Author: McKenzie Ross

I'm just a mom with a teaching license, raising my kids, and writing for this blog! Someday I hope to be back teaching when they are older, but for now, I'm here and loving it!
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Sight Word Games For the Early Reader in Your Life

With my oldest in kindergarten this year, sight words have become a big part of our daily life. She’s practicing them at school and then we have a list at home that we can work on as well. And as I’ve written time and time again, “Play is a child’s work.” So we don’t just buzz through sight word flashcards as fast as we can, we use sight words in our play. Here are a few games we’ve come up with together to help along the way. 

Sight word board game: My daughter and I made this game together in a similar way to how you would play Candyland. There are two ways you can play it- make your own cards with sight words written on them to indicate where your next square is. Or, roll the dice, move forward that many spaces, and read the words as you move. For pieces, we use Bingo tokens, various board game pieces, or small toys. Yes, Skye and Chase help us play this game! If you know, you know!

Sight word Jenga: We bought a few of these tiny tumbling tower sets from Dollar Tree and wrote various sight words on them. Once we pull a brick out, we read the word, and once the tower has tumbled, we take turns making sentences with the words we pulled. We did multiple sets so we could add in more sight words as they learn them in class. I plan to do CVC and CVC-e words someday when she’s ready for that. 

Sight word sentence builder: I bought a pack of sight word flash cards for cheap on Amazon to save me the time and effort of making my own. We use these cards, plus a few index cards with words we decide to add, to create fun sentences. We also use our Jenga blocks for this as well! This one is my daughter’s favorite way to play with sight words! 

Sight word seek and find: For this, we use our sight word flashcards, or sometimes I’ll write them out on sticky notes and use those instead. One of us hides the sight words and then the other one finds them while reading out which word they found. Pictured here is your classic “hide it in the Christmas tree” move. The amount of random toys I pull out of our Christmas tree at the end of the holiday from various hide-and-seek games is unreal!

Sight word seek and find + builder: This game is a two-part game! I place sticky notes with letters throughout our family room, then she is required to find the letters and build the sight words out of the letters. This one took some scaffolding. In the beginning, it was just a letter here or there omitted in sight words that she had to find, but as she got better and better at it, she started spelling her own words with less prompting. 

Sight word hopscotch: This one can be as intricate or as easy as your time and energy allow. We’ve done this quickly outside with sidewalk chalk, quickly inside with our flashcards, or intricately with painter’s tape boxes taped out on the floor or full sheets of paper with the words written on them taped to the floor. SO many different ways to do this one! While jumping from square to square, we read the words. 

Sight word beanbag toss: This one is a simple one we like to do in addition to the other games we’ve been playing. I simply just lay the flashcards out on the floor and my daughter takes a beanbag (or a soft toy, stuffed animal, etc.), tosses it at a card, and if it’s touching the card she reads the word, then she is handed the card. If she doesn’t read the word correctly, she tries again!

Not only are these sight word games building awareness of words, but they are also utilizing fine and gross motor skills, moving around the room, and using, deconstructing, and building these words in ways they haven’t before. Learning sight words isn’t reading. It’s memorizing. And play is a child’s work, so in order to work through memorizing these words, they must play. 

What sight word games would you add to this list? 

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Playing Preschool Round ✌🏽

A few years ago I started Busy Toddler’s Playing Preschool curriculum with my oldest. She was about three years old at the time and I wrote my review on the curriculum here. 

And now I’m back in the same position with my second child, utilizing our Playing Preschool guide once again! We trekked down to our storage room in the basement and pulled out the tape, dot stickers, pipe cleaners, and paint. We even dedicated a little corner in our home and call it the preschool room! 

Our Melissa and Doug calendar is set up on the wall and we start off our preschool day with poems and songs just like we did in the past. 

This is my second time around with the Playing Preschool curriculum and I am impressed all over again! It truly is learning through playing. As Susie from Busy Toddler promises, there are no worksheets and nothing complicated. It’s just everyday supplies gathered and utilized to help little minds grow and learn. A few things I’ve learned the second time around: 

  • I’ve taken the pressure off of myself to accomplish every single activity outlined for the day. Some days we get through it all, other days I see that learning isn’t happening and we need to take a break for the day. 
  • The repetition of one unit for two weeks can feel really… redundant for adults. After the 7th day of the apple theme, I didn’t want to look at or talk about apples ever again! But the repetition for those preschool-aged minds truly is crucial for learning. 
  • One of my cons on my last review was the hard time I had finding books to use because the pandemic shut down a lot of resources for finding what I needed. However, this time around with libraries open, it’s been much easier. After going through each of these units a second time, I’m more aware of what the needs are with the books used and can change and adapt the books as needed. 
  • The most important part of the entire Playing Preschool curriculum is to have fun. If you’re not having fun, you’re doing it wrong! 

