Purposeful Play: Creating a story book

Starting from now, I will be writing on a series of activities that I do with my almost 3 year old on a regular basis. I call this “purposeful play” as play, in my opinion, should never be meaningless. It is thru play that children learn. Their little brains and minds are like sponges, absorbing every piece of information that come along their way. My husband and I are firm believers in early brain development and we have always been on the same page when it comes to how we stimulate Aiden and provide him with the right environment and opportunities to learn.

On a boring afternoon recently, I decided that it was perhaps about time I introduce the concept of making a story book with Aiden. We have been reading story books to him on a nightly basis since he was just a few months old to cultivate his love for reading. By now at the age of 35 months old, Aiden is very familiar with what a “story book” means. So the other day, I asked him if he would like to create his own book with me and his face lit up with excitement. We got out some plain flash cards (I did not want to use normal writing paper as they would be too flimsy), hole-puncher, some strings, a glue and scissors. After stringing a few cards together, we went to the computer to look for some ideas.

I explained to Aiden that he had to think of the kind of story that he would like for his book. Just as I expected, he said he wanted superman (his current obsession). Then I asked him to give me an idea for every page so that we could look for pictures of Superman that we can print out from the computer. It was so cute as he started throwing out sentences like “superman is strong”, “superman can fly”, “superman can fight naughty people” etc. Based on his ideas, we searched online for suitable pictures that related to his concept. After printing them out, we stuck them on the individual pages of the “book” before colouring them. The end product looks like this:

Of course Aiden still cannot write so I had to do it for him but all the lines were his ideas. Initially I thought he meant "Aiden's superman is strong" but I soon realised he meant "Aiden Superman"! I guess he has been so obsessed with Superman that he is now fantasizing being one himself. My favourite got to be the last page of the book where he told me to write "Superhero Super Aiden". That was his way of ending the story. How cool is that?

So here we have. Aiden in his superman costume and showing off the book he created with pride.

=

Getting your child to create a storybook is a very good learning activity. He get to witness the whole production of something from stringing together paper/cards, developing ideas, printing of pictures and colouring them. Involving him in the stringing of cards and pasting on the pictures can help improve on his fine motor skills. Getting him to come up with his own storyline stimulates his creativity and develop his critical thinking ability. Encouraging him to verbalize his ideas will help to hone his communication skiils. This activity will also give him a great sense of pride that is beneficial to his self-esteem. I know because Aiden went to school the next day with his Superman book and showed off to his friends! His teachers told me that he was so proud. And so was I.