Family Literacy Day

January 27th is Family Literacy Day in Canada. It is a day for parents and children to enjoy books together. And since that is one of my favourite things to do, I was totally on board!

The night before, I chose a few books from my kids' shelves, and came up with some activities to do with them that related back to the story. I wanted to vary my activities too, and not just have everything be a craft or everything be a game. I thought it would be great to have a craft for one, a learning activity for one, a just-for-fun one, and a cooking one. I got all my preparations ready and supplies gathered, and then I was set.

This was my first book. And no, actually, this wasn't the book that I planned a cooking activity. Ha! No, in the book the moose makes sock puppets, and I had found a sock puppet kit at a book store for $2 and snatched it up, so this was the perfect chance to break it open.

It came with quite a few supplies, but I added in a few of my own materials to round it out.

So first I gathered my middle two kids (I had the baby down for a nap, and my oldest was still at school) and we read the book. Then I brought them up to the table where I had all the supplies out and waiting.

They were so enthusiastic about this idea! My boy snatched up a green sock and instantly declared he was going to make a snake.

And my daughter quickly set about turning a pink sock into, what else, a piggy.

After some felt, buttons, googly eyes, pompoms, and pipe cleaners were added on, these were their creations. I love what they came up with! I had to help them cut out their felt pieces, but the design and the rest of the construction was all their own.

When the glue was finally dry, they slid their arms into their puppets and gave me a show!

This was a library book we happened to have checked out earlier in the week. We own the first book, "Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type" and when I saw another of Doreen Cronin's books I thought we'd give it a try. I really liked Click, Clack, Moo. I thought this one fell short, but my kids enjoyed it, which was good.

For this activity, I did a little number worksheet. Down one side of the paper I wrote the numbers from 1-5, and then made swirly lines all over the center of the page and had them come out at the other side. The kids had to use their markers to trace my lines and find where each number comes out, then write the number at the end of the path.

Our third book was The Balloon Tree by Phoebe Gilman. We have all her Jillian Jiggs stories, and I bought this book at a used book sale because I loved the author's other works. Again, not my favourite, but it was a fun, cute story, and had Phoebe Gilman's sweet illustrations.

After we finished the story, we of course, played with BALLOONS! We did three games: The first one was just a simple 'see who can keep their balloon in the air the longest' game.

For the second, we sandwiched a balloon in between the kids and then they had to squeeze and hug as tight as they could until it popped. It was sure a shock when it finally did!

Our last game was a race around the living room with a balloon held tightly between our legs so we kind of had to waddle. So funny to watch them try!

Our final book was this lesser-known Seuss.

Then we made scrambled eggs together. Basic I know, but this guy here loves scrambled eggs.

It was such a fun afternoon. And at bedtime they asked me if it would be Family Literacy Day again soon. So great.