Let’s rewind a few years to explain. 110 years ago, troublemakers were causing problems all over JumpStart. You know those pesky Punk Punks that get in your way in AdventureLand and MarineLand? Well, they used to run loose all over JumpStart!  With The Secret Protection League Against Troublemakers was created to put an end to their mischief and bring order back to MainStreet and DownTown! Jumpeez were recruited to work with S.P.L.A.T. to contain the  mischievous furballs in AdventureLand and MarineLand, where brave explorers can train to combat them and stay safe.

Since the Punk Punk fiasco of 1900, JumpStart has been at peace and S.P.L.A.T. has not been needed. Until now, that is! With Tangorra racing to complete his potion, S.P.L.A.T. has been reactivated to help. The agency keeps the identities of its top agents hidden, so they can only communicate through the Secret Protection League Against Troublemakers Transmit Email Robotically (S.P.L.A.T.T.E.R). If you receive a message via S.P.L.A.T.T.E.R, please, follow the clues and help us save JumpStart!

*To learn more about Johnny Appleseed, visit Answers.com here. That’s where we got our info!*

Today is Johnny Appleseed Day, a day to celebrate Chapman’s growing accomplishments and have some fun with apples! You can make an apple tree, too – and, unlike a real apple tree, you won’t need to wait five years to enjoy it!

Materials:

• Large piece of white paper
• Brown construction paper (or a brown paper bag)
• Scissors
• Glue
• Red and green paint
• Paint palette or paper plate
• Play clothes that you’re willing to get paint on
• Fingers!

Get painting!

1. Cut out a tree trunk shape from the brown construction paper and glue it onto the white paper.
2. Put some green paint on your palette and dip one of your hands in. (This is where those play clothes will come in handy!)
3. Use your hand to stamp handprints at the top of the tree trunk. The green handprints should look like branches.
4. Put some red paint on your palette and dip in a finger or two.
5. Use your finger to stamp fingerprints in the branches of your tree. The fingerprints should look like apples.

There you have it – your very own apple tree, ready to be displayed! Now all that’s left to do is sit down with a Red Delicious or Granny Smith and enjoy your beautiful artwork!

Celebrate with your friends!

We made our Native American vest JumpStart-themed! From left to right: Kisha, Hopps.

Native American Vest

What you’ll need:

• 1 Brown grocery bag
• Pencil
• Paint or markers
• Scissors

Instructions:

1. Draw a thin line from the top, open end of the bag toward the bottom of the bag.
2. Make large circles at the bottom of the bag, and at the bag sides, towards its bottom.
3. Cut along the pencil line, including the circle.


Cut along the drawn lines, including the circles.

4. Trim the circle as needed to make enough room for your child’s neck.
5. Cut fringe into the bottom of the vest, as in the picture.  Shorten the vest to prevent the child from tripping, if needed.
6. Use the paint or markers to decorate the vest with designs.

Frankie swinging by the river to get a drink of water.

Enjoy your Thanksgiving-themed attire!

Tell your friends to diversify their kids’ closets with a new vest for this holiday!

By simply viewing the styles and quotes of famous American pop artists we can conclude that this revolutionary art movement craved the spotlight!  So, it makes sense that the themes of pop art consisted of bright colors, abstraction, and a sense of surrealism( from the 1920’s).  This type of art is one of my favorites, because it is so fun to look at, and completely unfamiliar to any definitive themes of postmodernism.

Teaching children about art from various time periods will give them valuable insight on the evolution of art and a unique perspective on  different time periods.  

Warhol once said, “An artist is somebody who produces things that people don’t need to have.”  But you will certainly want the stunning piece of pop art your child is about to create.  So, here is a fun way to let your kids pop their art, Warhol style!

Learn how to make Warhol inspired Pop Art with your child

What you will need:

• Bright colored paints and black paint. (Preferable pink, green, yellow, bright blue and orange) However, you can change it up, mix and match, and pick your favorite bright colors.
•  Pencil
•  Ruler
•  Paint brushes- medium size
•  Newspaper
•  A large canvas, or poster paper

What to do:

1.  Take your canvas and your ruler and divide your poster board into 4 or 6 equal squares.
2.  Draw the same picture in every square.
   Tip: You want to draw something simple that can be easily duplicated, like basic shapes. If the picture is too detailed, the different colors will not be easily distinguished. You can see here I attempted to draw a simple flower. It may even be easier if you draw the picture for your child and just have them color.
3. Here comes the fun part! Using the variety of bright colors, paint your repeated pictures. Make sure to paint each grid with different colors.
   Tip: Don’t be scared to use unusual color patterns! This art isn’t about realistic figures, but rather the popping colors!
4.  Finally, take your black paint and draw borders around your repeated pictures to distinguish them.

