Sensory Watermelon Painting

Preschool got off to a MUCH later start than usual on Tuesday, but hey, we have that liberty.

We pretty much stayed in PJs all day while I cleaned (why is it that I can never clean without rearranging furniture and making a bigger mess than ever?!).  

We got rid of a recliner in the living room (when the young couple from craigslist came to pick it up they were so excited for that beat up thing that I felt like I had done them some profound civil service) and I'm excited for the space it makes in the living room for our pre-schooling.  I was really sad to see the recliner go, its crazy how attached you can become to THINGS.

Instead of doing our lessons in the morning we waited for little brother's nap in the afternoon.

To encourage proper pencil grasp, I broke this pencil down to a much smaller size.  It forces him to hold it towards the bottom.  He did pretty well, but while I was watching him I realized that he does better with his hand over the top of the pencil.  I always give him a verbal prompt: "look how you're holding it," "try again a different way," or simply "fix your pencil," and he is able to correct himeslf.

I read HERE that this "Digital Prontate Grasp"is a normal stage in writing development at around 2-3 years.  I wonder if his left handedness will extend that stage into age 4 for him, as it seems easier for him to pull the pencil that way, instead of pushing it ahead of his hand and having it skip.

Not too shabby flying solo with the letter F.

Moving on to a number activity, we played match game to demonstrate the number two.  I started reading a children's bible to the kids before bed, and he doesn't like to go past the creation and the flood (with the paraphrasing this bible does, I really don't blame him!), so this Noah's Ark Match Game from the Dollar Tree was also a good way to reinforce the story... AND it emphasizes the number two more than any other match game because Noah calls the animals "two by two".

And now.... our super cool sensory exploration for the day:

We started by using our sense of sight to look at the color paints we were using and the shape of the paper plates cut in half.  Obviously, we were going to paint watermelons!

We used our sense of touch to feel the ridges of the plate as we painted the green watermelon rind.

With our sense of touch we also felt the course rock candy mixed in with our pink paint as we used our fingers to paint the watermelon flesh.  If we held pieces of candy between our fingers we could feel them popping (I did anyway, and he said he did too, so I'll take his word for it).  I thought this would be a stronger sensation that would tickle his fingers while he painted.  

See the face he makes while he's painting.  Look at the concern in his eyebrows.  That right there is why I push the sensory play for him.  He can be overwhelmed and bothered by textures and he doesn't enjoy getting paint, marker, dough, etc. on his hands during the course of the activity.  I have a cup or bowl of water there for him to rinse off when we do these things... I don't want him to be so uncomfortable he becomes frustrated and/or angry... but I try to assure him that it's okay to get messy while we are working, and that we can clean up when we are all done.

I was so happy with him to use his hands to paint.  I am able to recognize the development in something so simple.

With our sense of smell we noticed that the candy made our paint smell like watermelon, well... watermelon candy anyway.

Our sense of sound was definitely included in this painting project.....

 It was so fun!  The sound of the Pop Rocks lasted the whole time we were painting.

I did let him try some of the candy at the end (opened up a fresh package of course) so that we could say we hit every one of our senses. I was hoping for a more comical reaction out of him when he tried the Pop Rocks, but I guess the sensation wasn't as strong as I remember them being when I was a kid (then again I was quite the daredevil... risking my life by chasing Pop Rocks with Cherry Coke!).  Still, the candy definitely appealed to his sense of taste, and I had to cut him off.