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The Magic Reading Tree

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The Magic Reading Tree

Contact information, map and directions, contact form, opening hours, services, ratings, photos, videos and announcements from The Magic Reading Tree, Education, Wrotham Road, south street, Gravesend.

English Teacher, mum of 2 boys & �lover!
* Passionate about bringing the magic of reading and storytelling to the lives of little ones.
*REP : MAGIC15 15% off.

21/12/2021

☃️SNOW INSPIRED BOOK PLAY ☃️

🐻‍❄️Mr 3 absolutely loves small world so I decided to set-up a snow themed tray around a book he has loved since he was a baby! Mr 3 has developed a bit of a stutter (his brother had one at 3 and he eventually grew out of it). However, both Pre-school and I have noticed that when he plays with small world, his stutter disappears! This is why imaginative play is so important for little ones-it is a rehearsal for the real world and helps them to build confidence with language and practise new vocabulary without any pressure!

🌲Mr 3 has grown in confidence with messy play so I decided to go for another dry texture for the snow. He loved making snowballs and footprints in the snow with the polar bears and sieving it through his fingers.

To make the snow:
❄️ 2 cups of baking powder

❄️ 1/2 cup conditioner and mix together in a bowl!

📚The book: ‘Me’ by is a wonderful book which helps little ones explore opposites through the eyes of a baby penguin-perfect for little ones to relate to…it begins ‘The world is big and I am small’ and it ends with the baby penguin not minding the world being so big as he is protected by his mother 😍 such a beautiful message of a parent’s unconditional love.

20/12/2021

🎄CHRISTMAS COLLAGE 🎄

I’ve finally been able to catch up on here after an absolute mad couple of months-plagued by illness, major surgery, work and just general Christmas chaos!

The boys absolutely love open ended Christmas crafts so I set up a very simple crafting activity with an adorable book ‘when I dream of Christmas’ to inspire their artwork.

🎅🏻 Mr 8 has been learning how to make leavers in DT at school so he included one in his reindeer design so that the mouth moves up and down to reveal a Christmas message!

🎅🏻 Mr 3 wanted a lot of help with his collage-requesting I copy lots of pictures from the book for him to then decorate. We had a few strange requests…baby Jesus hanging on the star of Bethlehem and one of the three wise men needed to give baby Jesus a pair of shoes instead of gold, frankincense or Myrrh 🤷‍♀️

This kept the boys busy for around 45 minutes and as a bonus their imaginations and fine motor skills were set to work with he cutting, sticking and drawing!

10/11/2021

🦀 S E A C R E A T U R E
P L A Y D O U G H P U Z Z L E 🐙

Mr 3 has been under the weather with a sickness bug and temperature. Like all of us when we are unwell, we turn to things that bring us comfort and for him it’s been a request for books about sea creatures.

📚Once we had read through a few of our books on sea creatures, I made a DIY sea creature puzzle for him to do.
Mr 3 enjoyed matching the sea creatures to their playdough imprints and naming them as he did this. We also talked about the letter sound each sea creature begins with and for a while he enjoyed making his own imprints in the playdough. We spent about 10 minutes doing this before he wanted another snuggle on the sofa 🥰

08/11/2021

P H O N I C S / S P E L L I N G
T R E A S U R E H U N T

🏴‍☠️Since doing this activity with common exception words in the first lockdown (when mr 8 was a then mr 6 😢) he still, to this day, asks for treasure hunts! He asked for one during half term so I happily obliged!

🔤This game was inspired by and we have done variations of this activity over the last couple of years. It has been an easy and fun way of getting Mr 8 to learn his spellings, practise reading and for a now Mr 3 to learn letter sounds and graphemes.

The activity on this post was aimed at both boys-mr 3 went around the house aided by mr 8 and the treasure map looking for letters and identifying the sounds. At the end Mr 8 had to use the letters to spell a word.

🗺 When I have done this activity with mr 8 on his own, I have hidden common exception words around the house that make a sentence ( a code he has to crack) to receive his treasure…usually a biscuit and a book of his choice, read by me.

20/10/2021

🟥 C O N K E R S H A P E R E C O G N I T I O N 🔵

🔺Another very quick activity to set up and a different way to play with the conkers we have collected! Simply place the conkers along the lines to recreate the shape. Mr 3 tried 3 shapes before getting bored and moving onto playing something else but he counted the conkers as he positioned them on the line and told me the names of the shapes he created.

🔸This activity is so versatile and can be adapted to your child’s interests…numbers, letters, Halloween themed pumpkins etc. It’s also a great fine motor activity. You could also give them free reign to see what pictures they create!

I’m going to leave it out on the table to see if he has another go at a later date.

17/10/2021

🚜 C O N K E R V E H I C L E P L A Y🛻

🍁 The boys had a fantastic time last weekend looking for conkers and we’ve already played with them so much as they are incredible versatile!

🍂This tuff tray took a couple of minutes to set up and both boys enjoyed digging, scooping and pouring. They decided to include more of their small word toys like the farm animals and even their knights. The conkers became cannon balls for attacking and knocking the knights over! It’s lovely to watch their imaginations in action.

📚I teamed this activity with a recent charity shop purchase ‘Dig, dig digging.’

11/10/2021

👻 C H I L D L E D H A L L O W E E N E M O T I O N G H O S T S 🎃

📚With on Sunday, we read the ‘Colour Monster’ and our Usborne ‘Feelings’ book. This book is great for Mr 8 as it explores why we have complex feelings and helps children to expand their vocabularies and label a wider range of emotions they might experience. This is often part of the frustration for little ones-without the right Vocabulary it’s often very challenging for them to communicate exactly how they are feeling, which exhaserbates the emotion they are experiencing. Mr 3 is increasingly starting to use a range of emotion words other than just ‘happy’ and ‘sad.’ I try to label some of the emotions he might be feeling when he is having a tantrum such as ‘I can see you are frustrated.’ The Feelings’ book supports this by showing a range of scenarios of children experiencing a range of emotions with detailed, engaging and vibrant pictures for children to discuss and explore.

