Glad To Be a Gladden: Yellow Ball

This book - when I first read it to prepare our activities, I was at a loss. It is such a simple story. But of course, with a simple story, there lies endless opportunities. That's the very point of this book - it allows your mind to go beyond the pages, to be creative, make predictions, and have endless discussions. We actually spent quite a lot of time in the book just discussing the pictures and what we thought we saw and what may be happening. We made lots of sound effects and got to learn so much about perspectives and how they differ. Pictures tell the story and allow for imagination.

So we began our week with reading the book and then diving into God's word for a relative passage. We didn't do a memory verse for this book, we did a bible story to go along that we also focused on every day and honestly, Ellie got more meat out of the scripture than the story and that is AWESOME! Our passage was Luke 8:22-25. Jesus calms the storm and even the wind and waves obey Him. By the end of the week, Ellie was not only reciting the story as we turned the pages of "Yellow Ball," she was also on her own accord grabbing her bible, cuddling her baby, and "reading" her the story from the bible from Luke 8, beautifully reciting and recounting the scripture and the story to her doll. It was incredible to hear this and see it happen by her own choice and action.

The very first morning we baked gluten free biscuits shaped like yellow balls in different sizes (as the ball in the book appears in different sizes as the perspective changes). Here is our very simple recipe that tasted SO GOOD!

We did several art projects.

The first art project was a water color, scissor skill, and glue piece. We used a piece of watercolor paper, blue liquid watercolor, yellow construction paper, scissors, a pen, and glue. First, she painted the paper blue. Then on the yellow construction paper, I asked her to draw a big circle! She did and then I asked her to try and cut it out. We work on scissor skills this way. She is fairly good at it but still is practicing getting that muscle memory down and holding the scissors at an easy angle. She cut the paper and her daddy helped instruct her how to keep snipping down one straight line continuously. Then we helped her to cut the pen marking for the circle we made. Slow, steady, easy going instruction to keep helping her enhance that skill, not letting her get frustrated, but making her feel encouraged. Then, she glued her circle...or ball, on the "ocean" she painted!

The next simple (keeping theme with the book) art piece Ellie made was circular sponge painting. On blue construction paper, Ellie took yellow paint and used round sponge sticks and sponges to make a painting. She made two. I found her process really interesting, again, proving that simplicity is also wonderful as it allows the imagination an open room for creativity. In her first painting, she did as I would expect a child would do with a sponge in paint...paint the paper by going "blot, blot, blot," on the paper - lots of little dots. She noted that this was a lot of little yellow balls. But her second piece was where I saw her take control and open her mind and recall the story in her art. This time, she took the sponges and began with a blot technique, quickly transferring to a wiping and slashing and swirling technique. As she did this, she claimed wind was blowing really hard, blowing the ball away! The waves were getting big, and - pulling in our bible story as well - the boat is beginning to sink. She expressed all that with a sponge and yellow paint. So simple yet so full of meat.

Our third art project was to paint yellow "balls" (balloons) hanging from the ceiling. It was a fun messy, silly time! This is so good for cognitive development as well. Play, play, play! Oh its so great for those babies!

We did some math/geometry with yellow play dough. We rolled the play dough into balls and used toothpicks to make structures. Ellie made a triangle on her own and was so excited and proud of herself!

We also did a science experiment that incorporated both our book and our passage of scripture. We made a storm in a dish!

Our supplies:

- A yellow ping pong ball

- White distilled vinegar

- A glass dish

- Blue food dye

- Baking soda

We first poured the vinegar into the clear casserole dish and added blue food dye to make it look like an ocean. Then we placed the yellow ball on the very calm and still ocean.

But then....we added a large cup full of baking soda and dumped it in and "Whoosh!!!" The water rose, and got crazy! The ball moved with the bubbles rising and overflowing from the dish. But then, it calmed again. We were able to discuss how storms come, and they move and change things, and sometimes the wind blows things around and maybe it can be a little scary, but, God is always in control and He is the creator of winds, waves, storms, rain, thunder, and lightening. He allows physical storms on earth, and He allows storms in our lives as well. But God has purpose in all these things and is always in control and all of these bow down to and obey God. Our great powerful God! She really enjoyed this. And afterwards she enjoyed stirring it and playing and reenacting the scripture.

We played outside a lot (as usual and always) but especially with our own yellow ball!

We played your usual games, catch, roll, kick, bounce.

We also made a storm in the kiddie pool with the pool being the ocean. Ellie's daddy made waves in the water come and go and we watched how the ball was affected and Ellie made thunder sounds with a metal spoon and a cookie sheet.

I also took Ellie on a field trip to one of our state parks to play on the beach with our ball, take a nature walk, and have a pic-nic. We live in South Carolina so it was still 80F here at the end of October and we were able to swim. We chased the ball in the water and that was a fun game!