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| Mark Nowicki |
Weekend cooking with children can provide nutritious meals and nutritious snacks all week. It helps everyone relax and chat while making a favorite recipe or trying a new one as an experiment. After all, cooks are scientists, mathematicians and artists with reading and organizational skills. It’s a perfect quiet fun and learning activity with a reward at the end.
Super Simple Cheese
With a little help since a stove is involved, children will have a creamy cheese to add protein to snacks all week (Check that no one is lactose intolerant.)
This creamy cheese tastes like nothing, which can be good. Add a little salt and put it on nutritious crackers, vegetables, and fruits children already enjoy. It is good with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, toast, or finger licked in a bowl by little ones. The ingredients are two cups whole (works best) or 2% milk and one or two tablespoons of lemon juice.
Place milk in a saucepan, heat and stir it on low so the milk doesn’t stick to the bottom. If you have a cooking thermometer you can put it in the pan until the milk is 170 to 190 degrees. If not, just make it hot. Turn off heat and add one teaspoon lemon juice and stir until the little curd lumps form. Add a second, if needed, for lumps. Be patient and remove from heat.
Shaping Cheese
Let the mixture cool to a temperature you can handle. Now you will separate the curd lumps from the whey liquids. Pour mixture through a strainer into a bowl to save the whey and empty the curds into a cloth. A clean white t –shirt (never worn again), washcloth, or cheesecloth work.
Take the four corners of the cloth and twist them making a bag. Twist tighter and tighter to get the liquid whey out.
Cheese will be crumbly. Add a little salt and taste. Do not break it up further with your fingers at this point.
You can make a block of cheese by taking your cloth with curds and folding in thirds. Place on cake pan and put fry pan with 10 lbs on top for about 30 minutes. It will form a loose shape. Keep everything refrigerated.
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| fdarling fotos |
It will get firmer.
While waiting say “Little Miss Muffet, “ “Farmer in the Dell” or read “The Cheese” by Palatini or “The Stinky Cheese Man…” by Scieszka.
You may wish to try the whey, an acquired sour taste. Children will probably not like it, but it is rich in protein. Whey is used in protein bars, commercial protein shakes, and soups. The Swiss bathe in it to keep their skin soft. Hmmm. It can even be frozen.
Sketch: Mark Nowicki; Photo: Fran Darling, fdarling fotos
More Ideas and Activities....See the authors’ book “Learning Through the Seasons” at area bookstores and grandparentsteachtoo.org. For more help to prepare young children for success in school see the authors’ web site: www.grandparentsteachtoo.org. Also check our audio Podcasts WNMU Radio 90; Youtube video activities; and join us on Pinterest
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| fdarling fotos |
Teaching resilience is a long process that most children do not learn on their own. The American Psychological Association has suggestions to help children manage stress, feelings of anxiety, and uncertainty. This doesn’t mean children won’t experience emotional pain, sadness, difficulty, or distress. However, families can give them tools to “meet the challenges with strength, determination and a positive attitude.”
The previous column lists help with homework, playing board games, learning art and music, helping others, plus teaching and practicing safety rules and deep breathing to help children become resilient. Deep breathing helps families think before saying or doing something they regret.
Small Goals Needed
Families can teach children to set reasonable goals and then move toward them one step at a time. Celebrate small progress. Moving toward that goal in tiny steps and receiving praise for doing so focuses children on what they have accomplished rather than what hasn't been accomplished. This helps them move forward in the face of challenges. Break down large school assignments into small achievable goals. That means checking the backpack every night for due dates.
For example, if children consistently get words wrong on spelling tests practice a short time every night. Even if they get one more correct, celebrate and keep on practicing. Give practice tests in the exact format the teacher uses to minimize test stress.
Analyze tasks like a coach. If children have difficulty catching a ball, use a larger one and deflate it slightly for a better grip. Throw gently close up and gradually go farther away. Study their hand placement.
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| fdarling fotos |
Positive self-view
Turn off electronic devices and talk during meals, transportation, and waiting in line. Ask for two positive things that happened and one that can be improved. Help children remember ways they successfully handled difficulties in the past and help them understand these past challenges build the strength to handle future challenges. “Wow, last year you were not reading yet. Look at you now. I love to hear you read.”
Help your children learn to trust themselves to solve problems and make appropriate decisions. “You went to the Lost and Found and found your glove. Way to go!”
Teach children to see the humor in life, and the ability to laugh at one's self. “Ah, you might want to check out your socks, honey.” Chuckle softly together about starting a new fashion trend (mismatched socks) without being sarcastic. You are giving children words to create humor rather than being embarrassed about a little slip. Resilient children make a little joke about a simple mistake and move on.
Teach siblings to nurture humor and acknowledgement in your strong family unit rather than use sarcasm, meanness, and criticism. They can build self-confidence or shred it.
