Museum of Play

The Museum of Play is a special place for children.

It's rare to find a place that ALL the children LOVE to go,

and there's something for each of them.

This year my family went in on a membership to the museum as a Christmas gift.

It will be well used. :-) Here's our highlights!

Sesame Street set with a whole corner from Elmo's World.

Everything is shrunk down to "kid size",

including this cool post office wear the kids can write and mail letters.

Out of everything, the girls stayed the longest in this one area that had a full kitchen from the early 1900's. Even included an ice box. They were provided dresses to look the part, and they dove right in!

It totally reminded me of something I would have seen with their American Girl dolls.

 Washing clothes efficiently....

...and don't forget to iron

fetching water is a daily duty,

but she doesn't seem to mind.

Cupcakes anyone?

mmmmm....time to eat! Anyone think "Little Women"?

The [pretend] grocery store there is Wegmans - of course!

Only the best.

 even Heidi went shopping...

 Don't drink and drive people!

Every month the museum has one special exhibit.

This month is Sid the Science Kid, a personal favorite.

It included things from the show.

I didn't get a lot of pictures since my eyes will all over Heidi,

but it was quite good for the littles.

"Jack and the Beanstalk"

and the Giant's home 

making crowns...

 

Adventures with Bernstein Bears

and all the great things these bears accomplish...

weeeeeeeee!

[plop]

sky gazing

And the bears always grow organically...

selling hand made goods at the Quilt Shop

Heidi really wanted to buy one.

again, cooking up something in the kitchen

And what is a museum of play without a Super-hero?

The kids got to be Superman for a day and climb buildings.

 

Abby, always helping out here sister...

Or you could always do what Heidi does and show off by only using your feet

This was Abby's favorite part of the museum.

She dressed up like a queen while exploring the whole area for half our time here.

And I got to play with Heidi and Arista in the sand box.

 

We ended our day on the train.

CHOO! CHOO!

DIY Christmas Ornaments (great for the kids)

Clay Ornaments:

1 cup regular table salt

2 cups white flour

1 cup luke warm water

Mix all together in a bowl and they lay out with a rolling pin in sections. 

We used Christmas cookie cutters. 

We set the ornaments inside the stove at 200 degrees for about an hour, half hour on each side. After cooling we painted them with acrylic paint. We formed the hanging holes while still warm from the oven with the point of a pen and once finished strung with thin yarn :)

Enjoy! The kids loved this so much they keep asking to do it again!

Snowflake Ornaments:

Popsicle sticks

Glue

These were so easy for the girls and could do it all on their own! Even my three year old was capable to doing it!

Then once dried, paint and be-dazzle with sparkles! 

This is the first year we will have a (real) tree with the kids. So because this is a big deal for us (after 5 years of no tree), we decided to make it memorable - in hope to make the tree a complete expression of the children. Here's to great traditional memories!

the fight for education

So i have to thank the so many people that posted on my last blog. It's because of you that I am even writing this.

I had two different people recommend me to watch the documentary that recently came out Waiting for Superman. Usually if one person says it, I consider it. If more than one says i find it worth checking out. After watching its trailer - I knew I wanted to get a hold of it:

So I did...watched the whole thing and took notes, a part from the parts where I was actually crying and couldn't. This I can tell you, after watching it, my heart broke and my blood was boiling hot. I was more than upset. I was undone.

Here's the most impressive thing that came to my attention. Essentially, even if I decide to homeschool, the effects of the public school system still directly affect me - EVEN IF MY CHILDREN DO NOT GO. I was appalled to find out that because there is so much illiteracy in our American children that if we continue the way we are that we will actually have less people to fill bigger jobs to run our country.

Wowzers. oops America. oops Crystal.

here are just a few of the statistics the movie gave:

1. the annual cost of prison for an inmate is more than double what is spent on an individual public school student. Eight years after Congress passed the No Child Left Behind act, with the goal of 100% proficiency in math and reading, most states hovered between 20 and 30% proficiency, and 70% of eighth graders could not read at grade level. By 2020, only an estimated 50 million Americans will be qualified to fill 123 million highly skilled, highly paid jobs. (There it is!) Among 30 developed countries, the United States ranks 25th in math and 21st in science.
2. In America right now, a kid drops out of high school every 26 seconds.
3. 68% of 4th grade public school students scored below a proficient reading level in 2009.
4. 89% of Latino and 86% of African American middle and high school students read BELOW grade level.
5. 80% of pre-school and after-school programs serving low-income communities have no-age appropriate books for their children.
6. In the U.S. there are 32 million adults with low literacy skills.
7. Nearly 1 in 7 American adults have trouble reading well enough to understand the side effects listed on a medication bottle.
8. Having a QUALITY TEACHER through-out elementary school can wipe out the academic disadvantage of a low socioeconomic background!

And a lot of people think it's a money issue, but as David Guggenheim said it in his film, "we've doubled what we spend on each child. But double the money is worth it if we're producing better results. Unfortunately, we're not." And though many people will say the type of neighborhood you live in dictates the type of schooling your child will receive, researchers are now starting to believe the schools and education quality dictate our neighborhoods.

And because of tenure and the teacher's union, it's nearly impossible to fire a teacher on the bases of ineffectiveness. For example, 1 in 57 doctors in the U.S. lose their medical license, 1 in 97 lawyers lose their law license while 1 in 2,500 teachers lose their credentials. We fire doctors when their practice is ineffective, but not our teachers. It sounds hard, but if the union didn't exist we may just have more teachers wanting to do their jobs.

I realized that the issue of education is much larger than the question public school or home school? And because of the failing education system, more and more families are choosing the latter. But I had a revelation....this still doesn't solve any of our system's crisis. And if I don't become an advocate for quality education than I am not doing my part as an American citizen. Our country needs to raise up men and women who can intelligently lead this country.....and there are a whole lot of jobs to fill! If you would like to get involved as well check it out on how. And also, if you are choosing public schooling for your children, learn about the resources and schools that are local.

And if you're torn on homeschooling or public schooling I encourage you to check out some statistics and comparisons on the two.

Lastly I would like to conclude that this movie also made me more than aware that many parents do not have the privilege or choice to home-school. In fact, a majority of families cannot, whether its because they are a single parent, both parents working, the parent themselves is unable to read and write, or just lack of resources in their community....there are well-meaning parents who have no choice other than to put their child into the system. For those parents, I honor you by standing by quality education. i believe our children deserve it. Every child matters when we are measuring success!

And I am so thankful I have a choice - that I have the opportunity to choose what I think is best for my children. I think, ultimately, if parents are committing themselves to their child's education (in whatever way they can), they are doing a good thing:-)