Dolch & Kabana revisited

This is a revisit of my previous ‘so not a fashion post’. As with the previous post it is still doesn’t have much to do with Dolce or Gabbana but is a little more on the designer side none the less..

If your child started Kindergarten this year you probably know that Dolch is a word list, compiled by Edward William Dolch, PhD.  Kabana is all I have in the fridge to sustain me while I add limbs to our original Sight Words posting box.

Yes limbs; Mister P as we now call him has slowly become a funny little person.
Sight Words are high frequently words and the foundation of Dolch's "whole-word" method of beginning reading instruction. There are 100 of them (!) just to begin with, so you’d better be prepared to get creative with what might be your first experience of ‘homework’.

During our first 'big school' year, I volunteered to assist with reading groups in the classroom (longest 30 minutes of my life each week) and let me tell you, you need to be creative or the natives get truly restless – many kids find learning these words particularly un-fun.

There are a lot of elaborate games online but She Who Worships Pink came up with the idea of posting her word-cards into a letter box. Her own class ended up with three of our custom-made post boxes and they were a huge hit in the classroom.

Making the boxes is the easy part and you can download a PDF file of the words in envelope format here. I've also included postal service stickers to print and glue on for the US, UK and Australia. 
So our own Post Box has become a little character; from the addition of googly eyes, the accessories just kept coming.

My Art Director, Miss Pink, decided he should have hair, then she talked about a nose, then teeth, glasses… When she began spending more time discussing what Mr P needed next than learning her words, I decided to make it a bit of a rewards system. Every two levels of sight words she completed she got more body parts and the makeover became more extreme.

From her successful completion of Purple and Aqua words she has earned her little red friend some ears (carved from two slices of champagne cork).  She finaly got through Lime and Lemon so I needed to come good on my promise of arms too.
I was about to sew some arms until I found my old Knitting Nancy in the attic with my old toys.

I’d forgotten how to use this so I went online and found this wonderful tutorial.

I’ve cheated a bit and pinched some of Mr Potato-Head’s hands I’m afraid. But you know how it is when you’re time poor and there’s a spare pair of hands on offer..

So here he is: Mr P with his extreme makeover and this week's project finished.

Or not...

I’m fresh out of ideas but I know how someone else's  little brain works.

If anyone has any ideas how best to make him some feet, I’m all ears..