If you’re anything like me, you’re busy and you see a thing, buy tickets to the thing, and get to the thing and realize you should’ve planned better for the thing. I thought I was doing well by purchasing Early Bird tickets for general admission. Turns out, that’s not all I should’ve done. Here are a few interactive activities that I wish I had known about prior to our visit to the Georgia Aquarium:

1. NO OUTSIDE FOOD – it’s probably just me. I need to remember this. I carry snacks everywhere. Be prepared to pay a lot of money for an apple.
2. Dolphin Celebration/ Penguin Encounter/ Sea Otter Encounter/ Sea Lion Encounter -> THESE SELL OUT QUICK – Purchase tickets for these events ONLINE prior to your visit and not the day of, trust me. You don’t want to miss these shows. At least book one, and you’ll see what I mean. There are really really smart animals, dad humor, trainers, and Queen tunes to jam out to. Check the time at the beginning of your aquarium trip to coordinate a time conflict-free experience. All Ages (Ages 15 and under must be accompanied by an adult)
3. Virtual Reality Experience – this is a motion-based virtual reality ride that takes you on a deep sea quest to retrieve a jewel. You’ll dodge deep see rocks and shark bite attempts. If this is your kid’s thing, it’s worth the $10. It’s maybe 10 minutes long, costs extra (in addition to your ticket), and sometimes the wait for it can be >30 minutes long (so maybe do this when your eyes need a rest). My son requests to do it every visit, so if you think your kid will be attracted to this, plan accordingly. Minimum Age: 7
4. Waist Deep with the Belugas – Purchase tickets in advance online. Come face to face with beautiful, majestic beluga whales with close oversight of Georgia Aquarium trainers, of course. You’ll get to interact in the water with these gentle giants one-on-one. All ages (Ages 15 and under must be accompanied by an adult)
5. Toddler Time – Every first Monday of the month from 10:00a to 11:30a you can take your toddlers to the Georgia Aquarium to learn about sea life and how to protect the planet. Your littles also get adults in costume for story time, a craft, and a snack.
6. REFUNDS ARE KIND OF NOT A THING

Here’s the link for all the extra, ticket options to make your trip to the Georgia Aquarium extra cool: https://tickets.georgiaaquarium.org/single/EventListing.aspx

My kid has not stopped playing with this toy set since I bought them for him when he was 4 (he’s nearly 6 now). I even had to get another set so his creations could become more elaborate. They’re called Picasso Tiles – a version of the original, popular ‘Magnatiles’ that I found when trying to avoid the outrageously priced original. They are sets of brightly colored shapes that connect together using the strength of magnets. I find that the magnetic snap creates an ease that allows my son’s imagination to run wild. He builds car garages for his cars to castles for his Monster Trucks to live in.

Either way, he’s building and learning structural engineering concepts along the way. And, of course, ya gotta throw in a little lesson about triangle names and angles. *Ahem* Anyway, I got mine from Amazon (see below – check out the used options for an even lower price), but they occasionally pop up on Groupon too.

https://amzn.to/2Gxu0zZ

Picasso Tiles come in different quantities and theres also a small Picasso Tile train set that you can snag for $4.99. We ending up purchasing a set of 60 initially and eventually a set of 100 (because he loved them so much and friends could build structures along side him), and my nearly 6 year old son seems to content building his structures with that amount. As stated before, we’ve had the first set for 2 years, and they have been dropped, bent, and stepped on. They are still just as pretty and intact as day 1. Whenever we have visitors, they always comment of my kiddo’s newly constructed colorful creation. It’s his conversation piece to this day.

Groupon: https://www.groupon.com/deals/gs-magna-tiles-clear-colors-100-piece-set-4

What kid doesn’t love getting mail. And what parent doesn’t love seeing their kids read and discover. Weeeeellll…I recently found a Groupon special for National Geographic kids that I had to share…because c’mon – animals are cool to learn about. The cool part is that animal facts are typically fun for adults too. I got a year subscription for $9. Here’s the link for the mag (lucky you…use Code: SALE3 for 20% off):

https://www.groupon.com/deals/n-national-geographic-kids-magazine

And for me, after buying Nat Geo Kids, I purchased Highlights magazine for $2 more. If you don’t remember seeing this popular magazine at school and at the pediatrician’s office, I’ll jog your memory. Highlights magazine that has been around since 1946, and it’s been around that long for a reason. It’s a teacher favorite that publishes a monthly collection of stories, games, riddles, and experiments that promote reading and creativity. They even have a digital mag for you to sample if you need to see more before you buy:

https://www.highlights.com/store/highlights-magazines-for-kids/highlights-magazine

Happy reading 🙂 !!!

