Busy Kids are Happy Kids

Kids will scribble on anything. In my experience, they don’t mind if it is a wall, a fridge, the floor, cupboards, mirrors, bed sheets, plates,   human beings, dogs (not cats, cats wouldn’t stand for such a thing) … There are two ways of dealing with this. Plan A: You watch your child like a hawk every time he/she has access to crayons or pencils. You keep repeating ‘only on the paper’ to them like a parrot. You stop them as soon as you see their hand move away from the paper. As you can guess, this is not a great plan, for a hundred reasons. So plan B: You learn to get the stains off whichever surface they choose to deface. I’m sharing how I get crayon and pencil marks off walls. 1. I get a tube of white toothpaste. You will need more than a tube if the damage is widespread across multiple walls. 2. I apply the said toothpaste liberally over the crayon/pencil marks. I use my finger to spread the paste thickly over the area. 3. I use a clean cloth and a good amount ...

As some of you may have read in my previous activity, I’m trying to reduce wastage around the house. So when I bought a new electronic device last week, I decided to use the cardboard box it came in for this task. I found a few strips of corrugated paper inside some store-bought cookie boxes as well. So we used all of these to make an underwater scene in the form of an aquarium. This also gave us a chance to learn new vocabulary like corals, tadpoles, sea-horse, reeds etc. Materials required: cardboard box corrugated paper paints chunky paint brush scissors glue newspaper Activity: 1. Spread newspaper over the table you will be working on, to prepare for paint spills, scissor marks and other unforeseen calamities. 2. Cut out a rectangular shape from one of the longer sides of the cardboard box so that the inside of the box becomes visible. 3. Allow the child to paint the inside of the box in shades of blue and green to represent water and the bottom ...