Our Classroom Today--January 5

Today we went here:



And we bowled. Well, sort of. The kids rolled the ball down the lane and pins were knocked down. But I am not sure it could be called bowling. The kids had fun, to a point.

When you take kids bowling, you can either challenge them to push the ball all the way down the alley themselves, or you can let them use a ramp and let them have a little help from gravity to get the ball down the lane. This particular alley had only one ramp. I assumed (poorly) that the older kids (all 6 or nearly 6) would be able to roll the ball down the lane themselves and wouldn't need the ramp. I underestimated, however, the novelty of the ramp. So we were stuck--do you move the ramp back and forth between the two lanes? That would have been much more chaotic, and we were already dealing in chaos. Kiddo only bowled a frame or two with the ramp. I had him bowl without the ramp, and he did a fair job! I eventually also had Kutey bowl without the ramp, because there were 4-5 kids bowling on the ramp lane, and 1-2 on the lane without the ramp. I just helped her push the ball, and we did remarkably well. It also meant a lot less waiting for her.

We only bowled one "game." The kids were definitely done by then. It might have been better to follow a set order, because there was a great deal of asking if it was their turn yet. And since we were sort of willy-nilly about it, it was hard to tell them. But that would have required either two ramps or a lot of moving of the ramp, in addition to a much better understanding of what the kids were going to want. Live and learn, I guess! Next time. I also would like to spend a little more time working the scoring with Kiddo. Seems like a great application of math in real life, it was simply too chaotic to even think about working math. Maybe we'll practice on the Wii first...

After bowling, we adjourned to IKEA for lunch (love IKEA meatballs). Then we let the kids run wild in the store! Not wild, really, but they had a blast playing in the rooms they have set up to display furniture for kids. They each picked one to be their house, and they played for a long, LONG time there. I don't think we were too disruptive. For a frigid day, it was a good way to get out and about.