Flower Power Arts Learning Activity




ART Smart Parenting show

Summary: Happy May artsmart parents!  How did your month of Art in April go?   My girls absolutely loved the projects and have shared ideas for upcoming podcast so stay tuned.   You'll get to enjoy the beautiful spring weather in today's activity, although you could do it inside if your weather is not cooperating.  AND you'll be engaging your multiple intelligences as well as your child's.   Here's a quick recap of MI's since it's been awhile since we've discussed them.   You may recall that there are 8 distinct types of intelligence (Multiple Intelligences or MI's) classified by Harvard professor, Howard Gardner.  Getting in tune with your learning intelligence as well as your child’s will go a long way in helping you assist your kids with their learning.  Just like men are from mars and women are from venus, understanding learning styles will go a long way in helping your kids be successful. 1. Visual-Spatial -  awareness of their environments; like drawing, doing jigsaw puzzles, reading maps, daydreaming 2. Bodily-kinesthetic -  Keen sense of body awareness; enjoy moving and making things 3. Musical -  Enjoy music as well as have a sensitivity to sounds in their environment 4. Interpersonal - The social butterflies; do best with others around them 5. Intrapersonal -Enjoy being alone and have wisdom, intuition, and motivation 6. Linguistic - Relate to the world in words; reading, playing word games, making up poetry or stories are activities in which they might engage 7. Logical -Mathematical -  exploring patterns and relationships and are conceptual thinkers 8. Naturalistic Intelligence - like to classify and understand phenomena of nature Now that you’ve had a bit of a refersher, let’s get into today’s activity - one that incorporates all the MI’s My youngest daughter calls this activity Flower Power.   Here’s what you’ll need:   Fake flower petals, leaves, or other objects that can be easily picked up off the ground and a basket or bin in which to hold the objects.   Toss the flowers onto the ground and begin. The object of the game is to collect the proper number of flowers for each math statement or other learning activity. For example, if you say 9+10, the child would collect 19 flowers.  If you have more than one child, you could make this a race to see who can answer the questions in the fastest time.   Alternatively, you could write letters on notecards and help your child spell words, put names of states and call out state capitals, or match the country to its capital, cut up a periodic table of elements and match the symbol to the name you call.  The possibilities here are truly endless. Not only are you actively engaging in your child’s learning, you’re making it much more fun which to me is the best part about learning.  You’ll create lasting memories and remind your child that learning is not about memorizing facts and figures, it’s about having fun and becoming a better person for having learned something. I can’t wait to hear your feedback about this week’s activiity.  Please post them on the blog at artsmartparenting.com or at artsmartparenting on facebook.   Here's to a beautiful spring weekend growing your kids bodies and minds - Cheers!