What My Children are Reading: WATER by--Tara

We recently had the great excitement of winning this unique book from a giveaway at Live, Learn, Love.

WATER: by Tara

Tara has a series of books that came about from the fact that she has a son with autism. These books, with their simple subject matter and beautiful, glossy 8x10 photographs, are perfect for encouraging verbal practice with our youngest learners.
Even if your toddlers and preschoolers have no learning difficulty, these books get your child talking and discussing the wonderful photos and subject matter.
The book Water begins with a lovely poem. Even my older children enjoyed this.
The poem is full of adjectives, which we talked about with my early elementary aged kids. (since we are learning about this in our homeschool work)
Also with my older kids, we discussed which adjectives described the different pictures, and also thought of other adjectives that could be used to describe water.
After enjoying our new book, we had some fun with some "magic" water tricks.
Of course, for the school kids, these could be science lessons, but I decided to concentrate on the littles, and just enjoyed the mystery and surprise of these activities.
The first activity was the magic pepper in water trick.
Simple fill a white bowl halfway with water and then liberally shake pepper on top of the water.
Give your child a toothpick which has been dipped into dishwashing liquid.
When the toothpick touches the center of the pepper, the pepper "magically" repels away from the toothpick.
This experiment has a big WOW factor for little ones. (Make sure you have a lot of pepper , because this is done over and over again--if your kids are anything like mine--especially is big kids notice. Even my teenagers had to give it a try. Make sure to rinse out the bowl before trying this a second time to remove any dish detergent residue.)
At the bottom of this post you can see a little video of this.
Our next magically trick was to try and pick up an ice cube with a piece of string.
Again, fill a bowl halfway with water and then add some ice cubes.
This also served as a time to discuss the different states of water.
Try as they may, Kimmy, Gracie and Luke could NOT pick up the ice cubes with string.
And then, it was time for the "magic" ingredient.
I took regular table salt and shook it over the ice cubes and strings.
Make sure the strings are laying across the ice as you add the salt.
TA-DA!! It worked. "Magic" worked again. You will notice that Luke brought up TWO ice cubes. One of those cubes were Kimmy's.
This caused problems! Loud--problems!!

So, Kimmy got to try again. We got her a new ice cube, placed her string perfectly on top of the cube, and then Luke poured a generous amount of salt onto the ice cube.

Kimmy added a little more salt for good luck.

SUCCESS!!!!
Was she a proud and excited girl!!



Don't miss our great pepper experiment video!
Also don't miss checking out Books By Tara--you will be glad you did!!
You can check out many of our other water experiments that we have done in the past by clicking on this link.
Head on over to Mouse Grows, Mouse Learns for my What my Child is Reading posts.

We Have a Progresso Panko Giveaway Winner!

We have a winner for the Progresso Panko giveaway,

cpullmun said...
"I haven't used either one yet but I would use the Panko to make meatballs! I bet they would taste good!!Carla"

I used the Randon Number Generator and Carla's number came up!

I also need to thank My Blog Spark for the opportunity to giveaway these great products.

I also want to tell you about another opportunity and review coming soon, sponsored by CSN Bunk Beds.
This familyof companies offer much more than just bunk beds and funiture. They have toys, baby items, housewares, and much, much more --so make sure to check them out!!

Progresso Panko Giveaway-now closed

Thanks to Progresso and My Blog Spark, I have had the opportunity to tryout Progresso Panko bread crumbs and Progresso chicken broth (which I already use).

"Panko is Japan’s secret ingredient for crunch. A flaky bread crumb with a coarse texture and jagged edges, panko imparts a delicate crispiness perfect for frying or baking. For nearly a decade, panko has been popping up on the plates of fine dining restaurants, but for the home chef, panko has been difficult to find. Not anymore. Progresso Foods introduces its newest gourmet bread crumb, panko, in two flavors, plain and Italian." from Progresso's website.

My kids especially enjoy them as breading for homemade chicken strips. They remain crispy and tender after baking.

Also available on ProgressoFoods.com is a coupon for $1.00*off any two Progresso products. At ProgressoBroth.com you’ll find a coupon for $.50 off a package of broth

Now, thanks to Progresso and My Blog Spark I am offering on lucky winner the opportunity to win this great prize package. It includes

Progresso panko,

a carton of Progresso broth,

a measuring cup,

a slotted spoon,

a soup ladle,

and a sheet pan for baking.

*To enter this giveaway please leave a comment telling about your tip for using panko or broth.

After this first entry you can get extra entries by:

1. become a follower of my blog

2. add this post to a giveaway weekly "link up" and tell me about it

3. get 2 extra chances for blogging about this giveaway and letting me know

The winner will be drawn on 10/28 using the random number generator.

Kimochis Giveaway--Contest is Closed--Winner announced 9/14

I was very interested in the Kimochis when I first saw them featured on another blog.

These very cute, cuddley friends help children deal with their feelings, which are often very hard for our preschoolers to understand.

The Kimochis folks graciously sent us a Kimochi Bug, featuring the feelings happy, brave, and left-out. They also sent me an extra "feeling pack" to help the kids explore different feelings.

Kimberly, 3, has especially been enjoying our Kimochis. She lines up all the feelings and chooses how she would feel in different situations. It is also great to help a child discuss their feelings.

I highly recommend this product--it is a very helpful in teaching the hard concept of feelings to little ones. You can purchase one by heading over to their great site.

Now the exciting news!!

The Kimochis folks have offered to send a Kimochis of their choice to one of my lucky readers.

I am giving you a few chances to be entered into the giveaway:

1. Head over to the Kimochis site and tell me in a comment which character you would choose.
2. Become a fan on Facebook of Kimochis and leave a comment here and tell me you became a fan.

3. Become a public follower of this blog--Ten Kids and a Dog

4. Blog about this for one more chance!!

That's 4 chances to win--comment for each chance please.

Make sure to include a valid e-mail address so I can contact the lucky winner.

I will keep the comments open until Sunday Sept, 13---we will pick a winner on Sept 14.