February highlights

 

It's been a while since I've posted a blog.  I have been under the weather a bit, but now that I am back, I thought I would just show some of the things the children did in February. 

Scripture

As far as scripture memory goes, K has been working on his verse for church, which is Psalm 46:10.  The kids and I have revisited Exodus 20:12, and I believe we will stay there for a bit.  In conjunction with that, we play a game called the "Obey Right Away" game, where I ask the children to perform a task, and they say yes ma'am and do it right away.  It has been helping with greater first time obedience because I was definitely slacking on enforcing that while I wasn't at 100%. 

The Mag Lab

We took the kids to what is like a science open house, which is designed to show kids of all ages fun things about science.  Here are the kids holding bubbles made using dry ice and dish soap.  They had a blast!  They loved it even  more because some of our best friends joined us.

K with his bubble

G with hers

 

 Valentine's Activities

We also made valentine's cards for their Dad, but I didn't take any pictures of those.  Additionally, we used the hearts in the photo below to work on addition and subtraction with K's ten frame. 

Counting activity using foam hearts, cupcke tins and numbers

Red sensory tub

 

M having fun with sensory tub



M and G having fun together

Other Activities

K and G building with blocks

 

K's writing work
 

 K has been doing a lot more writing and also writes one or two letters a month to his friend or family members.  Of course, we are always reading and visiting the library, which the children thoroughly enjoy.

Week in Review (August 27th)

We've had a good week at our casa this week, despite the 24 hour bug that hit K and G.  Thank God it was in and out quickly.  We continued reciting Deuteronomy 6:5 with our hand motions and working on self-control during our mat time.

This week we checked out Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading (I discuss this book here) from the library again.  Both K and G were really excited about starting their "lessons" again.  K is working on the long vowel sounds made with the silent e, and G is working on the letter sounds themselves and a little song that goes with it. Even though M isn't quite big enough for lessons from the book, he has with his own special lessons.  Sometimes, he brings me the magnetic board because he likes for me to write letters there so he can say the letters/sounds =).

K has also been working on a counting activity using a set of flashcards my parents gave us along with our hundreds board.  This activity is not only good for his counting to 100 but for recognizing the numbers themselves (particularly the higher ones) and the order in which they go.

K's work up to 31

We also had some fun with an activity my friend Flo made for us.  I talk more about this activity in this post.

Count those beads G!

K and G also painted with their do-a-dot paints (thank you Publix for the pictures, which came from their free coloring books). They love art time, and I really should incorporate it more often. I have some finger paints and hope to use those soon.

K painting fruit

G painting a little bear putting some food away

Here is little M having some fun with the bead maze at my parents' church.  He did come home after that and play with our smaller bead maze some, too =).

Some fun in the rain, reading, and writing work rounded out our week; lots of fun was had and looking forward to more next week.

Pipe Cleaner and Cylinder Beads - An easy fun activity

My friend Flo, who has four children under five which includes a two and a half month old, created this activity for my kids with leftovers she had from making it for hers.  She's pretty amazing!  This activity allows the children to work on sorting, fine motor skills and counting.  The items needed are pipe cleaners and cylinder beads. We also use a sectioned tray to sort the items in, a mat to put the items on  (shelf liner) and a bowl for our numbers. 

There are many different ways to set up this acitivty, but here is what we do.  The pipe cleaners and beads start out in a plastic bag on thier trays with the numbers in the middle.  I have K and G pour the beads and pipe cleaners on their individual mats and then sort them by color onto their sectioned trays (I purchased these trays at Wal-mart for a dollar over the summer).  Then they put a number on the mat, count out the beads and put them on the pipe cleaner.  Then, I have them take the beads off and put the pipe cleaner back, placing the number they use to the side or in a small bowl before they choose another number.  They have the option of using the different colors available; sometimes they do, and sometimes they do not.

G at work

K at work

 The kids have really enjoyed this activity, and we are very greatful to Flo for making it for us.

Week in Review - Legos (August 6th)

This past week was a good one for us.  With the new (to us) legos that we received from my parents, I decided to see how many activities we could do with them.  Here are some of the things we were able to do so far.

Counting with Legos
We used our jumbo numbers that I printed from here, and used legos for one to one counting.  Both K and G enjoyed doing this. 

K counting

G is focused

K also enjoyed stacking all his smaller stacks together and counting all of the legos.  I liked this because it was a way for him to practice some higher number counting. 

Addition
We have a set of addition cards that are in nice bright colors, the same colors as our legos, so we used the legos to practice addition.  He only does about 4 or 5 problems per sitting.  Hopefully, that number will grow.

Love that K wants to add

Sorting
We sorted the legos by color and shape.

Design
Of course, K and G enjoyed simply playing and building with the legos. 

In addition to our lego play, we made very simple party hats (used white computer paper, markers, and stickers) after reading Blue's Big Parade, a story where Blue and her friends plan a parade and make party hats as a part of what they do .  K asked to do this. 


G designing her hat

 

K and his hat design

K's finished product

We also used our first words cards, which allowed us to work on beginning sounds of words with G.  We also used our giant letter mat, which K and G used for some beginning, middle, and ending sound work.

G enjoying placing her cards on the table and emphasizing the beginning sounds of the words.

M is still playing, investigating and discovering all over the house.  We had a good week here!

Sidewalk Chalk numbers

I was feeling a bit stuck in what we were doing.  So a God-inspired idea came to me to use sidewalk chalk on the deck.  I wrote the numbers 1 through 10 on our deck, gave the kids different items to use as counters (checker pieces, bottle tops, felt stars, and the ever famous cars), and sent them to count away.  The kids really enjoyed it, with the exception of the heat, and G even look out the window whenever the Leap Frog music CD played songs with counting or numbers in them to look at our deck numbers. 

