WEEK 3. Magic fruits with gelatin.

I invite you to visit the website oh! fiestas.. They have great ideas for holiday recipes,crafts ... I picked up this colorful jelly recipe.

Gelatin is a very healthy food. It is a pure protein obtained from animal raw materials containing collagen. Another advantage of gelatin is its content of amino acids,especially glycine and proline, which improve the construction of the structures of ourbody, mostly bones, cartilage, tendons and ligaments. An insufficient supply of amino acids can manifest itself in joint pain, brittle nails and dry hair. Industrial Gels are not recommended for  babies because they have plenty of sugar and unwise coloring.

This week activity is to make these fruit gelatin with the kids.

Give a new way to gelatin flavors!
Cut limes, lemons and oranges in half, remove all the pulp and fill them with jelly following the preparation instructions. Let cool and cut into wedges.
If you want to do even more special, just when warm, put a few chocolate chips to simulate the seeds. Delicious!

Educate children to become entrepreneurs. Cameron Herold.

I would love to share this interesting video.

WEEK 2. We play how to be mechanics.

We are starting a new course and it's time to start a new life, no pressure, no charges ... this month I decided to get rid calmly of everything that does not work or we do not use. Normally what I do is to analyze whether I've used in the past year, if I did not think there's a specific occasion in which I will need it, I throw it away or I give it to someone to who it may be useful (thus the pain of separation is more tenuous.)

We have started wit this little appliance that no longer worked. So, I have given it to the children withsupervision. The development is as follows:

1: Dismount.
2: Think in the function of each part also invent magical or fantastic functions.
3: Assemble in other ways and invent other possible uses.
Happy week to the small engineers.

Yesterday I began the adaptation in my nice "kinder garden". I was very happy because this year my class is huge and I can run away directly into the courtyard while teachers do not see me. There were many new children who cried and cried. So the first thing I've done was thorowing a bascket full of toys onto the floor. The roar was not as I expected because some kids were crying. My teachers were very attentive to the kids who were sad so I've been playing at my leisure.




 My mom has come very early, and I did not have time to finish the tower blocks. I asked if I could stay longer and she answered me that tomorrow I would.Then sehe told me not to throw things and that I should help my teachers in order not to turn them crazy. As she is right, today we made them ​​some cookies to sweeten these so hard days. Let's see if I have time today to finish my castle. One big kiss to Jessi and Carol from David.

Cookies for my teachers.
- 100 gr. butter
- 125 gr. sugar (half white, half brown)
- 1 egg
- 200 gr. white flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon cocoa powder

Mix sugar with butter softened previously.
Pour the egg in the mixture and continue mixing.
Sift the flour with the yeast over this and continue mixing.
Finish by mixing the cocoa powder.

Bake in preheated oven at 180 º for 20 min.

Physical activity makes us smarter.

For some strange reason we have the stereotypical of muscle-fitness men as fools.

We knew that sport makes us feel good, fights depression, strengthens the immune system, guard your heart, prevents certain cancers ...

But only recently we discovered that exercising produces cells in certain parts of the brain and that it denses connections between nerve cells, which makes  more agile communications that prepairs us to learn and remember better. It has even been found that can prevent Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, as well as mitigate the effects of hyperactivity and  deficit attention disorder.

Sports favoring neurons are aerobics, soccer, swimming, cycling, tennis, running ... Thestrength training would not cause these benefits. Sport increases blood flow in the brain and the production of BDNF protein that stimulates communication between neurons.

The brain somehow accumulates the benefits of sport, so if we practice it, the brain still has any reservations which you can dip into if you run into problems.

Some investigations in schools have resulted than those who engaged in sports like swimming, basketball, football ... a couple of times a week, they got a better performance than the ones leading a sedentary life. Some doctors aware that sport accelerates executive functioning, and promotes logic skills, math and reading, claiming that schools do more sport.

In short, the sport promotes brain plasticity that prepares you to learn better. If you play sports but the mind is not stimulated intellectually, is like breeding  unplanted ground. If the opposite happens, we plant seeds without watering or fertilizing, the plant will grow weak.

Now that we are crazy evaluating school activities for this course I would give my humble opinion. In general the kind of education in Spain is rather academic for my point of view. Many children are discouraged. I think they need to do funny things to feel safe. Myinitial intention is that my children made ​​only sports as extracurricular activities. I wish I could replace language classes for a summer au pair or a trip to a foreign country,Kumon classes for home games ... Unless there is a big area of ​​interest or a lack I will try to avoid repetitive "academic" subjects from school. (I also believe that music is very important but Dani´s school is very involved in this curricular area.) This course Dani will make pool and tennis. David will go to pool.

I recomend the book "How to teach your baby to be physically fit" from Glen Doman. I think we should all read it before having a baby. 

Another bit but more technical: "How the brain learns, the keys to education."

Reference source: "The brain and the sport." Cristina Sáez. of the great magazine"Body and mind." N231.

WEEK 1. Finishing drawings with imagination.

I hope you spent a great holiday. We were supposed to rest, but just coming bak we can fall on the thought of being overwhelmed with books, backpacks, clothing for school, laundry ... Well calm, everything will be done. We disconnected psychologically and come laden with illusions and new purposes.

I propose a very easy activity to be prepared, now we need to re-hook to normal quietly life.

Cut an interesting image in a magazine and glue its edge to a card or sheet. Let your little one to complete the work of art ...