Have you purchased Playing Preschool? What are your thoughts on the curriculum? 

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Christmas Picture Books for 2022

For the past three years, I’ve written a new Christmas book list of favorite Christmas books to read during this season. It’s been such a fun blog post for me every single year, so this year I am excited to announce that this will be my fourth Christmas book list! Picture books are near and dear to my heart, but Christmas books just hit different. You can read past book lists here:

2019

2020

2021

And without further adieu: Christmas Picture Books 2022

Mr. Willowby’s Christmas Tree by Robert Barry

The rhythm of this book is really what makes it fun! You won’t be disappointed by this one. 

How the Grinch Stole Christmas! By Dr. Seuss

I’m not typically a Dr. Suess fan, the books seem excessively long and almost a little too far-fetched for me. However, this is one that I do love. 

Madeline’s Christmas by Ludwig Bemelmans 

I grew up on Madeline books, “an old house in Paris that was covered with vines” brings comfort to my soul. But adding Christmas to the setting just makes it a notch better! 

5 More Sleeps ‘til Christmas by Jimmy Fallon 

Such a fun book that encompasses the anticipation leading up to Christmas through the eyes of a child. 

What Christmas picture book is on your list this year?

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The 2022 Scholarship Winners- My Thoughts

For the ‘21-’22 scholarship season, our beloved blog writer Kassidy took over the submissions and hand selecting the top five winners, which I know is no small feat after having done it myself! 

It starts with reading through every single submission at least twice. And then reading and re-reading, again and again, to somewhat rank them. After picking out which applications are on the higher end of the ranking, then comes multiple phone calls to schools and mentors to hear about the projects from their point of view, as well as hearing about the student’s personality and work ethic. We then read each submission over and over again and again, ensuring that each applicant has followed all of the rules and guidelines, make more phone calls if needed, and discuss, discuss, and discuss amongst all of the scholarship board members to narrow it down to the top five.  

So when I say it’s no small feat, I mean it! And Kassidy absolutely took it in stride and found five incredible winners for our 2022 awards. 

Shoshana Folic with Wishing’ U Well saw an immediate problem within her community and filled it. And the coolest part is that she started on a community level and it grew and grew into something huge! We are so proud to have Shoshana as our top winner. 

We also saw foldable tiny houses, fiddle groups that closed the generational age gap, community gardens, and kits to help the displaced people in the community. You can read about all of the past winners here. 

Reading through their stories is truly so inspiring to see how these youth are changing and improving their communities. With kids like these in our world, we don’t need to worry about our future. These scholarship applications are proof that empathetic, kind, caring kids are out there and willing and ready to help. 

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Stop Pushing The Books And Let Them Take it at Their Own Pace!

You guys, I love reading. I love reading so much that I have consumed (and completely finished) 47 books this year. If I were to include the books I’ve skimmed or started but didn’t finish, I’d be somewhere near 60+ on the number of books I’ve read this year. 

From the time my oldest was born, I have tried so hard to instill a love of reading in her. I’ve done everything the professionals tell you to do for kids to enjoy reading. I don’t ever push books on her, I let her take the lead on what to read, how to read it, and when to read them. I never turn down an opportunity to read a book if she’s bringing one to me. Yet still, she’s seemed very disinterested in reading and learning to read. 

It’s been hard for me to have such a love for reading and watch her not care as much. She’s now five years old and started kindergarten this last fall. It seems like an opportune time to introduce chapter books with a little more depth and story to them, but those turn her off even more! I always dreamed of the day I would sit down in a big recliner with my child and read Charlotte’s Web for the first time, but that day feels so distant to me right now, which is disappointing. 

However, I’m doing my best to create a safe, fun environment around books for her, so I’m working every day on not pushing the literature! Instead, we spend plenty of time surrounded by books, all throughout our home at the school library, and the public library. I model reading for her by reading my own books. We also spend a lot of time looking through picture books but not reading them, which is always a win, too. 

Do you have a kiddo that doesn’t love reading whether your own child or in your classroom? How do you help foster a love of reading and an environment of support for them? 

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Delaying Kindergarten for Boys? Does it Make a Significant Difference?

I’ve written quite a few posts on here about decisions centered around kindergarten, more particularly on when to send kids to kindergarten. There is so much research out there on what to do, especially for those late summer birthday kiddos. 

My second child is in a similar boat as my first, his birthday is in early August so he is right around the Sept. 1st deadline for starting school as well. If we were to send him to kindergarten when he is supposedly supposed to go according to these guidelines, he would turn 5 years old and then head to his first day of kindergarten just two weeks later. Some kids thrive under these conditions- i.e., my firstborn! For others, this sounds like an absolute trainwreck- i.e., my secondborn. 

We still struggled with the decision for a while, though. 

