When Jonathan turned 6 months old and started to crawl, I
really started to feel the "need" for some sort of "play
room" for him. I was tired of my
entire house being a play zone. Tired
all the nicks on the walls, things getting damaged, baby-proofing to the 9's
and mostly not having a space for him to be a KID and not always have to tidy
up cause people may come to the door and see a demolition zone! We had bins in every room of toys. What was once our "new home";
professionally decorated to our likes; had now turned into a child's den. It was time to move to renovate!
Now, I totally understand that everyone's situation is
different and not everyone has the ability to just randomly create a new
"space" in their home. For us,
we had an unfinished basement with some ideas in the back of our mind to someday
renovate it. Apparently now was the time! If you are
considering renovating your basement too or another room in your home to create
a play room, or for my homeschooling friends - if you are looking for "school"
room ideas OR if you even just want to make your regular home space a little
more "kid friendly"; here are some things that we did that we are
finding is working great! In fact, I am
writing this article as a response to a request from others parents who have
been to our home for play dates :)
THE ZONES: our new play area consists of different
areas or "zones" as I call them.
The Kitchen
When Jonathan first took a liking to "kitchen
play"; we just didn't have the space or money to invest in one of those
really neat / large kitchen play seats.
So instead we just got this little table top mini kitchen :) I like how it takes up less space and is
easily portable / removable. We have a
ton of "play food" and kitchen items.
I took a bunch of plastic kids tableware out of our own kitchen and gave
jonathan his own shopping bag, chef's hat and apron to finish off the look
**beware -- the play kitchen food is a huge mess-maker
:) Although its lots of fun, be prepared
to be picking it up off the floor all the time :) (http://www.toysrus.ca/product/index.jsp?productId=11651726)
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| jonathan cooks in his "kitchen". This particular table top one was from Costco. |
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| Jonathan sets the table for baby and puppy. This table couples as as art table. |
The Chalk Wall
These are hugely popular.
You can buy chalk board paint at most big box building stores
today. We got this one from Home
Depot (http://www.homedepot.ca/product/chalkboard-paint-black-887ml/980042). Note that it doesn't have to be
black! you can get it made in any colour
you choose. Also -- there is a magnetic
base that you can put on as well if you'd like to also have a huge magnet board
*although I hear it doesn't work too great.
**be sure your walls are smooth or sand them. And great ready to do at least 3 coats
:) To clean our board / wall, we just
use a wet microfiber cleaning cloth. If
you are worried about "chalk dust", there is really cool new dustless
chalk (Crayola) and chalk paint. But,
once again, remember that this is a kids room so a little chalk mess is not a problem
in a designated kids play area. Id caution
more about doing something like this in a bedroom.....
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| http://www.crayola.com/browse-products/12-ct-anduseptic-antidust-chalk-sticks.aspx |
The Arts & Crafts Area
Arts and crafts were always hugely important to me! So we have designated bins and bins of craft
supplies alone. Everything has its own
place and is labelled. I find if
everything has a proper spot and you teach your kids to respect their toys, it's
not a problem to have it all out like this.
Jonathan is especially good at knowing that colouring happens only on
the paper and that markers need their lids back on them. Only 1 or 2 play doh colours are allowed to
be opened at a time (even though I think we have a lifetime supply of play doh
in our house!)
 | |
| http://www.staples.ca/ENG/Catalog/cat_sku.asp?CatIds=&webid=682538&affixedcode=WW A Dymo Labeller is my best friend :) Beware the label tape is pricey :( |
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| http://www.canadiantire.ca/AST/browse/3/HouseHome/StorageOrganization/ContainersBinsTotes/PRD~0680449P/12+Bin+Organizer.jsp?locale=en **These go on sale all the time. Reg $69.99 but I only paid $35 for mine :) |
The Play Area
Really this is everywhere, but I do have those foam mats on
the floor in designated areas for "floor play." Once again; every toy has a spot or bin that
it goes it.
You'll notice in our home (as part of our homeschooling
philosophy); we try to have as little "noisy" toys as possible. In addition, where possible I try to get wood
or cloth toys. The less plastic the better!
Some of our favourite toys include:
1) lacing beads
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| Primary Lacing Beads http://www.setonbooks.com/viewone.php?ToView=P-MDPK-37 |
2) Melissa and Doug wood puzzles
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| Numbers and letters sound puzzles http://www.setonbooks.com/viewone.php?ToView=P-MDPK-16 |
3) stacking toys
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| http://www.ikea.com/ca/en/catalog/products/60061967/ |
4) books *note that
we actually have a children's library in our home that could rival a public
library :) it is not located in our new
basement play area as I find too many books in one place at any time leads to less
appreciation and inattentiveness.
Instead, we have 1 bin of books in the play area and 1 in our bedroom
(that I pre-select based on age appropriateness, the time of year i.e. if a
holiday is around the corner, what we are learning i.e. colours, numbers, etc.,
our interests at the time i.e. trains, etc.)
The Reading Nook
Further to above, we have what I like to call a reading nook
under our staircase. It was an odd shape
/ space to fill so I thought it would make a great place to throw a bunch of
pillows down for quiet time and reading.
This can easily be done anywhere with some foam floor mats and random
pillows. **I have future plans to add a
curtain around this area to also couple this as a hide-out / fort area some
day.
The Media Area
Yes - this basically means that we have a TV in our play
room. But before I get ahead of myself let's just say that this TV is actually
not really for the kids :) We figured
if we were going to finish the basement, we should at least put a sofa down
there and a TV in case mom and dad ever wanted to hide out down there :) I can see this being of more use in the
years to come. We have video games hooked
up to this tv so we can do our Wii Fit in this space, etc. jonathan also has age appropriate video games
that he is allowed to play on occasion
Some of our favourite DVDs
1) Brother Francis Series
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| http://www.catholicchapterhouse.com/catalogsearch/result/?order=relevance&dir=desc&s=brother+francis&q=brother+francis&searchSelect=store |
2) Character Builders DVD Series
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| http://www.aophomeschooling.com/product/prm100/ |
The Homeschool Area
As a homeschooling family, our needs may be a little
different in terms of organizing our day.
Where possible, I try to not "model" a school classroom
environment as this is not really what I want to create. Instead, I model it around functionality and organization;
mainly for my sake as the "teacher".
~ The Week Wall
These are little pockets attached to the wall of what we are
going to be doing "school wise" each day of the week. This could be worksheets from our curriculum as
well as a multitude of supplemental resources I use
~ The Word Wall
This is what Jonathan is currently working on. Right now its letter recognition, number
recognition, name recognition and his colours.
Right now he knows his letters A-Z, numbers 1-20 and all his primary
colours. My goal for this year is for him to recognise each of them at random,
know his letter sounds and be able to write his name. Wish us luck!
~ Mommy's Desk
This is my "cube" of resources and materials for homeschooling. Jonathan really doesn't touch or play with
these items (unless he chooses to grab his flash cards off the shelf for some
extra practise of course;)
