How to Use MGT Tools to Extend Curriculum for Older Children

Last week I wrote a post about how I had finally figured out how to incorporate some of the Mother Goose Time tools into our daily or almost daily routine.  I am using Mother Goose Time both for my preschooler and Kindergartener.  So there are some concepts that in preschool they need to be introduced to, but in Kindergarten they should have a deeper understanding of.  Mother Goose Time comes with so much more than you can even imagine, it's seriously mind blowing.  So I knew I had everything I needed to extend the curriculum for my older child. Unfortunately I've just been a bit slow at figuring out the how. 

I was lucky enough to have Leslie, CEO of Mother Goose Time read my post and she passed along some amazing pointers on how to extend MGT.  I was able to try at least two of her ideas.  One of them I posted on my Facebook page and one no where at all, until now.

The first idea uses the Hands On letters and Phonics Cards.   We happened to be on the letter S.  So I started an S station at the corner of our table.  Here you can see the Hands On letter S, a pen and a pad of Post Its.  Leslie actually recommended a 3x5 card that they could then tape to the wall or too the Phonics Card itself.  I just figured I would make it a little easier and remove tape from the equation. 

The only problem we ran into is that my kids are used to writing pretty big.  So they quickly ran out of space on this standard Post It size.  I would like to find and purchase some Post It notes that are a bit bigger.  Both of my boys are pretty good at coming up with words that start with ____.  So they are ready to take it to the next level.  With this extension idea, they really get to learn how to put words together. 

Here is how it works.  They come up with a word, ask me how to spell it and then write it out.  Of course, this makes for good writing practice as well. 

This picture shows our collection just getting started.  I think we had about five or six on there before we moved on.

Another way that this could be done is to laminate the phonics cards and set out a dry erase pen.  There is enough white space on the Phonics Card itself that the children could write right on the card.  There is even more room on the other side. 

The second extension idea Leslie gave me was with the manipulatives.  She said to set out multiple sets of 10 manipulatives (10 being the example number, it could be done with any number). 

This is how I set it up.  I used the cubes and lined them up in columns of 10.  Just for reference I put a number 10 counting card next to it. 

Then have the child divide the 10 into two groups. 

I had Lachlan sit down and separate the columns by pulling a group of the cubes down to the bottom of the tray.  This was a very organized and easy to visualize way of doing this lesson.  I highly recommend these trays for so many reasons.  I ordered them online at Lakeshore Learning.

After Lachlan had separated the columns we worked our way backwards, from right to left, counting the two groups of cubes in each column and adding them together.  It didn't take long for Lachlan to figure out the pattern.  Soon he counted quickly, 6+4=10!    8+2=10!    1+9=10!

We need to do this again soon.  Such an amazing way to really visualize math.