[think of a something Thursday]

This week’s post (ghost written by yours truly) was entirely the idea of my eldest child, Wolfie. We were driving the usual eight or so miles towards our house recently, and once we had exhausted the “what did you learn today” questions, he proposed we play some, in his words, “safe car games”:

I Spy, Alphabet Games, Numbers Games, Opposites, Language Word Pairs, and Finding Rainbows.

I Spy.

He introduced me to this game a year or so back. It’s a very easy game; one person chooses something they can see from the car, describes one or two things about it (I spy something square and green with white letters), and everyone else takes turns guessing what it might be. Each person takes turns trying to spy and guess.

Alphabet Games.

I’ve actually played a couple variations of this game, attuned to the player’s ability levels.

The easiest versions have each player taking turns speaking the letters in the alphabet: one person starts with A, the next B, the next C, and so on.

A more advanced version has each person name something that begins with their letter as we work our way forwards and backwards through the list.

The most advanced version has each person adding a “something” to the list, after repeating all of the other items listed. Apple. Apple, Biker. Apple, Biker, Chicken. Apple, Biker, Chicken, Dandelion …

Numbers Games.

These vary; we’ve done alternating numbers like the easy versions of the alphabet game to work up our proficiency in counting.

As the children are getting older, we’ve added in simple addition and subtraction as well. As they get older still, I’ll cycle in a few numbers games of my youth: counting train cars (on longer trains - we’ve got the three and four car commuter trains down cold), counting colors of cars, guessing the change before it’s shown on the register display.

Opposites.

This is an early concept kids love (as do authors - I’ve seen many opposites books). One person mentions something that has a likely opposite, others need to guess the opposite. Tall, short. Big, small. Close, far. Fast, slow. Moon, sun.

The opposites do get a little strange from time to time: The opposite of up up tree is apparently down down tree, while the opposite of fast car is not slow truck.

English and Spanish Word Pairs.

This one is a bit harder for me; I know some of the Spanish words they’re learning, such as body parts and colors. But I’ll have to study up to keep ahead of these smart kids.

Finding Rainbows.

This, luckily, is one of the easiest games of all. You see a rainbow, you call it. We admire it for as long as we can see it, and talk about how they are made. And at least I can understand it. He used to have a game called “falling trees” that he told me he played daily - but never could explain the rules. In first grade, my best friend and I used to play “timber” which involved falling off of a stoop in front of an old church building from the early 1920s - the winner was the one who laughed last or fell the furthest before checking her fall. But we were six - we weren’t too obsessed with keeping score.

Making games isn’t that hard … though sometimes tiring.

You can make a game of almost anything, really. One favorite of all of ours was learning the “phone number song”. I took an old simple hotel chain commercial jingle and put my cell phone number to it. We sang it over and over and over together until he got it. We’re still working on the home address, but he’s got the “I am lost” and “calling 911″ scenarios pretty pat. Next job: fire drills.