Ta-Da! There you have it. Your very own pop art picture! The best part about this new work of art is that it will be bright and alluringly abstract. It might sound crazy, but the end result will be great to hang up for everyone to see. Warhol often talked of “15 minutes of fame” to refer to celebrities that grabbed the attention of the media.  While your child may not be painting to grab attention from the media, they will certainly be pleased to gain 15 minutes of fame from their family, so display that canvas for everyone to see! Andy Warhol would be so proud!

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As the month of May comes to a close, your little ones have probably already begun their countdown to the much anticipated summer vacation. As much as your studious pupils deserve some fun and relaxation, it’s important that their brains don’t take a break all summer long. Research shows kids in grades kindergarten through sixth lose between one and three months of learning, or about 45% of what they learned during the school year, throughout those long summer days. This summer slip in learning happens when kids don’t get a chance to engage in educational activities during their vacation. Prevent a brain drain this summer and keep your kids’ minds in gear all summer long with these fun and simple brain boosting activities for kids of all ages!

Math

Since kids lose more math skills than anything else over the summer, try to incorporate some math-related activities into the daily routine.

• Help your kids mathematically monitor and keep track of a summer sport. Research your favorite team’s statistics, averages, and rank and keep a chart monitoring the team’s progress.
• Cook a meal together, letting your child follow the recipe and use measuring spoons and cups.
• Hang a thermometer outside to track the temperature throughout the summer.
• Make paper airplanes or egg parachutes and measure their flight paths and distances.
• Let your kids help you shop. Tell them how much money you’re aiming to spend and let their estimating go to work as you throw items into the shopping cart. Be sure to get their estimated total before you get to the register.

Writing

Help your child’s vacationing brain build creativity, writing skills, and vocabulary with these activities:

• Fill in summer’s special days and events on a homemade calendar. Use pencils, drawing paper, and rulers to create, decorate, and fill in a personalized summer calendar for your family.
• Make the summer a time to relive for an eternity by creating a scrapbook of summer events and memories. Your kids can fill pages by writing details of their experiences, adding photos and captions, and placing any items they collected during the summer months inside. Add their artistic and creative skills to this project, and you’ve got a brain building memory to last a lifetime.
• Writing made-up or real-life accounts of summer adventures is always a fun way to get the imagination and the mind going. Work together to create a ‘choose your own adventure’ book where the ending is always unknown.

Social Studies

It’s easy to learn about history, geography, and culture without even realizing it during the summer months. Here are few ideas to make studying social studies simple.

• Help your kids set up interviews with older community members or relatives. Delve into lives of the past and learn firsthand about history and how things used to be.
• Help your child make a map of the places and landmarks she’s visited. Color the places visited in one color and shade in the places that she’d like to visit someday in another color.
• Visit a historical monument, a national park, or a history museum.
• Your kids will feel great ownership and quite proud when they help you map out and plan a family vacation or day trip. Let them help you research activities by poring through brochures and websites. Make it a math lesson as well when you give them a shot at budgeting the family entertainment, dining, and lodging.
• Take your kids to an international market or an ethnic restaurant. Try new foods and research the country or region the foods came from.
• Be a tourist in a new city- explore, navigate, and learn together.

Stay tuned for more ‘Brain Drain’ prevention techniques next week, when we’ll look at building the summer brain through reading and science!

Albert Einstein: Time Magazine’s person of the century, a scientific genius, mathematical whiz, prominent professor, and…creative comedian?

Although he’s most renown for his theory of relativity, what about Mr. Einstein’s theory of creativity?  Some people believe Einstein’s brilliant brain and ability to creatively think outside the box may have stemmed from his playful personality and his love of laughter.  After all, it’s been proven that laughter releases endorphins that lower stress.  Lower stress means that your brain is more receptive to learning.  A good belly laugh increases white blood cell activity and boosts the body’s production of chemicals that increase alertness and memory.  Laughter also tends to leave you happy, calm, and open to new ideas.

If that didn’t get you and your brain chuckling, this is sure to leave you in stitches!

