Craft Gossip

Independent craft blog since 2007

Let’s Talk About Glass

by

howeeshow1

Allow me to introduce myself. I’m a crazed bead maker. An avid glass enthusiast. I fuse it and melt it and will mosaic it if that needs to happen. I teach bead making and glass fusing and have been fortunate enough to have appeared on TV showing off some of my skills. I’ve tried different techniques and seen a variety of demos. I have learned technical information and tried out different types of glass. I make jewelry with glass beads. I macramé curtains with glass beads in them. I am your basic lover of glass. That’s why I’m here.

My plan with this blog is to help you love glass too. I want to show you what other glass lovers are doing, what new products are out there to be used to alter your glass, any new glass available on the market, all of the places to go to learn about glass. All things glass.

With all of the conferences and organizations related to glass in the world there is a vast body of information I plan to seek out and write about. I look at this blog as my venue for information on glass that other glass lovers need to know. I will always be looking for more information and ask that if there’s something I need to know please share it with me. If you have classes or shows or meetings that need to be posted I’ll post them for you. The more information the better.

In my over 15 years of glass experience I’ve been privileged with a variety of opportunities and lessons which I’ll share with my readers. But I’m always learning more and plan to share those lessons too. I’m planning on tutorials and projects from myself as well as those of you other glass lovers out in the world. This is all about sharing the love because I feel beads are love…glass is love and I sure do love glass. It’s all about the glass!

Have you read?

Learning Numbers for Preschoolers

Learning numbers actually involves a few different skills, from recognizing the shape of the number and knowing the word that goes with it to understanding one to one correspondence for counting and what order the numbers go in. 

A lot of this is learned best through play and activities that get kids counting and tracing and otherwise interacting with numbers. These activities can help. 

I specifically mentioned tracing above because of these number formation rhymes cards from Teaching Mama, which can be used in lots of ways to practice making the shapes of the numbers, including tracing, lining up items on the number shapes (and counting them!), using playdough to shape the numbers and so on. Each number has a little rhyme to help you remember how to make it, which is cute. 

And speaking of playdough, you can find lots of playdough number mats with different themes for kids to use as they learn about numbers. Preschool Play and Learn, for example, has these cute apple themed ones that also teach one to one correspondence as you learn the numbers and count to 10. 

Or use these tree-themed ones from Live Over Cs to form the numbers, count out items on a ten frame and place the correct number of items in the tree to match the number (do this with playdough, little buttons or whatever manipulatives you have on hand). Your little builders will also love these Duplo number mats from Life Over Cs, which allow you to shape the number out of blocks and count out the number of blocks that corresponds to each number.

I also love these mats from The Savvy Sparrow that include the number and the word you can trace with playdough or marker, showing how to count the number on your fingers, a tens frame and a number line.

Finger plays and counting songs are lots of fun for little ones, too, and Childhood 101 has a great collection of songs and rhymes having to do with numbers (as well as printable song cards you can use with them. 

This cardboard roll number chain form Hands On As We Grow would be a fun addition to singing number songs or to use in other play and counting games. And we all love something easy to make with stuff we already have. 

Older kids who already know the order of numbers can also use these connect the dot number printables from Fun Learning for Kids. Or use the shapes for playdough mats or to practice tracing even for kids who don’t know all the numbers in order yet.