Photos: Fran Darling, fdarling fotos
More Ideas and Activities....See the authors’ book “Learning Through the Seasons” at area bookstores and grandparentsteachtoo.org. For more help to prepare young children for success in school see the authors’ web site: www.grandparentsteachtoo.org. Also check our audio Podcasts WNMU Radio 90; Youtube video activities; and join us on Pinterest
Families can do two important things to help children learn to read. One is to talk and read to them and have them read to you daily. The second is to regularly practice their very special weekly spelling lists. They are sight words and word families. Sight words are frequently used words that must be recognized immediately for children to read fluently. There are about 220 basic sight words like ‘the”, “where,” and “here” that cannot be sounded out because they don’t follow rules. Go to lincs.ed.gov for a list.
The other words in early spelling lists are word families that can be easily sounded out once children learn the code.
Word Families
English has about 35 word family endings. They can make over 300 words by changing the consonants in front of them. Some examples include: at, am, an, ap, and it.
When children add consonant sounds like b, c, f, h, to “at “they start a word family of rhyming words. As they learn the 35 endings and how to use them to sound out (decode) and spell words, the door to reading opens. If they know cat, they can spell bat, fat, hat, mat, rat, sat, and flat.
These word families are also syllables of larger words. Flat is the first syllable of flatten and flatter. Children then use the syllable clue plus the rest of the sentence (context) to understand new words.
Family Support
How can families support their young children? Be able to recognize word families yourself. The list is on http://grandparentsteachtoo.org/ .
Every night spend five-six minutes studying your children’s school spelling lists with them by spelling out loud and printing the words. Show them how to turn one family word like bat into mat just by changing the first sound (phoneme). Teach children to silently or whisper sound -out (word family) words as they print them. However, sight words cannot be sounded out. They must be memorized. Then, give practice tests. Practice that is like the test is efficient studying.
Show children when they write stories if they know a rhyming word like fat they can probably write flat. They will get closer words they want to write if they use this method.
Study Fun
Learning is easier when fun.
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| fly - sky |
While traveling or waiting in line, take out the list of word family endings and play a rhyming game. Pick a word family like ab. Teach kids to go through the alphabet of consonants, making new words or syllables in larger words and putting them in sentences. Make up silly stories with rhyming words. Use Scrabble tiles or paper cards of letters to play the game above. You can play for minutes of a special activity or technology.
sketch: Mark Nowicki, photo: Fran Darling
More Ideas and Activities....See the authors’ book “Learning Through the Seasons” at area bookstores and grandparentsteachtoo.org. For more help to prepare young children for success in school see the authors’ web site: www.grandparentsteachtoo.org. Also check our audio Podcasts WNMU Radio 90; Youtube video activities; and join us on Pinterest
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| fdarling fotos |
Resilience is the ability to bounce back after a disappointment or difficulty. There is often a tug of war between desiring to help children be happy and safe and teaching them to get up, dust themselves off and start all over again. Research from medical groups has suggestions for families.
Practice at Home
Resilient children practice schoolwork, sports, board games (interaction with people), art, music, and help others. These activities teach winning, losing, making mistakes, recovering quickly, and determining to do better. They grow in self-confidence and lessen self-centeredness.
Find tasks at which children can be successful, master, and go on to the next challenge. If they have difficulty, break it down into smaller parts.
This starts in the family. Children feel useful and an important part of the family when they do age appropriate chores. Give some basic guidance for dusting, for example. Let them work, check up, and praise for doing a nice job. Competence is part of resilience.
Teach them to help others and join healthy groups like scouts, church, or community volunteers. Resilient kids think of others.
Teach Safety Plans
Communities teach safety through the schools and send home materials. Follow up.
It is a great time for family conversations, safety plans, and practice. When the fire department sends home a request to practice a fire drill, stop, drop, and roll, and smoke alarm battery checks, take time for their requests.
Do young children know their name, family names, address, and phone number? Can they call 911? Can children find a store employee (service desk) if lost? Do they stop, look, and listen when they are old enough to cross a street because they have practiced with adults?
Do adults ask every day for two good things that happened and one thing that can be improved so families know what is going on? Are backpacks checked daily for school notes and homework? There are usually signs that things are not quite right (like bullying) if the family’s radar is up. Information and practice help children be resilient and confident.
Deep Breathing
Teaching young children to deeply breathe helps them to think and cope with stressful situations like standing in front of a class, taking tests, or other tough situations. The habit of deep breathing medically calms the body, slows the heart, and helps control pain. It helps all of us think before saying or doing something we may regret.
Slowly inhaling through the nose filters the air and is better for oxygen uptake. The exhale, which slows the heart rate, should be longer than the inhale. Practice keeping the shoulders down and neck relaxed. The bigger inhale forces the abdomen to expand, the diaphragm to extend, and pushes the ribs out.
photos: Fran Darling, fdarling fotos
sketches: Mark Nowicki
More Ideas and Activities....See the authors’ book “Learning Through the Seasons” at area bookstores and grandparentsteachtoo.org. For more help to prepare young children for success in school see the authors’ web site: www.grandparentsteachtoo.org. Also check our audio Podcasts WNMU Radio 90; Youtube video activities; and join us on Pinterest
