Child Activity Holidays

A holiday flotilla

GRAFTON  —  Coconut, Jack O'Neil's toy monkey, was a bit of a test dummy yesterday afternoon at Silver Lake Beach, but everything turned out OK.

Jack, 5, of Grafton, gingerly placed the SS Monkey, an elaborate boat made of water bottles, Pringles cans and many other items, into the water for its inaugural voyage. Coconut was at the helm, but the child's beloved toy did not get wet. The boat floated. Delighted, Jack followed it around in the water, splashing at it to propel it forward.

His design, which won a best in regatta award, had a bubble gum box for a plank, just in case someone needed to be forced to walk the plank, an orange Kleenex box for the pilot house and paper drink umbrellas, a flag and many other items attached all over the top.

The S.S. Monkey was one of 14 toy-sized boats made out of recycled materials that took part in a Recycled Boat Regatta yesterday afternoon at Silver Lake. Sponsored by the Grafton Recreation Department, the regatta was held as a monthly activity for local youths, and also to draw attention to the idea of recycling. It drew mostly Barbie-size boats, but Rick Kennedy of Upton showed up with a full-size raft he made out of 40 three-liter Poland Springs water bottles, a couple of pieces of PVC tubing and a lot of tape.

Mr. Kennedy is a regular in the Upton cardboard boat race that takes place later in the summer, but showed up in Grafton, partly because he did not realize it was a small boat regatta, and partly because he enjoys the challenge. He took his boat out after the young children floated theirs and, other than a few steering problems, it did pretty well.

“I could have taken it across the lake,” he said.

Mr. Kennedy said he added the PVC pipes to the bottom of the boat because without them, the bottles could not hold his weight. Even with the pipes, he got a little wet, but remained mostly on top of the water.

Mr. Kennedy's effort also earned him a prize. It so impressed swim lesson director Brenda Armstrong, that she said next year they might invite adults and older children to create full size boats from recycled materials.

“We'd still have the small boats, but add the larger boats,” she said.

Those who participated this year had different takes on how the boats should look.

Two used Quaker Oatmeal bars boxes for sails on their plastic bottle hulls.

Summer Holiday Life Savers | WAHM-BAM!

With (UK) summer holidays just around the corner I’ve started thinking about how we’re going to make the most my extra time with my two young girls, having lots of fun AND staying sane. One magic resource I have prepared in my box of tricks is a stack of “activity books” for the girls.

By activity books I mean those which require nothing more than a pencil case to make the most of – books full of colouring, doodling, games and sparks of imagination. And today I’m very happy to be sharing with you my selection of the very best that I know about. However, before diving into my recommendations I wanted to add a few words about activity books and why I think they are so great.

Activity books are life savers for me. I use them with the kids in two ways – sometimes I need them to do something by themselves for a while and sometimes I want an activity we can all do together which is quiet, calm and doesn’t require any preparation. Activity books are perfect in both circumstances!

Many creative parents wince at the thought of their children doing colouring-in, claiming it is not creative as it’s all about staying within the lines and adhering to rules, but I believe colouring really does have a role to play in the parenting toolbox. Lots of children find colouring-in calming, relaxing and absorbing – and these are certainly valuable qualities, even if you do adhere to the belief that colouring-in is not imaginative .

I’m a great believer in the natural creativity of children, but I’ve also witnessed how kids (and adults) can become even more creative (or creative in different ways) if they are initially given some tools and ideas to spark the imagination, a sort of framework if you will. Activity books can do this by providing simple scaffolding to activities – a spark of a sentence or a suggestion about how to approach filling in a page. Whilst I’m all for kids having plenty of opportunity to find out things themselves and come up with their own ideas, sometimes a little bit of support (for example when they are tired or simply are moaning they they are bored and have nothing to do) is just what is needed to get the juices flowing again.

Colouring-in and doodling can be great for exploring different materials, shading and developing pencil skills. Often the activity reinforces important mathematical ideas such as patterns and shape recognition and manipulation. Activity books can also be a great way of developing literacy skills. Over the summer I hope I manage to encourage my eldest to read to me but I know it might not happen. With activity books, however, kids are reading instructions and practising their literacy skills without realising it. My eldest has been happy to sit and read an activity book from cover to cover to select what she wants to do, but would probably have pulled a face had I suggested we sit together and read a book as that would have been seen as too much like homework!

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