👻After discussing our emotions this weekend Mr 8 spontaneously turned his Halloween picture into an emotions Halloween picture. He decided to give each ghost an emotion by drawing a different facial expression on it. He then turned it into a game and we had to try and guess the emotion of each ghost.

🎃Mr 8 got me thinking…you could draw templates of pumpkins or ghosts and offer a range of materials or just pens to encourage little ones to draw and discuss a range of different emotions. I’m going to do this with Mr 3 at the weekend!

The best ideas always come from them 😍

For 15 % off Usborne books use code:MAGIC15

05/10/2021

🦸‍♂️ S U P E R H E R O C U F F S 🦹‍♀️

Mr 3 has been very engaged in playing with his superheroes recently and we love reading the ‘Supertato’ books together. I found this activity in the wonderful .hooray handbook. Both boys enjoyed making their superhero cuffs. Although Mr 3 didn’t spend too long on the creative part of this activity, he absolutely loved wearing his cuffs and instantly initiated some superhero imaginative play! This activity took no more than 5 minutes to set-up!

26/09/2021

🎨 PEBBLE PAINTING 🖌

We finally got around to painting the rocks and pebbles we collected at the beach during the summer. This entertained both Mr 3 and a newly turned Mr 8 😱 I can’t quite believe my first born is now 8 years old!

05/09/2021

🐟 REPETITION 🐡

You have probably seen me post a similar activity based on this Octonaut’s book however, I just wanted to emphasise the importance of repetition for children in a child’s development. I know Mr 3 is most likely to learn if it’s based on a book he loves, a tv programme he is engaged with or toys he consistently plays with.

Activity: I hid some of his favourite sea creatures amongst recycled packaging to re create the kelp forest that features within the book and included some letters for him to find to match against our glittery letters. Mr 3 used a scoop, fishing net and our fine motor tools to do this.

REPETITION BENEFITS:

📚Leads to mastery, predictability and a sense of confidence-this is why children ask for the same book at bedtime as it creates a feeling of reassurance and comfort.

📚 Children learn more vocabulary as they begin to understand the nuances of language-how words can be used in different contexts and their deeper meanings. As they become more confident with language they begin to integrate it into their own repertoire.

📚 Reading the same book on repeat helps a child to understand structure and patterns within stories. It supports their understanding of sequencing, and consequences.

📚 Children start to notice familiar structures in stories and will subconsciously make predictions using skills of inference and deduction to do this. Being able to read between the lines is a LIFE skill!

📚 Repetition tells us a child is ENJOYING reading! To instil a life long love of reading it must be done on a child’s terms…however irritating it might be for us reading the same book for the hundredth time!

📚 Supports emotional development. Reading stories about emotions, sharing etc is a rehearsal for the real world. I’ll often see my children act out a scenario we have read about and it helps them to develop those problem solving skills.

📚 Develops empathy! Children begin to identify with the emotions of the characters are reading about-an important life skill.

17/08/2021

🎒BUSY BAGS 🎒

Another road trip is approaching so I have prepared some age appropriate busy bags for Mr 3 and Mr 7.

🏰We are visiting Warwick Castle on our trip so I bought an amazing Usborne ‘knights and Castle’ sticker book from which I know will be a winner as Mr 3 LOVES knights. I have also included his Usborne ‘Peep inside the Castle’ book which I know he will be all the more engaged with once we visit a real castle! You will also see small world knights, dinosaurs, cars he will happily play with in the car and for when we arrive some playdough to stomp his dinosaurs through! He is also very much into his Alphablocks at the moment (they came with a c-beeebies magazine when Mr 7 was 2!)
Not forgetting his pencil case for drawing.

📚Mr 7 is into drawing monsters at the moment so I bought an Usborne ‘Build your own Monster Sticker book’ to keep him busy. Also included are his much loved Usborne animal word search, picture puzzle activity book and pencil and paper games-which we all love as the games are so old fashioned and great for the whole family to get involved with! Popular games include: hangman, 0s and Xs, code breaker, battleships, minefield, strike out snd many more! You can see some other things we take which are always a hit-his top trump cards, reading books, pencil case and sketch book and a fab interactive car journey game ‘are we there yet?’ Which is a classic I-spy game for kids on the move!

Currently missing from the bags: their poppets-I can’t find them 😱

Mr 7s kindle-it’s charging.

Use MAGIC15 for 15% off Usborne books

16/08/2021

🕷THE VERY BUSY SPIDER 🕸

This activity was inspired by the boys finding a spider’s web in the garden. They were completely captivated watching it attack and then start to devour a fly it had trapped in its web!

I decided to recreate the web with wool and set Mr 3 the challenge of using his scissors and tweezers from to free the insects from the web before the spider ate them.

Mr 7 and I took it in turns to move the spider towards the web, which created a lot of excitement for Mr 3 as he worked under pressure to free the insects!

📚 ‘The Very Busy Spider’ is a much loved book in our house and both boys still love the sensory element of the story-tracing their fingers along the raised web -great for hand-eye coordination! They also love trying out the different animal sounds throughout the book.

🕷We also had a sing song of Incy Wincy Spider-using actions to help support gross and fine motor skills and develop language and communication.

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Wrotham Road, South Street
Gravesend
DA130QQ

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