Summer time is finally here! Officially! Spring was not easy this year. You might have noticed my non-blog happening. It got progressively worse and was decimating me physically and emotionally. Spiritually it was knocking me onto my knees to repeat the words of the Serenity Prayer throughout the day and night. Just rough. School situations finally ended for the kids a little over a week ago and I finished up last Friday. Doctors and dentists the beginning of the week. This means TODAY marked the beginning of our official summer!
I thought we needed something new and exciting to celebrate this exciting beginning. I have been lax about most of my plans for the summer. Hubby pushed me to plan an official vacation. Our lazy summers in PA are something we normally look forward to, this year I am not ready for that yet. I'm also trying to severely limit our spending on gas and other frivolous stuff. So I needed something that could bring some of the fun, random activities into our everyday. I came up with "Summer Bingo".
Many of you may have heard of summer bingo before. It is a mainstay amongst home-schoolers and stay-at-home moms to alleviate the "Mom, I'm bored" syndrome spreads like a contagious disease amongst school aged kids. So we busted it out of my mental archives to put into action. I came up with some simple, blank 25 square boards for each child. I made up a 2 column per page, 2 page list of ideas for activities (one page side is random, onepage side is grouped by concepts like Math, Writing, Chores, Serving Others, Outdoors Fun and Art). I made a sheet with house rules and rewards. Finally I sat down with the kids to start it.
The rules are simple:
1. Chores need to be done each day before you can work on it.
2. Sunday you get a new chart to fill in with activities for the week. You can choose a free space as long as you make the chart. If Mom makes the chart, no free space (and it might be a chore space then too).
3. Keep the 'rents informed about what squares you are doing.
4. You get a ticket for each bingo completed (horizontal, vertical, diagonal, h, corners). Tickets can be spent on prizes.
5. Blackout Bingo by Saturday earns you $5 to spend as you wish.
Rewards are pretty simple to:
1 ticket- Extra 10 minutes of quiet reading at bedtime
2 tickets- Popsicle/scoop of ice-cream at home
3 tickets- 1 hour of Wii/Dsi/TV
4 tickets- Redbox rental
5 tickets- Ice-cream out (like a fastfood cone)
Blackout BINGO- $5 to spend as you wish!
The kids very quickly decided which activities to put on their board, working together so they could fulfill the "sibling" activities at the same time. They checked the choices off on their own lists so they no which ones not to repeat. And the got started. Free space done- check! First activity- make and play a board game- check! Off to a grand start!
Now for this week's problem. We are starting on Wednesday. They only have tonight, tomorrow, Friday and Saturday to complete BINGO. They had so much fun making the games and now playing them that I can't get them to move on. And lots of this week's activities are lllooonnnnggggg! The trade-off is worth it though: it is the teamwork going on. They haven't argued all evening! At all. They are enjoying each others company. They are encouraging each others creativity. They'll move on when they're ready. Hoping this is a great to start to the BEST SUMMER YET!
BINGO! I think its a winner!!!
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