K and G working together

G working on her own

We also attempted to do some basic addition, subtraction with K like we've done with the cars and numbers I addressed in this post.  K was not really into going from number to number because he does not like the heat at all.  So I stood on the numbers giving him addition word problems, and I had him tell me what number I needed to move to.  He watched me out of the window.  That way I did all the sweating ;).

Week in Reivew (July 9th)

We've had a fun week at our little academy.  We were out a lot more than we were in, so there wasn't as much formal learning, but there was still lots of fun to be had.  I took a little extra time this week to work with the kids on staying disciplined and staying on their mats during verse time and prayer. They did much better, and I was proud of them for that. 

G got in on the action in The Ordinary Parents Guide.  She has come in while K and I are working on his lesson, and so of course, she wants to do her "blessing" as she calls it.  It was so cute when K tried to tell her that blessing was what their Poppy says over them at night, but she still calls it her blessing.  She knows the letters of the alphabet and their sounds, but I started at the beginningof the book with her, and we've worked on the vowels.  We play a little game where I say the vowels sound, and she picks up the corresponding letter.  She could do that all day.  There is also a little poem/song that goes with the vowels that we sing. 

Using the Sandpaper letters

K pulled out some cupcake baking cups from Valentine's day while I was sorting through things/cleaning, and so those came back into the rotation for two activities.  Both K and G enjoyed counting with beans, and then they brought out the muffin tin and pretended to fill the baking cups in the tin.  Good pouring practice. 

K working on cups with multiples of five in them

G working on cups with 1 to 10 on the bottom

Still working on keeping the beans in the tin ;)

We also got a second shelf!  K helped, and even G helped out this time.  They really enjoyed participating in the shelf building.  My husband was so patient with them; it was great watching them work together to build the shelf. 

K hammering a nail in

G hammering a nail in

M is learning his letters and letter sounds, and really enjoys playing with these letter magnets.

His favorite letter at the moment is O

The highlight of the week for the kids was the trip to Chick-Fil-A as it was Cow Appreciation Day on Friday.  Time to dress up like a cow!  I cut pieces of felt using the template from Chick-Fil-A's website, and I taped them to their shirts/bottoms.  I started sewing the spots on initially, but it was too time consuming.  I will have to start out a little earlier next year! 

We enjoyed time with friends, time at the park, and time at the library (we really enjoy story time and checking out books to read at home!) as well. 

Week in Review (July 2nd)

I love celebrating holidays!  There seems to be so much more excitement and anticipation leading up to them, and of course, we can't forget about the festivities.  We did a lot of 4th of July themed activities this week, many of which I address in this post.  This week, we focused on learning /beginning to memorize the pledge of allegiance, which is a work in progress.  We also counted the stars and stripes on our flag daily and talked about what they stood for. 
 The kids had fun with the new activities that were out. K didn't really want to be photographed this week, so I mostly have pictures of G with our activities. 

Water bead transfer

Do A Dot Flag

Red, white, and blue sensory tub - G counts the stars

A counting activity with homemade felt stars and number cards

 
We also spent some time reading a book we checked out from the library entitled A is for America: An American Alphabet.  I plan to continue to read this book throughout the month since it offers many opportunities to discuss our country's history with the kids. 

by Devin Scillian

K enjoyed the activities too along with some reading and a new Clifford book with a read along CD.  He's still excited about his reading "lessons" as well. 

Here is M enjoying his Melissa and Doug wooden trains.

We also had fun with hopscotch for the first time.  It was interesting, fun, and funny.  We've had a good week here at our home and out enjoying the 4th (although my husband, M and I may have been the only ones to really appreciate the fireworks)!

Week in Review (June 18th)

Another week at our house has come and gone, and we had fun.  We are still focusing on Exodus 20:12,  a verse about honoring your parents, and one day G even sang the verse, which helped her in obeying something I was asking her to do.  It's nice when that happens.

K has been working out of a book a friend referred to me entitled The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading by Jessie Wise and Sara Buffington.  This phonics book, geared to the classical approach to education, is divided into many short lessons and starts with teaching the letter sounds.  We started work with the lessons that focused on consonant blends.  Though K is able to zip through many of the lessons now, this book has helped me to see some areas where he needs extra work .  K enjoys it, and since it's something only he and I do together, he really likes that.  I talk more about this in this post.  K also did some tracing, cutting, and pasting with numbers.

Numbers on the choo choo train

G did a great deal of work with her 1-2-3 floor puzzle (which we do on the table).  She is getting so much better at putting the pieces together.  K joined in; he had fun helping her out.  G was so encouraging and gracious, telling her brother "Good job!" and thanking him for his help.  It warmed my heart. 

Team work!

K and G enjoyed some art time this week.  I finally bought some do-a-dot paints, and both kids liked painting with those.

K working on his Cars 2 picture and G on an Aerial picture

One day this week was a little hard; so, to break the monotony, we went outside for bubbles (which we play with at least a couple of times a week) and learning time.  G worked on her puzzles and K and I worked on adding using his cars, pretending different amounts of cars were going into the "garage."  It's been difficult to engage him with adding and subtracting, so I was glad this was interesting to him. 

ABC puzzle

On Saturday, the kids got the opportunity to enjoy one of our state parks with  fun in the spring and a boat tour where they got to see alligators, ducks and other birds and hear about their habitat and some facts about them.  Thanks to my friend Ra for inviting us!

M enjoying the water

An alligator on the bank

The kids also enjoyed some time at the park as well as fun with friends.  Grateful for another great week!