Craft Fun: Toilet Paper Roll Ant

Today, EV and I worked on a 'ant' craft project using recycled toilet paper roll. I found this cute idea from Snails and Puppy Dog Tails. It is very easy to make, and takes about 30 minutes. Just make sure that all the necessary materials are prepared beforehand. 

Here are the materials needed:

a. Toilet paper roll, cut into three parts, for the ant's body

b. Black paint to paint the ant's body

c. Pipe cleaner (in black or brown), cut 6 long pieces for legs and 2 short pieces for antennas

d. Googly eyes

e. Scotch tape & double sided tape to tape the body, eyes, legs & antennas together

EV enjoys her new playgroup

EV has been attending TalentPlus playgroup for about a month now, and she has adapted successfully to it. Now in the mornings, she knows exactly what to expect when we change her and give her her red school bag and water bottle. Then she would wait patiently while her shoes are being worn. The moment the gate is open, she will walk out, saying bye to everyone at home. 

EV checking if she has everything she needs

When we reach the playgroup, and if we're early, my little 'beauty queen' will sometimes make her rounds and wave hi or shake hands with her little friends. Once the teachers open the door, she'll line up to have her daily HFMD check, before waving goodbye and zooming in to the play mat which is already filled with toys. After the session, she still leaves the playgroup with a smile on her face, though extremely eager to see us as our presence means she can go home, eat lunch and sleep!


It's really comforting to see her looking forward to attending playgroup every day. And as parents, we can see that the playgroup does follow a rough curriculum. On Mondays, they learn Chinese; on Tuesdays, it's Mathematics; on Wednesdays, it's alphabet time; on Thursdays, the kids learn parts of the body and on Fridays, it's art & craft. Almost everyday, EV will bring home some work eg pasting C letters and colouring a cat, or bumble bee finger printing, which I then display in her room. She has a great memory. She can still go to her art work and point out knowingly what she had done a few days after. I have a clear file that I've specially prepared, so after each week, I would put the work that she did at this playgroup in. I think it's a good way of showing her what she has done, and also show her how proud we are of her achievements.

Tot Club: A for Ant

Today, I started EV on the Tot Club, with the letter A. Though I prepared all the materials before hand, putting them altogether so that they are within easy reach, I was still kinda flustered trying to go from one activity to another without taking too long, and yet trying to keep EV entertained.


I began with a greeting song, which is to the tune of Good Morning, from popular classic Singing in the Rain. I just changed the lyrics to:


Good afternoon, good afternoon
It's fun to learn and play
Good afternoon, good afternoon to you


Then I went to introduce the letter 'A' and 'a', using the feely card to show how 'a' is written. I got EV to paste the arrows on to the 'a' card, saying 'round' and 'down'. I did most of the pasting of course, and when completed, EV repeated after me, tracing the letter and saying 'round' and 'down'.

Next, I used a printed A4 sheet to show the two letters again (thanks to LearnTheFunWay for this great idea), and let EV take pictures of 'A' words from a bag. Then I realised I totally missed the phonics part. So I continued and got EV to paste the pictures on to A4 sheet. After that, I told her that we were learning 'A for ant', and asked her to point to the ant, which she did, as you can see here. I also asked her to point out alligator, avocado and arm. 

After that, I played the phonics song, and EV really liked this music part. She is already familiar with the 'a' sound, so it was no problem for her to pick it up. Amazingly, once she heard the word 'ankle' from the song, a word we haven't really used previously, she repeated 'ankle' and pointed to her own ankle. And when I took the picture of the ant and made it crawl up my ankle, she took the picture from me and imitated my action. I was quite delighted with this positive response from her.


EV loves colouring too, so she did enjoy the craft part where she had to colour the ankle and the ant. After that, by holding her hand, we wrote the letters A, a and the word 'ant' together.

Next, I showed her a flashcard with the letters 'A' and 'a', and also the word 'ant'. After that, I took out some letters, and asked her to identify 'a', 'n', and 't'. She had some difficulty identifying them on her own, but with minimal guidance, she was able to do so. I also said the sounds of the three letters, and got her to repeat the spelling letter by letter after me. 

To end the session, we sang the closing song of 'The Ants Go Marching', with the both of us standing and doing the actions. Then I asked EV to give me a hug, and she did so with a smiling face. It really did look like she enjoyed herself, and I'm glad. She seemed to be on a roll, and didn't want the session to end, so I got her to do some other activities such as folding paper and colouring. Later on, she took a book and sat down to 'read'. In total, the whole session lasted about one hour, with the Tot Club lasting about 30 minutes.

While the lesson seemed a little disorganised today, I'm sure I will be able to improve on it for the next one. Important thing is, EV was receptive to it, and enjoyed the activities, and this definitely gives me a confidence boost to do even better the next time round, when we do 'A for apple'.    

EV stringing words and singing the last words of sentences in songs

EV's linguistic ability is developing rather fast. She's picking up new words, and stringing them together to converse with us. Though not in complete and full sentences, she gets the meaning through to us adults. On Sunday, she woke up and said 'bumble bee, teacher', in reference to the bumble bee finger painting that she did at playgroup on Friday. 


Beginning in January, I also shared that EV had begun to sing the last word of each sentence in 'Twinkle, twinkle little star'. She has since picked up more songs. She hums and sings happily to Humpty Dumpty, enthusiastically saying the last word of each sentence. She has also rekindled a love with Kindermusik songs that she listened to when she attended enrichment classes there, often shaking her body or waving her hands to the music, sometimes even uttering some lyrics. It's really a joy to see her.