A Raft / Splav

Twigs and string - a beautiful combination! I think that everything made of twigs and string - is just beautiful!

Grančice i kanap - prelepa kombinacija. Čini mi se da je sve što je napravljeno od grančica i kanapa - jednostavno prelepo!

V was thinking and talking about boats and ships these past few days and wondering how to make a boat for his imagination travells around the world. I saw that he was realy puting an effort to figure out how a boat can be built. So instead of just talking about it, I suggested we make one, and since there are a lot of twigs all around the forest,  we decided to make a raft first. It is a simplest boat after all. And I got so surprised when I saw how little help he actually needed from me. He made two of them - one for himself, and one for baby Z.

V je proteklih dana puno razmišljao i pričao o brodovima i čamcima za svoja zamišljena putovanja po svetu i smišljao, smišljao kako da napravi sebi jedan čamac. Pošto ovde u šumi ima puno grančica, predložila sam mu da prvo napravimo jedan splav. Iznenadila sam se koliko mu je malo pomoći sa moje strane bilo potrebno. Napravio je dva splava - jedan sebi i jedan bebi Z.

After that he put them in water to see if they sink or float.  Where did he get that from? We never talked about that. He put different toys and items to see how they behave. He even put some small rocks, counting how many of them can he put before they drawned the raft.

Posle je tražio da ih stavimo u lavor sa vodom da vidimo da li tonu ili plutaju. Odakle mu to? Nikad nismo pričali o tome.  Stavljao  je različite predmete na splavove i ispitivao da li tonu ili plutaju.  A kamenčići? Koliko kamenčića može da se stavi na splav, pre nego što počne da tone? Eto, to su njegova razmišljanja.  

Hammering With Kids / Zakucavanje eksera sa decom

Kids usually want to do everything that we (the grown-ups) do. At least my kids. So, while making the geoboard the other day, both V and baby Z were importuning me to let them hammer the nails as well. Since the wood log for the geoboard was to hard, I found this small wood board that was soft enough for little hands.

Deca obično žele da rade sve ono što rade odrasli. Bar moja deca. Tako su pre neki dan, dok sam pravila ovu geo tablu, navaljivali da im dozvolim da i oni zakucavaju eksere. Pošto je panj bio suviše tvrd, pronašla sam ovu drvenu daščicu, koja je bila dovoljno mekana za male dečje ručice.

We used large nails so that small hands can hold them easily, and a large but a lightweight wood hammer (that we use for meat). V didn't miss a nail. Ha!

Namerno sam dala V-u velike eksere, da bi mogao lakše da ih drži, i ovaj veliki ali lagan drveni čekić za meso - zbog velike udarne površine. Nije promašio ni jednom, i nije udario prstić ni jednom. Ha!

After that, V was so curious to see how the pincers work, so he took out all the mails.
Nakon toga, V je želeo da proba kako rade klešta, pa je izvadio sve eksere.

But, there is another kid oround here that always cries - 'Let me do it, too!' - so here is the same activity set up for a two-years-old girl. The same lightweight wood hammer, clay and some sticks. 

Međutim, ovde imamo i jednu malu devojčicu koja stalno traži da radi sve što radi i njen strariji brat, pa sam ovu aktivnost ovako prilagodila njoj: isti drveni lagani čekić, glina umesto drvene pločice i grančice.

A Handmade Natural Geo Board / Geo tabla

You all probably know what a geoboard is, and what it's used for. But, here, where we live, there are no geoboards in stores, so I decided to make one myself for V. I took a wood log and nailed some nails in it. Very simple. 

Geo tabla je tabla koja se uglavnom koristi kao matematičko sredstvo za usvajanje i vežbanje različitih koncepata iz geometrije, ali je nama zanimljvija za likovne igre. Budući da ih u našim radnjama nema, napravila sam jednu od jednog panja i malo eksera. Vrlo jednostavno. Nisam sigurna da li geo tabla mora da zadovoljava određene standarde (npr. određen razmak između eksera, pravilno rastojanje između njih i sl.) da bi se koristila za matematičke vežbe, ali kako je nama za sada potrebna da bismo pravili 'slike', nisam vodila računa o tome. Slike jesu geometrizovane, i da, naučili smo usput kako izgledaju trougao, četvorougao, itd, a ta usputna saznanja su nekako i najslađa, zar ne?

How Many Kinds of Green / Koliko zelenih nijansi

We are surrounded by green, here. A beautiful color! But is it only one color? 
When talking about color-mixing people usually say: "We add white to a specific color to get a brighter tone, and black - to get a darker tone". But actually color-mixing is much much more then this simplified statement. In order to mix and get a specific color, one has to search for it, and try out different combinations.  What would happen for example, to a green color if we added some yellow, or some red, or orange, or a pinch of dark-blue, or some amount of light-blue, or gray, or pink, or violet, and then again some green... Mixing colors is an exploration adventure, not a prescribed recipe. In order to make children understand the concept of 'many kinds of one color' - nature can be our best helper! Just observing, talking about and spotting (in an 'I spy game') these gentle differences of one color - is a good exercise for little kid's eyes. So, choose a color, take a look around yourself, and try to see - how many kinds of it, can you see?

Ovde smo okruženi zelenom. Prelepom bojom! Ali, da li je to samo jedna boja?
Kada razgovaram sa ljudima o mešanju boja, obično kažu: "Dodamo belu u određenu boju da dobijemo svetliju nijansu, ili crnu boju - da dobijemo tamniju nijansu". Ali mešanje boja je mnogo mnogo više od toga. Da bismo dobili određenu nijansu neke boje, moramo tragati za njom, isprobavati različite kombinacije boja. Šta će se desiti, npr. sa zelenom bojom ako u nju dodamo malo žute, ili malo crvene, ili narandžaste, ili mrvicu tamno-plave, ili dosta svetlo-plave, ili sivu, ili ljubičastu, pa onda ponovo malo zelene? Mešanje boja je istraživačka avantura, a ne gotov recept. Da bismo pomogli deci da razumeju koncept "mnogobrojnih nijansi jedne boje" - priroda nam može mnogo pomoći! Samo posmatranje, razgovor o, ili opažanje (u igri pronalaženja određene nijanse) - je dobra vežbica za malene dečje oči. Tako da, odaberite jednu boju, pogledajte oko sebe i otkrijte - koliko njenih nijansi možete da vidite?

In Our Mud Kitchen / U našoj blatnjavoj kuhinjici

Here is where hours and hours of beautiful play is spent. I am always fascinated by the greatness of the simplest things (and in this case - the attraction that they have on kids)! And this is one of them: some old kitchen pans and utencils, a little sand or mud and some nature bits of this and that to set up a perfect playground! Sand and mud are some of those wonderful open-ended materials that calm the kids and relieves them from excess energy. So when ever you can - let the kids play in sand and mud! You will be surprised by what you will get to see (besides dirty clothes)!

Ovo je mesto gde deca provode sate i sate igranja. Uvek sam fascinirana veličinom najjednostavnijih stvari (i u ovom slučaju - moći kojom privlače decu)! A ovo je jedna od njih: stare kuhinjske šerpe i pribor, malo peska, blata i prirodnih drangulija za savršen kutak za igru. Pesak i blato su fantastični likovni materijali koji podstiču kreativnu igru otvorenig tipa ali i matreijali koji oslobađuju decu viška energije. Zato, kad god ste u mogućnosti - dozvolite deci da se igraju u pesku i blatu! Bićete iznenađeni onim što ćete videti (osim prljave odeće)!