Our First Kiwi Crate in September: Did We Love It?

This is our first year working with a partner public school for a few fun educational extras. My favorite addition? The subscription boxes! Sure, foreign language is fun, and art (things the older kiddos are doing through the school), but what's better than your own personal activity kit, new every month? I have a thing for subscription boxes, I'll admit.

Inside the box...

we found a book with games and information, an instruction booklet, all the materials needed to do the activities, and a wall poster to show our year's Kiwi Crate progress.

Of course little miss P wanted to do everything the moment the crate arrived. But I had a. no time at that moment and b. plans for our upcoming school days. So we started with the least involved project, the stethoscope. 

Stethoscope:

Amazingly it ACTUALLY WORKED! Miss P learned all about beating hearts and a bit about sound and why a stethoscope magnifies sound so clearly. She spend most of an afternoon listening to things. The dishwasher, the cat, her siblings. She also learned quickly not to yell into the funnel. I had a bit of fun trying to find baby's heartbeat, but I guess it doesn't work quite that well.

After another day of non-stop-constant-endless-crazy-making "Mama, I want to do my box!" I finally pulled out the X-ray kit. Yes, there are bone-shaped clings and a sheet of clear plastic and a dry erase marker in the box. Plus a sheet of light-reactive paper. So we talked about how X-rays see inside our bodies. I didn't snap pictures of miss P using the light-reactive paper (she'd charge it for maybe 5 seconds, then rush to the closet to see, then show me a blank sheet because it had faded already!). She's just too quick. But here's how it works:

X-rays:

At long last P got to do the craft her heart most desired. We got to sew and stuff the brain, heart, and stomach, then fix them to a more-than-life-sized child poster with Velcro. I find it only slightly disturbing that the bladder is smiling.

Sewing a Stomach:

I knew this craft would be involved since, sewing. But P picked up the whipstitch pretty quickly, and after a few minutes we all took an organ and started helping her. She even let her siblings put faces on "their" organs!

My Body Poster:

Our final discovery, a Doctor's Report sheet (dry erase!). After I explained what it was and showed P how a doctor would fill it out, P disappeared for a while. When she returned she had on a gift from last year, a doctor's outfit complete with things like thermometer and name tag. She and her little brother had a blast fighting over who got to give shots to the cat and so on. AND P decided she wants to be a doctor.

Except she wants to be one now, not when she grows up. Some tears ensued on this point ("I want to be a real doctor NOW!"), but we talked all about how much she's learning with kits like this, preparing to be a real doctor someday.

So, did we love it? Huge resounding YES!