The Blog For Kids

This blog is for kids!
The posts you find here will be mostly for children ages 5 to 10, with some stuff for younger or older kids.
Happy reading!

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Build-Your-Brain: Word of the Week

GLOBULAR

pronounced: "GLOB-yah-ler" or "GLOBE-yah-ler"

shaped like a round ball, a sphere, or the globe
or
something made of sphere shapes
or
something that is found worldwide.

Charlie Brown has a very globular head. If you draw continents on his head, you could use it as a globe.

Monday, September 21, 2009

Meet Maddie

This is Maddie.
She has 3 teeth.

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Wall of Wisdom

"Sticks and stones may break my bones,
but words can never hurt me."

Well, actually, words can hurt a lot. Sure, maybe words can't break a bone, but words are powerful things.

Brett Westcott and Cameron Brown realized they could make the world a better place with the power of words. They do it for free, too.

Brett and Cameron stand on a sidewalk at Purdue University for two hours every Wednesday. They give out compliments to people walking by. The nice things they say to people make the people feel noticed and happy. So many people enjoyed the compliments, that they started calling Brett and Cameron "The Compliment Guys".

A hero is someone who uses power for good. Now, more people at their school want to be kind, too. Paul Shepard, who works at their school, says Brett and Cameron make him want to be a better person. The Compliment Guys sound like 'heros' to me.

Maybe they can teach all of us the power of kind words.
Maybe kids will soon be saying:

"Doctors and nurses may heal my bones,
but words can save my soul."

Okay, it doesn't rhyme, but you get the idea!

Comment with the kind words you said to someone today!

sources:
Hometown Heros, The Compliment Guys, by Maria W. Aldrich
and
http://www.purdue.edu/UNS/x/2009a/090313ComplimentGuys2.html
Purdue News Service photo/ Andrew Hancock

Sunday, September 13, 2009

Boredom Buster Box (project)


MATERIALS NEEDED:
* a small box
(A little metal box like the ones that mints are sold in works well.)
* lots of little items that will fit into the box
(The box in this picture has twenty things in it!)
* paper and pencils

DIRECTIONS FOR GAME #1:
* the first player chooses items from the box and lays them out for everyone to see.
(choose fewer items for younger children, more for older children or for more players.)
* everyone except player one closes their eyes while player one removes an item.
* player two tries to tell what the missing item is
* player one congratulates player two and returns the item
* player two now removes an item while player one closes thier eyes.



variation:
* player one does not return the item after player two names it
* player three (or more) closes their eyes while player two removes an item
* player three now names items 1 and 2 that are missing
* continue this pattern for as many players in the game

variation:
* player one lays out 10 items and gives everyone a few minutes to look them over
* everyone except player one closes their eyes while player one removes five items
* everyone except player one writes the names of the five missing items onto a piece of paper
* the player with the most correct 'wins' the chance to choose items for the next round

Print these directions and put them in your box.
This is a great game to play at a restaurant or anywhere else that you have to wait. Check back for more ways to use your Boredom Buster Box.

Autumn Acrostic (poetry)

An acrostic is a poem that usually begins each line with a letter so that the beginning letters spell a word going down.
You don't have to worry about rhyming, just have fun!
How would you write an accrostic with the words AUTUMN DAYS?

Apples, red and sweet,
Up in the
Trees and crunching leaves
Under
My feet, fall is
Nature's lullaby.



Drowsy bees
And honking geese, autumn
Your song will too
Soon be done.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Stone Face at Harvard Mine (personal narrative)

It was a good thing I bought new mud boots. It had been raining for several weeks, so I knew I would need them on our hike up to the Harvard Mine. Harvard Mine is at the top of a mountain in Maine. My two sons, Nathan and Sam, and my mother and I like to go rockhounding there at least once a year. It is a beautiful hike and we love looking for gems. We would also stop at Perham's, a jewelry store and museum near the mines. The Perham family owns the mines and lets people rock hunt there for free. They were always friendly when we visited, and would help us identify our finds.

This time was a special trip, as it was also the day Perham's was closing forever. Perham's had been in business for ninety years and was famous around here. Many people were sad to see them close their shop, and came to visit the mines for what might be the last time. The trail to Harvard Mine was busy that day, but not everyone prepared for the hike as well as we had.

Some parts of the trail were more like a stream. Sections of the trail were a foot deep with mud. Other parts were dry, but mud boots were definately needed. Many people we saw were wearing only flip flops or rubber clogs. "Are they crazy?" we would say after we passed them, watching them pull their feet out of the mud. We had been up to the mines many times before. We knew what to expect.

We had to stop and rest often, because my mother was getting tired easily. It was a steep trail in places, and we were carrying hammers and chisels in our backpacks along with water and a snack. We also needed to stop so Nathan and Sam could fix their socks. Their socks kept slouching down off their feet and bunching up in the toes of their boots.

As my mother rested and my boys fixed their socks, I looked around at the woods and the piles of boulders spilling down the hillside. Suddendly something caught my eye. I climbed over huge rocks to get a closer look and pulled myself up the hill by grabbing onto small trees. It was just a bunch of rocks, but they looked like a face!

I called Nathan and Sam to come see. They scrambled up and were as amazed as I
was. We took pictures and pretended to talk to him. "See my new boots?" "Are you enjoying all the visitors today?" "We might never come here again."

The rest of the hike was just as wet and tiring. We stopped to take more pictures and to examine and collect rock specimens. At the top of the mountain we enjoyed the company of the other rockhounders and had our snack. We cracked rocks in half with the chisels and "ooohhhed" and "aahhed". I even found a baby snake that we admired for a while. As usual, our backpacks were heavier on the way down, but we were happy with our selections.

When we came to the spot with the rock face again, we took one last look. To think that all these years that we have been coming here, that face was sitting there in the woods all along, watching. We didn't think anyone else had ever noticed it, since it was pretty well blocked by trees. How sad to think that we found it on what might be the last day to hike here, if the Perhams sell the property.

Back at the van, I pulled off my muddy boots and wondered if others would think the rock looks like a face. I tossed all our boots in the back of the van and thought perhaps we saw the face because we needed to. It seems that sometimes we find things at just the right time.

If the mines remain open to visitors, we will now have a new addition to our traditional hike. If not, then we got to say goodbye in a very interesting and unique way. And maybe, just maybe, the mountain was saying goodbye to us. Or maybe he was giving us the boot.

Monday, September 7, 2009

Starfish (non-fiction)


Starfish are an ocean animal. They are not a fish. The correct name for starfish is sea stars.
Sea stars live on the ocean floor near the shore and can be found in all oceans of the world.
There are about 2,000 kinds of sea stars, and many of them have 5 arms. Some kinds have more than five arms.
Sea stars have spiny skin to protect themselves. They can also lose an arm to keep a predator from eating their entire body.
They have tube feet all over their underside which they use to walk and to pry open shells. Sea stars eat the meat from inside shell animals.
To read more about sea stars, visit the sites below.
sources:
http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/invertebrates/starfish.html
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/interesting-facts-about-starfish.html
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/subjects/invertebrates/echinoderm/Seastarprintout.shtml