During our research, my husband and I ended up reading the book Boys Adrift by Leonard Sax, a great book full of advice for raising boys in the modern world. In the chapter about starting school, Leonard talks a lot about a study done on brain scans of male and female brains over the period of many years and the findings they had on how a male brain develops vs. how a female brain develops. When it comes to the part of the brain that has to do with attention span, reading, writing, etc., they found that the male and female brains develop at the same pace, but the male brain is roughly two years behind the female brain in this development. 

He is clear that this does not mean that one is smarter than the other, it just means they are different in how they develop. In regards to boys starting kindergarten he states, 

“Trying to teach five-year-old boys to learn to read and write may be just as inappropriate as it would be to try to teach three-year-old girls to read and write. Timing is everything, in education as in many other fields. It’s not enough to teach well. You have to teach well to kids who are ready to learn, kids who are developmentally “ripe” for learning. Asking five-year-old boys to learn to read- when they’d rather be running around or playing games- may be the worst possible introduction to school, at least for some boys.” 

He continues on with the subject and even states that more often than not, you’ll see the majority of boys starting kindergarten at six years old because parents are seeing the benefit of this “gap year” in their sons. 

This research seemed very interesting to me and in observing my own children, it made sense. At three years old my daughter was ready and eager to learn letters and numbers and how to write. At 3.5 years old, my son wants absolutely nothing to do with them and I am doing my best not to push anything on him until he is ready. 

What are your thoughts on sending kids to kindergarten a year later and giving them a gap year? Do you think gender, birth order, or other factors play into the decision? 

Cover photo from pexels.com

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The Addition of Video Games To Our Household

When my oldest was born five years ago, I noticed a shift in how parents view screen time. Maybe it somewhat had to do with the fact that I had just entered the parenthood world, but since I had spent the previous four years very immersed in the school system as well as nannying for a local family, I felt like I somewhat had an idea of the screentime trends. 

I think what I was observing was 5-10 years ago parents started realizing the long-term effects of screens, smart devices, and video games were having on kids. I kept seeing movement after movement of, “screen-free summer!” and “let’s spend 10,000 hours outside instead of on our devices!” 

Which are not bad things to do! Spending time outside is a great investment. But where I find the fault is that we are blaming screens. 

I grew up in the 90s and we spent plenty of time playing video games and watching tv shows. We also spent plenty of time running the streets of our neighborhood until the street lights came on. That actually wasn’t a rule for us, but it felt very similar to how I grew up and fitting for the given situation. 

Looking back, maybe parents of the 90s would beg to differ, but I think we had a perfect balance back then. We were pirates and explorers by day, and Mario Kart racers by night when it was too dark or cold to be outside. The screens were not the problem! 

However, over time the use of screens changed and adapted and been used (and abused) more and more. So when my oldest was born, I felt such shame for using any amount of screens in her life. So much to the point that when we were visiting a restaurant one evening, their menu boards were big TVs, and as an 18-month-old she wouldn’t stop staring at them. I felt like a horrible mom for allowing her to do this. She wasn’t supposed to have any screen time! 

Looking back, I realize how ridiculous my thinking was. But with all of the propaganda out on social media (ironic, isn’t it??), I was sure any time spent in front of any screen for my child was certainly melting her brain. 

Over the years we tried many different approaches to screen time. My favorite was physically putting the remote in my child’s hand. I think the biggest downfall with this, though, was that there wasn’t a countdown or physical timer she could see that would indicate how much screen time she had left for the day, so she wasn’t able to properly time manage her TV access, which led to frustration. However, giving myself a break and allowing screen time in our home was a good thing overall for us. 

Around the time my oldest turned 5, the idea of video games popped up. My initial thoughts were, “No. Absolutely not. We don’t need those in our house.” But then I was introduced to an Instagram account that changed my thinking. 

@TheGamerEducator is changing the way we think and look at screen time and video games. She has shown facts and research on why video games are good for kids! She also promotes scheduled screen time and points out why kids are asking for screen time in places like Disneyland or the zoo, and why we don’t need to be upset about it. 

It gave me the right push to add simple video games into our home. And believe it or not, it did not cause instant tantrums or overstimulation. In fact, it caused A LOT of problem-solving skills to be utilized. It caused great fine-motor development. It gave my kids the opportunity to use their brains to move a joystick to control an object on the TV, something they’ve never had to do before, but something that takes a good amount of brain power in the beginning to use. 

And in the end, my kids are still spending the majority of their days outside running the streets and inside playing board games and toy trains. But they also have some fun, scheduled screen time as well, and it’s been amazing for our household. 

The amount of education kids can pick up from video games is incredible. However, please be wary and not buy into “this is an educational game.” If you want more information on what makes something an educational game or show, I would strongly suggest diving deep into @TheGamerEducators resources she has available because she can give you more information on it than I ever could! 

So let’s stop giving screens and video games a bad wrap. They’re doing so much more for us and our children than we even realize!

Are you a video game family? What does screen time look like for you?