Yep. Do it. Start now. I’m a big proponent of introducing complex concepts to children early – in a fun way. When Solomon was little we used to watch education YouTube vids and happened upon this:

He LOVED it! It’s so catchy, and he requested to hear it at least once a day – over and over. And who was I to say no, lol. As he babbled what he didn’t realize was literally the building blocks of all the things and would eventually be on all his Chemistry exams, I formed a lesson plan around it. I let him listen to it every day (he still does). Then, I began introducing a few of them by associating them with stuff he used/saw every day. e.g. Oxygen (air we breathe), Fluorine (for our pretty teeth – toothpaste)

He naturally began to pick ones he was interested in on his own. Nerd seed planted :).

Check these out too:

Periodic Table Meal Placemat (can be used as a poster too!):

https://amzn.to/2Iwq9VN

Periodic Table Song with the lyrics (for the readers & the song is fast near the end, so this provides much needed clarity):

Periodic Table Song for 5 hours straight (apologies in advance, as this song will forever be embedded in your brain):

My son and I happened upon a super cool engineering toy that we wanted to share with you. My boyfriend says it’s been around a long time, but it’s my first time ever hearing of it. It’s called Marble Run, and it’s a tiny engineer’s dream.

Why It’s Good:

Similar to LEGO, it requires kids to build strength in their hands and fingers by attaching, detaching, and reattaching parts of the structure. It also requires design-thinking and creativity. Each piece that the marble can roll down has a closed side and an open side. The goal is to design structures that you can drop marbles into to make a marble obstacle course of sorts. The engineering part comes in when your child builds something with a route in mind, but the marble does something completely different. Then, the have to re-evaluate their design and think about what they need to do to achieve their intended goal. Love love love that about this toy. I even have a good time with this – it’s for all ages, really.

There’s just one catch. When you go to Amazon or wherever to search, you’ll find that sooo many vendors make this toy and most of them are TERRIBLY made. How do I know? I’ve purchased 3 of them. I took my loss on the first one, returned the 2nd one (a piece literally cracked in my child’s hand), and decided to spend some time carefully researching (product reviews can be super shady nowadays). The bad Marble Run sets are hard to stack together, which makes a small child lose interest and the parent ends up doing the building. Also, the bad sets have cheap, fake marbles, which takes a lot away from the whole concept of having smooth, shiny marbles that will make parents nostalgic.

And now I present to you the best Marble Run:

https://amzn.to/2Iyq9Vs

This set has beautiful, real marbles (makes that satisfying clanking sound), and it has parts that are easy to stack together for the marbles to travel through. There are sturdy funnels, windmills, and other cool parts that will get your kiddo’s noodle going. The perfect birthday gift for any child. It’s one of our favorite developmental family toys. Again, don’t be fooled when you see a cheap one – this one will make a great gift for any child (see choking hazard age before purchasing).

As much as I’d like to tell you all that I was asked to be room parent because of my stellar parenting skills – that isn’t the case at all. A representative from my son’s school emailed me saying:

“Hi there, we met briefly at the Kindergarten picnic, and it seems like you’ve got your ish together (impressively gathered from our 5 minute chat). Also, 3 parents have backed out. Can you help a sistah out?!”

Lol…ok, so maybe I doctored that up a bit, but you get the point. I felt the pressure. I wasn’t going to leave my son’s class hangin. I’ve got this! (not really)

Fortunately, I have some amazing friends who are teachers themselves and I was able to use my interviewing skills and ask them what they wanted from a room parent. I took what they said and used my noggin to come up with tips for busy parents to help them to be the coolest room parent in their grade. Check it out:

PLANNING
Set up a meeting with the teacher your ideas (I’ll help with those in a sec), questions (see starter questions below), and boundary-setting cap on. Boundaries are for your protection. The teacher will have expectations, and you have to make sure that you come with yours too!

Questions for Teacher:

• How would you like to communicate with me? (text, email, classroom app (e.g. ClassDojo)
• When is your birthday? When is the Teacher’s Assistant’s birthday?
• Are parties acceptable? When are they appropriate? What is the food policy?
• What assistance will you need with classroom supplies?
• What methods are acceptable for collecting money?
• What is the policy for approving books for mystery reading?
• What are ongoing classroom supply needs?
• For each event, please send dates, volunteer needs, location, context, and all relevant times at least a month in advance or as soon as the event is approved by school administration (this gives you time to create the sign-up and/or email, let the teacher approve it, and then send it out to all the parents.)

