Routine - The Mommy Teacher

Instead of sharing “highs” and “lows” around the dinner table, try this…

First, let me just be honest and say that when my husband wasn’t home I had gotten into the habit of sitting my kids in front of the TV to feed them dinner.

One reason is because I have to admit that I can be a short-order cook who makes my kids what they like to eat if my husband is not home. I’m not saying that I recommend this or that I am proud of it, but it does work for us sometimes.

Secondly, I just needed that time sometimes at the end of the day to not have to think. I wanted to be able to tackle dinner in the best way (solo) that I was able to at the time.

But, when my husband was home for dinner we tried to sit around the table and share about our highs and lows, which was not easy when the kids were really little. But, as the kids are getting older (preschool age and above), we are now sharing about our day regularly and I want to tell you what is working for us lately.

My husband and I came up with the idea of sharing one thing we Loved, one thing we Learned, and one thing we Loathed about our day. The kids immediately loved this idea. So, we started to stick with that and just talk about it. It actually reminded me of the Berenstain Bear’s Book “Too Much TV” where it says that the bears used to have “lively conversations around the dinner table” but now “they just sat around and chewed…”

That is how it felt honestly, but in reverse. We were mostly just trying to teach some table manners, clean up messes, and re-heat food, but now we feel like our dinner time is a little more purposeful with “lively conversations around the dinner table.”

This book really is the best tie in for this transition. It is one of my favorites.

Once we started our new little conversation starter, we ended up starting to go around the table and let the kids share from littlest to biggest, one by one, what they loved, learned and loathed about their day. They even started to remind us if we forgot “We gotta share what we loved, learned and loathed about our day!”

When I was a kid, we used to share about our day around the dinner table holding Centrum Vitamins because my dad said whoever had the Centrum Vitamins was the “Centrum of Attention.” Classic dad joke.

So, I took that idea (kind of) and decided to make signs to keep us on track and whoever held the signs would be the only one allowed to talk until they got to complete their turn. It ended up being a really pleasant part of the day and my daughter even had an assignment to write what her favorite family activity was, she wrote “Sharing are (our) day.” That is when I realized that no matter how tired I am during “the witching hour” every day… this “love, learn, loathe” thing is simple, but meaningful, and we are going to stick with it.

So, CLICK HERE to get the free printable, and give me a follow or a share on any one of my platforms if you love it!

And here is how I assembled my signs but you don’t have to make signs. You can 1) just talk about it. 2) print onto regular paper or 3) write the words paper plates with a sharpie (your kids wont know the difference). This is just a resource I wanted to make for myself and decided to share. 🙂

I cut them out right around the border of the circle and laminated with my self-laminator.

I cut them out again and then hot glued wooden dowels I found at the family dollar store.
I actually ended up printing a second copy for the backside because I am an over-achiever/perfectionist. I promise you don’t have to do any of this.

And then finally, I made my kids take pictures with the signs because that is half the fun. I’m so glad at least one of them was willing to get into character for “loathe.”

October 7, 2019 by Jessica | 0 comments

Breakfast Choices

Every single morning my kids want to eat goldfish for breakfast.

I didn’t say that it happens, I just said that that is what my kids want…every.single.morning.

I do like to let my kids make choices about what they would like to eat for breakfast and for lunch (not-so-much dinner), but I typically like to give them a variety of options to pick from.

Telling my kids, “Goldfish is a snack, pick something that you want to eat for breakfast: cereal, oatmeal, eggs, etc.” just wasn’t cutting it, so I decided to make a visual.

My printable functions kind-of like a menu for the kids. It shows them what they can pick from when we are in a hurry (which is a lot), and of course I will make the take-your-time printable when I have, well, time.

breakfast choices.001

I got this idea when Casey wrote a post in August and she set up some breakfast options in a basket…

breakfast basket

I am including the Breakfast Choices PDF Template with both “on-the-go” and “take-your-time” templates that you can glue the box-top images that you would like to use in the spaces, draw/color your food choices, or take pictures and add them to the templates. (When I update this and complete it, I will be adding it to the member’s page).

I would love to see what you come up with!

Share pictures with us on Facebook if you have any morning solutions of your own.

February 16, 2014 by Jessica | 0 comments

Simple Chore Chart Checklist – Tidying !

I would classify myself as a “clean as you go” mom. I am NOT a clean freak but I do like a tidy house.

I play with my kids and I pick up after my kids (admittedly) a lot.

With three under three, tidying up after my little tornadoes is an ongoing discipline. But as I approach the ages of chore-chart readiness I wanted to give my little ones a bit of familiarity with the responsibilities they can handle, and those that are age-appropriate.

