Congratulations to Jenny R. of Arvada, winner of our Colorado Mountain Mamas membership!

I still remember when I was in the hospital with my firstborn that I was stupefied the hospital staff didn’t check in on me every few minutes. Did they not know I had never even held a newborn before? And those first poops that looked like tar – what were those all about? Where was my manual for it all?

I have felt the same way about my daughter’s education. Though I have her enrolled in a capable preschool and she has graduated from the mind-numbing Teletubbies to the bilingualism of Dora, I often have this nagging feeling that I should be doing more. But beyond the basics of numbers, letters and reading, I have no idea what she needs to know for kindergarten or how to teach it.

[photopress:activity_kit1.jpg,full,pp_image]Then a friend told me about Little Hands Learning Company. Started by Littleton mom Traci Geiser, LHLC provides quarterly or bi-monthly activity kits for children up to age five. Traci has worked in the early childhood education field for more than twenty years and is the author of over twenty published teacher resource books, including the winner of the 2007 Teacher’s Choice Award.

Each kit provides the following:

*A high quality, entertaining children’s book on which all of the activities are based
*A parent guide with complete directions for each activity
*Everything you need for the activities is included, pre-cut and ready to go
*Several pre-reading activities (phonics, letter recognition, phonemic awareness and more)
*A math activity (numbers, counting, sorting, patterning and more!)
*An interactive toy to be used with the educational activity in the kit
*A creative art activity
*A child-friendly, easy recipe
*A family fun game
*Ideas for creating family traditions and extended learning

I had Traci over for a demo. I loved the concept and my only criticism is the kit needs to be laminated for durability, something Traci assured me they plan to start doing in the fall.

[photopress:IMG_8690.jpg,thumb,pp_image]But the true critic was my daughter. Instead of being resistant to learning new concepts as she sometimes is during my tutorials, she delved into it all. We read the accompanying llama book. We did matching and rhyming games. We made animal crackers with the cookie cutters and recipe provided. And I demonstrated just how craft-challenged I am when we created delirious-looking cloth puppets. All in a great day’s learning and play, thanks to LHLC.

Little Hands Learning Company is pleased to offer an activity kit for one lucky mama to enjoy each quarter of the year! To enter, please email us at giveaways@milehighmamas.com with “Activity Kit” in the subject line, along with your mailing address. The contest deadline is March 29, 2008.