1. Ask teacher to come prepared to the meeting with a calendar that indicates all expected events.
2. Ask teacher to come prepared to the meeting with a parent email list. (Don’t forget to chat about the appropriate way to protect parents’ personal information)
3. Signup Genius is your friend! This is a free application that you may use for field trip, class program, and mystery reader sign-ups. It allows you to use your own custom pictures, send an email blast, and notifies you when volunteers sign up for your events. I used even used this sign-up app to ensure that all kids made the teacher a homemade birthday card. Those who didn’t sign up to make one were provided a ready-made card that they could sign so they weren’t left out. Here’s the link to Sign Up Genius BTW: https://www.signupgenius.com/
4. In my case, the teacher wanted to have parties for a few holidays. Here is how I approached each party: Part I: Educational Fun/Exposure Activity Part II: Creative Craft Part II: Storytime or (if time permits) a fun video that relates to the party’s theme. See my Holiday Party approaches for Halloween, Christmas, and Valentines Day, here: TBA
5. Don’t get stuck with the bill $$$. Plan ahead, and make sure that teacher gifts (birthday), events, and supplies are funded by the parents. You may have the parents bring the money into the classroom to the teacher to ensure that you’re in the clear of all money-handling foolishness. Signup Genius also has a money-collecting feature, but I’m pretty sure they take a percentage. You can usually cover a lot of ground by asking each parent for $1 each (and I had any leftover donated to the classroom supply budget)

Teachers are rockstars for dealing with our kids all day. I’d like to make sure we willingly take care of them just like they willingly take care of our youngins. Hope this post enables someone do just that!

Make the best out of screen time. Kids don’t know what they don’t know until you (and later other people) expose them to all the things. With my child, I made sure that I prioritized educational content from the beginning, and so far, that’s spurred my son’s curiosity in math, science, and has improved his vocabulary. Don’t get me wrong, he still loves the other stuff *AHEM* LEGO and Ninja dude stuffs, but now he appreciates the educational stuffs too. SO… While you have the power*, pump their little minds full of all the info you want them to learn about. Fortunately, thanks to the shows I’m about to mention, your kiddos can learn while entranced in the televised version of joyful education (Psychology Today agrees, read their take about that here: https://www.psychologytoday.com/files/attachments/4141/the-neuroscience-joyful-education-judy-willis-md.pdf) .

*Power – The ability to manage your child’s day-to-day activities. Read more about why this matters here from the good folks at Vandy U: https://my.vanderbilt.edu/developmentalpsychologyblog/2014/04/how-do-you-affect-your-child/

The Magic School Bus (old & relaunched versions available to view)

This show is tried and true – you’re probably familiar with the books. The teacher character in this series, Mrs. Frizzle, is the best at taking a complex science concept and literally turning into it with the students for a first-hand adventure in the way things work e.g. becoming a piece of food and traveling through the digestive system. This method makes science processes and terminologies memorable and fun! Needless to say, the vocab is great too!

Platform: Netflix, YouTube, Amazon

Sesame Street (duh)

Foundation is everything, especially when put into song. And Sesame Street is the best at that and making repetition learning creative, interactive, and engaging for youngsters. Mastering fundamentals is overrated because there’s ton of kids’ content out there and easy to introduce advance concepts to little brains prematurely. You can’t go wrong with starting your child’s screen time with incremental doses of  Sesame Street.

Platform: Amazon Prime, Hulu, HBO

Blaze and the Monster Machines

I was so impressed by this show (and still am!). Created by a really, really smart group of people (who also are writers for Team UmiZoomi – it’s up next), is a cartoon that attacks introducing technology, engineering, and science through monster trucks and their human 8-year-old techie friends. My son finished episodes understanding concepts like force, adhesion, acceleration, and friction. He couldn’t get enough – because Monster Trucks, duh.

Platform: Amazon Prime, Nick Jr.

Team UmiZoomi

Math is a subject that needs to be embraced early on IMO. If not properly introduced, we humans have a tendency to find it tedious and intimidating. Team UmiZoomi gives the characters and the viewer the challenge of saving the day and incorporates math problems as a part of the ‘game’. Your child will be adding and subtracting and identifying greater than and less than scenarios correctly without even realizing it!

Platform: Amazon Prime, Nick Jr.

Minecraft Choose Your Adventure (Requires smart TV,  laptop/desktop HDMI connection, or iOS device)

This one is for kids who are a bit older. Because there are words that require convo for the youngins. But, other than that, let me tell why this interactive screen time option is good. Reading and critical thinking. This show allows kids to choose what happens next on a trackpad to click the options. That said, they have to read and decide based on the content they’ve seen what ‘makes sense’ in the next part of the show. The vocabulary is pretty good too.

Platform: Netflix

COMING SOON: 5 Quality Screen Times for Your Littles Part II