Keeping it Cool

www.fridayschildmontessori.com

It’s been so hot lately!

We hope you’ve all been managing to cope with it and

even enjoy it.

The hot climate is one reason why a lot of people choose to

live on the Gold Coast.

We certainly hope that you’ve been able to get some time off

work so that you can go swimming with your children, either at the beach or in the

pool.

Children can often get grumpy when they’re hot, especially

when it’s humid as well as hot.

The human body, especially bodies that have European

ancestry, still doesn’t seem to have got over the Ice Age and

we seem to have more physical mechanisms to

cope with cold than we do for coping with extreme heat.

As parents, we’ve probably read all the advice and all the

rest of it written in colder climates that talks about the importance of wrapping small

people up warmly because little bodies lose heat quickly

(although this might be a matter of debate – this writer once lived in a colder climate and saw a small child trying to

run around outside in his underpants in the sleet and howled in protest when his mother tried to put warmer clothes on him and/or bring

him in out of the cold).

But forget about all that in the heat. Choose clothes that let

heat escape rather than trapping body heat.

If you have a small baby and he/or she is indoors, you might want to let him/her go around in just a nappy and nothing

else (incidentally, cloth nappies are cooler than leak-

proof disposables).

You should ensure that your children are protected from the

sun, but look out for loose styles, and light natural fabrics like cotton and linen (silk’s a

bit too fine for busy kids).

Ideally, summer clothes should be in lighter colours that

reflect the sun’s rays a bit more than darker ones, but

these show the dirt very easily – you have been warned.

Apart from clothes, what can you do to help your

children stay cool (in both senses of the word) when the temperatures are soaring?

The following ideas might be helpful.

1. Evaporation cools us down, so if the day is hot

but not humid, try soaking clothes in cold

water.

This is particularly helpful for people large and small who

don’t sweat as much as others, and it’s amazing how quickly a dripping wet T-shirt will dry off

on a really hot, dry day.

Wet clothes feel a bit funny at first and are a bit harder to put

on, so you may need to help your child get the clothes on, even if he/she normally can

get dressed solo.

2. If humidity is a problem, the key thing is to get

air circulating.

Hand-held fans made from cardboard taped onto a stick

after being decorated can be a good craft activity that will

keep small hands occupied and produce something that keeps

them cool.

You can also try making a “cold tent” out of a wet cotton sheet draped over a string tied

to two fixed points.

This makes a good playhouse that protects children from the

shade and also keeps them cool if they flap he sides of the

tent to get a breeze going.

Don’t worry about drips if you try this indoors – they’ll dry

soon enough!

3. Keep up the fluids.

Water is best, as you’ve probably heard. However, most

children seem to like plain water if it comes frozen, and ice will certainly keep them

cool.

You can try making novelty ice blocks to jazz up drinks of plain cold water by dropping a leaf of mint, a strawberry or some other berry, or a wee piece of

some other fruit in the ice cube tray before filling it up with

water and freezing.

Also keep an eye out for novelty ice cube trays in

interesting shapes – silicone chocolate moulds can double as ice cube trays and come in

a number of novel shapes.

You could even try making giant ice cubes in muffin tins if

you’re very keen.

Watching an ice cube melt and the resulting puddle evaporate

is a good way for children to discover the different states of

matter – basic science!

4. Ice cream is a wonderful part of summer but too

much isn’t good for you or for your children.

Why not make your own at home to avoid endless trips to the convenience store at the

end of the room?

The easiest way to make a healthy ice cream is to pop three or four bananas in the

blender, add a dollop of yoghurt and maybe a bit of

vanilla or cinnamon, whizz the lot up and then freeze it

overnight.

Children can do this with only a wee bit of supervision.

Other possibilities include home-made popsicles made with fruit juice (popsicle kits

can be bought in most supermarkets) or sorbet made by putting stewed fruit in the

freezer “as is”.

Or you can get fancy and try an old-fashioned ice cream

recipe with lots of real cream.

With all home-made ice creams that are frozen in a big tub, you get a better texture if

you stir it every hour or so (children can do this, and

standing by the freezer for a short period of time is another

way to cool down).

Or freeze whatever you’re making in a flat tray with a bit

of a lip on it (e.g. a baking dish) and run a fork through it

when it’s solid to make a granita sort of thing. The tray

method is usually a bit quicker, too.

5. Take a tip from the folk in Mediterranean countries

and take a siesta in the middle of the day.

This may mean that you and your children end up getting

up later and/or staying up later at night, but you do avoid the

heat of the day.

Our bodies seem to naturally get an energy slump about lunchtime and this is the

hottest part of the day that we ought to avoid in order to be

sun-smart.

It’s a pity that Australian culture was so heavily

influenced by British traditions (“The British detest a siesta,” as the song “Mad Dogs and Englishmen” tells us), as we

could do with a siesta tradition over here!

This article is brought to you by:

Fridays Child Montessori