So, I made a simple checklist of the things that I would like them to be responsible for…. to pick up:

Shoes (We have a shoe basket)
Toys (Toy Chest)
Cups (Sink)
Clothes (Hamper)
Trash (Can)
Books (Book Bin)

I printed my checklist two per page and then laminated it (I have an affordable self-laminator from Walmart) and put this on our fridge with a square of small stickers held by a magnet nearby.

I introduced this checklist by saying that from now on when we are responsible and pick up after ourselves we get a sticker for each thing we pick up. Then we picked up one of each item and put it where it goes, getting a sticker for each one.

Sticker Checklist — Letting him take the sticker off helps develop his fine motor skills!

Now every time my kids pick up and put away something I give them a sticker to put in the box beside the chore. I give my kids stickers now even if I encourage them to clean by singing or ringing a bell… not just if I “catch” them cleaning, but if they do it without me asking I give them two.

Every time my kids put a sticker up, I say “Oooh we are going to fill up all the boxes and we will be able to see how hard we work.” This week our “trash” box is getting full so I asked Sean Patrick what he thinks we pick up the MOST of and what we needed to pick up MORE of so that I can keep him familiar with important math terms.

I am not giving him some big reward for filling up the boxes at this time because I want to get him accustomed to working hard because it pleases God not just to get the incentive. 🙂

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October 11, 2013 by Jessica | 0 comments

Summer Break Part 1: Summer School

Happy Summer, Mommy Teachers!!! Oh wait, MOMMY teachers don’t get a summer break! For those of us with school-aged kids, we get to spend extra time with our big kids too – which means extra busy bodies in the house.

It is really important to me to maintain some type of schedule during the summer or the kids and I could easily fall into the routine of staying in our pajamas, never leaving the house and then by 3 o’clock everyone is completely stir crazy. Because of this, I am mapping out a daily schedule that includes play dates or errands, Bible study, school time, free time and more so my children will never have the opportunity to say, “I’m bored” or “Mom, when can we play the Wii?” They will have one opportunity per day to either play the computer or video games. Summer is a time for kids to unplug (for the most part – I mean, let’s get real… even Mommy enjoys her Mario Kart).

It is also important for school aged kids to stay on track for their next school year. Many kids have to play catch up at the beginning of each new grade level because they forgot most of what they learned the year before. As Mommy Teachers, it is our job to bridge the gap between grades on both an academic/cognitive level and a social level.

On an academic and cognitive level, this can be achieved by simply doing activities to reinforce what your child learned the previous year (think back to all of those homework assignments your child’s teacher sent home) or visit the website for the Common Core Standards which is what each child should know by the end of each school year (these have been adopted by the public school systems of most states). And if your child had a super awesome teacher like my kindergartner did, chances are they will have sent home a packet for practice this summer.

Now, I am not particularly a fan of “hand outs” and worksheets, however, the 2 months off of school can break kids of the social behaviors that they learned in the classroom this year. Social behaviors aren’t just interactions we have with other people, the are also what is expected of us when we are in different social situations such as sitting in a classroom, standing in line, and waiting our turn. Just think about how those things prepared us for sitting at our office desk, standing in line at the grocery store, and waiting our turn to use the ATM machine. So, in this case, a handout or worksheet a day, where your child sits correctly in a chair, pulled up to the table (not on the floor) is more than just working on maintaining academic knowledge; it is helping them retain that social behavioral expectation that they will need for the fall when they have to sit quietly at their desks to do work.

I recently made a trip to our local school supply store (it’s like the IKEA for teacher supplies – ah-may-zing!) and purchased a few summer school supplies for my kids. Now, you can absolutely find free templates for a lot of these worksheets online (there are plenty on The Mommy Teacher alone), but my printer is B-R-O-K-E-N and this was cheaper for me than replacing the printer.

I bought 2 Summer Bridge Activities workbooks (on e for each of my boys) that are specifically designed to align with the common core standards, reward charts, stickers, lined paper, and lined journal paper. For every page they finish in their workbooks (or for when they work extra hard on a particular activity) they each get a gold star sticker (highly coveted). When they fill up the chart we will take a trip to Jump Zone (their choice) as a reward for all of their hard work.

The lined paper is to specifically practice handwriting (one area that my 5 year old struggles in) and the journal lined paper is to practice writing paragraph stories and drawing a picture of what happens in that story (a kindergarten skill). Many kids will write a story of say, going to the store, and they draw a picture of a tree. This summer we will practice creating complex stories and adding detail to our drawings. My ultimate goal is to make this activity FUN for my 5 year old because he absolutely despises writing and drawing (totally my husband’s child). I may have to ::gasp:: resort to bribing for this one!

* This weekend I will be following up with posts about our summer schedule and weekly themed curriculum, so I apologize for the clumped posts, but summer starts today and I’m already off schedule! Eep!

