Learning Together at Travelers' Academy: Tot School--General Learning and Fun

Isaiah is 37 months old

We didn't get to Tot School every day this week, but we did have lots of fun!

Isaiah has been amazing us with his new sitting ability! He's learned how to get himself from his normal tummy crawling position to this sitting position. He's also now perfecting a position where he sits on his knees and doesn't use his hands for a few seconds. This succeeds in improving his balance and scaring Mama while I try not to grab at him every time to prevent his falling backwards.

Working out those hips with Daddy!

We had a fun night with our friends. Lydia was teaching Isaiah how to take care of a doll, which of course Isaiah has no idea how to do, since he has no dolls. And much to Mama's sadness, he doesn't even really care about stuffed animals--it's cars all the way!

Continuing with the idea of working on the letters of his name, we did imprint painting (at least that's what we're calling it). I took a large piece of paper and folded it in half, then I painted a big I in the middle. I let Isaiah paint wherever he wanted, then we folded the paper in half again to imprint what he had done on both sides.

Apparently paint imprints work well with two hands, too.

Then of course we tried crayons again. He likes these crayons from Aunt Luda because they come with a cup that he can take them out of and put them in very well on his own.

I got this idea from a fun book that some friends sent us. I haven't started using the actual book yet, because I wanted to get Isaiah used to some of the actions on a larger scale first. Here we worked on drawing a "straight" vertical line from one point to another. I saw we, because we did it together.

But then he actually seemed a little more interested in coloring, at least on the table.

We pulled out this awesome play-doh set (also from our thoughtful friends). I enjoyed the play-doh. Isaiah enjoyed taking all the accessories out of the box and putting them back in. He LOVES doing this with everything!

Or singing into the cup. :)

We got a package! Isaiah's birthday present from Aunt Emily and Uncle Rich arrived, and we were finally able to go pick it up! Isaiah enjoyed trying out his new foam playmat that has numbers and letters and animal puzzles and 4 special drawing squares--perfect for drawing while playing on the floor.

Our friend Julia came over on Wednesday as we were trying out this new activity. Our friends, yep the same ones!, sent us some great stickers that I used for a few number cards. The plan is for Isaiah to put the correct number of stickers on a second set and then use them for matching cards. We'll do that part this coming week. For now we're using them for number learning. Julia worked on the Russian; I worked on the English (and a little Russian, but naturally, her pronunciation is a little better than mine). I just love his expression in this picture. :)