According to brain researchers, three parts of your brain light up when you laugh at a joke. There’s the thinking part that helps you understand the joke, then there’s the area that controls the movements of your muscles, and the final area to light up is the brain’s emotional area that makes you feel good.  Consider a simple riddle like, “When does it rain brains?”  Before giving up, your brain quickly searches through its files looking for a possible answer.  Any seasoned joker knows the answer is going to require thinking outside the traditional brain files where we store information.  After a couple seconds of searching your brain for the answer, you give up.  Do you give up?  It rains brains during a brain storm!  Even before you groan at the ‘punny’ joke’s outcome, your mind had to drift off in an unexpected direction to “get it.”  Creating and understanding humor is a process that forces our brains to think differently from the traditional logical ways that it’s used to.  It requires our brains to approach problems from different angles using different perspectives.  Creating and telling jokes builds creative problem-solving skills and thus increases brainpower.

Now that you’ve got a lot on your mind, here are some great ways you and your kids can spend time together giggling and growing your brains:

• Sing silly songs together: Make up the lyrics or find a song that brings lots of smiles and snickers.
• Read humorous books together: In addition to starting a great lifelong habit, funny books provide the perfect opportunity to spend time together and add some witty wisdom to your brains at the same time.
• Tell jokes: Why didn’t the brain want to take a bath?  It didn’t want to be brainwashed!  What works even after it’s fired?  Your brain’s neurons!  What did the brain do when it saw its friend across the street?  It gave a brain wave!  When does a brain get afraid?  When it loses its nerve!  Laughing yet?
• Make up jokes, riddles, or limericks: Creating puns requires thinking and reasoning about why the joke would be funny.  This activity is sure to end in a side-splitting giggle fest.
• Laugh at yourself and your kids: Laughter is contagious.  If your kids see you laughing when you find yourself in a silly situation, they’re more likely to do the same for themselves.  Show your kids that taking life too seriously causes stress and unhappiness.  Being funny is needed for balanced health and increased happiness.
• Create funny pictures or comics: You and your kids can use your artistic talents to create comedy to display around your house.  A quick chuckle will never be too far.
• Play “What If”: It’ll be a hoot when you let your imaginations run wild and think of the silliest possibilities to complete the question… “What if…”  What if cows were pink?  What if dogs could fly?  What if humans had three mouths?”
• Play “Don’t Laugh”: It won’t be long before you all end up rolling on the floor laughing after challenging each other to a game of “Don’t Laugh.”  Following the rules has never been so difficult.  Try to keep a straight face without cracking a snicker, smile, or snort.  A chorus of laughter from everyone playing won’t take long!
• Be spontaneous: Surprise your kids with unexpected and out of the ordinary actions.  Show them your inner child by walking on your hands, playing tag with them on the jungle gym, or teaching them your trademark yo-yo tricks.

Go ahead and give a little giggle!  Get your kids to join in too…it’s good for the brain!

In order to help your kids understand these differences, it’s important to develop a strong sense of your own family individuality. This can also aid your kids’ ability to overcome and understand cultural differences through elementary school and beyond.

But how do you establish this family individuality and cultural identity? One fun and creative way is to make a family tree. Expanding your kids’ knowledge of their personal ancestry helps them form strong cultural connections, recognize the importance of family, and can get them curious about other traditions and backgrounds, too. Celebrating where they come from will help them accept differences within themselves at a young age and encourage a better understanding of ethnic diversity as they get older.

Where do I begin?

-Start by sitting down with your kids and writing down the names and birthdays of their immediate family, like siblings and parents or guardians.

-Then, have your children list off their aunts and uncles. You will most likely need to help them with some of their names and birthdays.

Tip: You can use index cards or individual pieces of paper to separate aunts and uncles on different sides of the family.

- Work your way up to grandparents, and branch out to cousins, great-grandparents, and great-aunts and -uncles. This will spark conversation about where your family came from. It will be a great time to engage in conversation about family origins and how your family came to be where they are today!

Now for the really fun part!

-Once you’ve listed all your family members, write their names and birthdays on individual small pieces of paper. You can be really creative and cut them out into different shapes, like leaves or little faces with a space for a picture.

-Make a background poster, and attach the individual family members in an orderly fashion. You and your kids can have a lot of fun decorating the poster. For instance, you can draw a big tree or even the flag of the country your ancestors came from!

A strong sense of family, tradition, and culture is important in the developing identities of young children, especially in today’s societal melting pot. A family tree will create a cultural awareness and develop creativity… plus, it’ll be great to show off when your relatives come over for dinner!