May 24, 2013 by Casey | 3 Comments

House Rules

I recently wrote a post about a Routine Change for our after school schedule that I posted on our chalkboard door.

I also posted our house rules on that same door, in plain view to remind us how to behave throughout the day.

1. Be Respectful
2. Be Obedient
3. Be Honest
4. Be Kind
5. Be Positive

I once visited a classroom that had just two rules: be respectful and be obedient. Brilliant! I mean, you really don’t need much more than that because those are two rules that any type of disobedience can fall under. I call them “umbrella” rules.

I decided to use that in my house. Once your kids get a full understanding of respect and obedience, they are extremely effective for toddlers. However, those are BIG words for little kids, so don’t expect them to immediately understand them. However, if you use the same language a few times while modeling each of the behaviors, then your 2 year old will start telling you all about the appropriate behaviors he or she just displayed. (They also may start questioning you about your appropriate or inappropriate behaviors – but that’s all a part of the learning process).

How to teach your kids about respect and obedience:

-Define the new vocabulary

“Respect means you are being nice and talking nice to your mommy, daddy, siblings, friends and other adults. ”

“Obedience means you listen the first time and always remember the appropriate behaviors you should be showing at all times.

-Model the new vocabulary

“‘Mommy, may I please have some milk?’ is a very respectful way to ask for something. Can you say that? ::wait:: Great! I love how you used your manners and talked to me in a sweet tone. I appreciate you showing me respect. That was a very respectful way to ask me for something.”

“If I tell you to please pick up your clothes, a respectful response should be, ‘Yes, ma’am,’ and then you show your obedience by picking up your clothes right away. Listening the first time every time is a great way to be obedient.”

-Show the opposite behaviors and define them

“If I tell you, ‘Gimme some milk!’ Is that showing respect? No. That is called disrespect and it is not allowed. How can we rephrase or say it again in a respectful tone? ::wait:: That’s right! You say, ‘May I please have some milk?’ I love how respectful that sounds.”

“If I ask you to pick up your clothes and you don’t look at me, don’t listen to me, or tell me, ‘no,’ that is called disobedience and it is not allowed. Instead, what should we do? ::wait:: You’re right! Be obedient! We do the task right away! The VERY first time you are asked to do it! But first, how do we show respect when asked to do something? ::wait:: You’re right. We say, ‘Yes, ma’am.'”

-Model different scenarios of respect, disrespect, obedience and disobedience and have your child label each

“Is this respect or disrespect: ‘Moooooom I wanted to play with that toy!’ ::wait:: “Right. Disrespect. Do we allow disrespect? No.”

“Can you please throw this away? Yes, ma’am! ::throw trash away:: Was that obedience or disobedience? Right! Say, ‘great job, Mommy! Thank you for being obedient!'”

-Have your child generate responses from cues

“How can we show respect to our friends? ::wait:: You’re right… share our toys! Great idea!”

“If I ask you to clean up your spilled milk, what would you do to be obedient?”

-Praise and repeat language

“Thank you for being respectful!”

“I love how you were being obedient! You listened the very first time!”

-Frequent Reminders

“The way you said that was disrespectful, can you please change your behavior and use a respectful tone?”

“I have already told you once to do _____. You have not done ____. Is that being obedient?”

Sure, kids slip up from time to time, but by effectively setting your expectations for behavior and being consistent with praising and correcting, your child will likely choose to meet those expectations.

Now after having these rules for a while, I began to notice a few behaviors that my child was displaying that I still wanted to change. It was necessary for me to set aside a few more rules to clarify which behaviors I did not like, even though these rules can also fall under the first two big umbrell a rules.

3. Be Honest
4. Be Kind
5. Be Positive

My kindergartner, bless his little imagination, can get himself into a lot of trouble with the stories he tells. He is definitely the “dog-ate-my-homework” kid, so we instated the “be honest” rule.

He and his toddler brother were also starting to pick on each other around the same time. Sure, they were both being respectful and obedient toward Mom and Dad, but were they showing the same courtesy to each other? No. So we instituted the “be kind” rule.

Our last rule is to “be positive.” Sure, we can all have bad days (even Mommies and Daddies), but our newest rule is to take a few minutes to yourself to reflect, and then when you return to be with the rest of the family, you must come with a new and improved new attitude. And it must be positive.

After all is said and done, I have been rewarding my kids with tally marks when they follow the rules. We set a goal for our family: 100 tally marks = a trip to Kart Ranch (similar to Chuck-E-Cheese). It’s been way more positive than punishments for not following the rules and they have been more obedient all around, knowing that there is a reward – a positive consequence – at the end. Just a little encouragement for them.

What kinds of rules do you have in your home? Which behaviors do you want your kids to change? What new rules would you like to add to your list of expectations for your kids to follow?

March 11, 2013 by Casey | 0 comments

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