Nadia: The Girl Who Couldn’t Sit Still by Karlin Gray is a picture book biography of Nadia Comaneci published this month by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Nadia Comaneci, who is 55 years old today, is a legendary Romanian gymnast, who will always live in history as the first gymnast to ever score a perfect 10. Perhaps as famous is the resulting dramatic confusion as the Olympic scoreboard was not programmed to display such a high score.
As if it wasn’t enough, she went on to earn five Olympic gold medals, three silver, and one bronze. This lively and beautifully illustrated book takes readers on a journey from a small village in Romania through defeats and years of dedicated training to Nadia’s triumphant rise to become the most celebrated gymnast in the history of gymnastics.
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Activity Pack
Our activity pack is ten pages long and it was made to go along with the book Nadia: The Girl Who Couldn’t Sit Still by Karlin Grey. It’s free for subscribers of Kid Minds. If you are already a subscriber click HERE. If you want to become a subscriber click HERE.
The activities are best suited for kids 6 and up, but the following home Olympics exercises are great from toddlerhood and up (so younger siblings can join in on the fun).
Included in the pack:
- Comprehension Questions
- Discussion Questions
- Vocabulary
- History
- Geography
- Venn Diagram – How does Nadia’s childhood compare to your childhood?
- 7 Fun Facts about Me
- “Perfect 10” Math Practice
- Create a postcard to Nadia (She now lives in Oklahoma, USA).
Updated: I got a surprise email from Karlin Grey. She shared two links that might be of interest to you.
Karlin Grey: Tips for Writing a Biography
Gymnastic Activities Without the Gym
Gymnastics is great not only for physical fitness, balance and flexibility, but it’s also fantastic for teaching attention and following directions. Many of the gymnastic moves involve movement patterns. For example, you can ask kids to walk on a beam, make a forward roll, jump up, and say “Ta-Da!”
Here are some of our ideas:
BALANCE BEAM
- Use scotch tape to make a line on a floor. Practice beam walk. First, walk forward carefully putting one foot in front of the other on the tape. Then move sideways along ‘the beam,” and finally backward.
- Jump to each side of “a beam” in quick succession.
- Kick-Walk: as they walk, they can bring one foot up to the knee and kick out. Switch.
- At the end of the beam, they can hop off and throw their hands up in the “ta-da” position.
BALANCE WORK
- Animal walks
Frog Hops: touch the ground in a squat position and then jump far forward (traveling jumps). Some other ideas: slithering like a snake on a pillow or on a floor, crabwalk sideways, donkey kicks with hands on the floor and feet kicking the air behind them.
- Hopping on one foot and then another
- Jumping up from a squat position
- Jump on and off a first step on the stairs or a sturdy aerobic step box
- Jump over a pillow
- Cover the floor with pillows. Have children jump from pillow to pillow. When they get bored, add “tag” element. Now they have to jump the pillow and tag each other at the same time.
- Combo jumps (memory practice): jump up three times, turn around, squat, bounce up and throw arms overhead saying “ta-da.”
MAT WORK
- Forward rolls
- Backward rolls
- Headstands against the wall
This post is part of the Olympics series by the best kid bloggers from around the world. Go to the landing page for the links to all the posts.
Nicole says
Hello. I subscribed but the Nadia activities aren’t downloading. Is there something I’m missing?
Julie says
I was excited to find your activity pack for Nadia. Unfortunately, after subscribing, it would not let me access it. It just sends me back to the book.
Whitney S says
I don’t have kids but this is so creative! Absolutely love this idea!
Amber Nelson says
This would be so much fun to do with the kids. I’m going to check this out with my kiddos.
Rese says
This is a great summer activity package for the kiddos this summer. Anything to keep them engaged and prevent summer brain drain.
JOE Funk says
Cute kids!