one lot of toys for about 1 week, then hide and swap for the next one. Rotate the lots at any frequency or order you like. Babies forget the toys they haven’t seen for a while so seeing a toy they haven’t played with for some time is like getting a brand new toy.

3. Tidy up: For me, personally, putting toys away is probably one of the most frustrating household chores – they get thrown around the room in seconds right after you’ve finished tidying. But this chore can be really helpful in keeping your baby happy and engaged with her toys. Babies love creating messes – tipping toys out of boxes, throwing scarves, puzzle pieces, balls around, demolishing neatly built block towers and generally creating lots of havoc. But if they are placed in a messy spot to begin with it is difficult for them to concentrate their attention on a single object as there are too many brightly coloured objects scattered around. Babies tend to be a lot less fussy in play areas where toys are arranged neatly because they can focus on things that interest them and it is easier to get to particular toys that catch their eye. So clench your teeth and tidy those toys even if you absolutely hate doing it.

4. Replace toys with other household items: When all the toys in the house are just not fun anymore you can turn some household objects into toys. Here are some examples of objects that make great fun toys – pots, pans, big plastic ladles, clothes pegs, plastic containers, sealed bags of chips or pasta (they make a wonderful crinkling noise but please supervise your baby to make sure that the bag doesn’t rip), scarves, belts, hats, old computer parts (e.g. mouse, keyboard) and many more. So be creative and turn your house into one big toy shop.

Hopefully, some or all of these tips can help you entertain your baby on those rainy days or just when you need to leave your baby to her own devices for a short while so that you can attend to other household chores. And one last very handy little tip that I have learnt after I gave birth to my second child is that not only it’s ok to leave your baby playing independently (as long as you know that everything around them is safe) but it’s actually good for them. So no need to feel guilty if you are unable to spend every single second of your waking hours with your precious baby – it will teach them the art of playing independently and give them the ability to initiate their own play.

MY FIRST WORDS iPhone App – Flashcards by Smart Baby Apps

admin — Fri, 13 May 2011 13:14:55 +0000

Recently, a friend has introduced me to this wonderful new iPhone/iPad App for babies. It is an application that has a multitude of flashcards in a variety of categories such as First Words, Opposites, Food Festival, Animal Kingdom and many more. The brilliant thing about this application is that it is interactive and allows babies to control the flashcards all on their own. I have watched with amazement how my friend’s one year old girl wiggled her little fingers over the iPhone screen to flip the flashcards while listening to her mum’s voice and looking at the gorgeous pictures.

Yes, and that is another brilliant thing about this application – you can record your own voice to read out the flashcards labels. This means that for bilingual kids the flashcards can be recorded in another language. The written labels on the cards can also be changed and written in a different language if the language is installed on the iPhone or the iPad.

Overall, this is an amazing way to teach babies their first words and increase their vocabulary. However, if you prefer the real over the virtual flashcards please check out our range of JUMBO Reading Cards for babies and toddlers.

Using Montessori Materials at Home

admin — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 04:33:14 +0000

In the previous post about the Montessori Snake Game I briefly mentioned the difficulty some parents experiencing when they decide to try using Montessori materials at home. Sure enough, there are wonderful blogs and websites out there which have an abundance of information but it is often difficult and time consuming to find specific instructions for specific materials.

This is where teaching albums and instruction manuals and dvds can come in handy. The following website has manuals and instructional materials created by AMS and AMI accredited teachers.

Montessori Instruction Manuals for Home Use

And best of all, these manuals are very reasonably priced.

Montessori Addition Snake Game

admin — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 08:52:54 +0000

Many of my customers are mums and dads who just want to buy some great materials to use with their kids at home. Unfortunately, most Montessori products don’t come with instruction manuals and unless they are formally trained or attended Montessori workshops many parents feel lost when they decide to buy Montessori teaching aids.

This is the best time to turn to internet in general and blogs in particular. There is a multitude of Montessori information websites and blogs run by parents that describe how these materials should be used.

Here are some awesome videos that I found on how to use the Montessori Addition Snake Game

Positive Snake Game – Making Tens

Using the Black and White Remainder Bead Stair

Random Montessori Addition Snake Game Problem

Astronomy for kids – an astronomically fun Snap Game

admin — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 14:11:32 +0000

Snap is such a fun and easy game to play and it can be used as a learning tool by adapting it to any subject. And since my son has recently developed a real fascination with all things astronomical I have decided to create a simple Snap Game of Astronomy.

I have used all of the planets in our Solar System (including poor Pluto which has been demoted to a dwarf planet) as well as several other solar system bodies such as Moon, Sun, Asteroid, Meteor and Comet. Each card has a picture of the astronomical body and 3 interesting facts listed underneath. There are four identical snap cards for each of the astronomical bodies.

I must say, it has been difficult distilling the information to 3 interesting facts per astronomical body but I have learned a great deal in the process. Hopefully, now I won’t have to resort to Google everytime my son has a question on the subject of astronomy. Although, knowing the type of questions he usually asks (e.g., Mum, can aliens land on Jupiter?) Google wouldn’t have helped anyway.

So I now present to you a new addition to our Free Downloads family – The Astronomy Snap Game for Kids. All you have to do is download, print out the 15 pages (use thick paper for better snap effect) and cut it up into snap cards.

Flags of the World – Free Geography Download

admin — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 07:32:29 +0000

I have been looking for a website where I could download flags of the world in an easy to print format. My son has a large poster of a world map on his wall and loves looking at it but the flags are small and hard to see. After searching for a while and not being able to find quite what I was looking for I decided to create one myself. This flags of the world download is organised in alphabetical order and contains flag images of 166 countries. You can download it here from our website’s free downloads page

http://www.brighttomato.com.au/downloads.html